Perhaps this is a negative topic. I plunge ahead anyway.
Just as there are people who inspire us, there are people who don't inspire us, or to be more accurate, inspire us to not be like them.
A fact: we all have difficult people in our lives. Whether it be the neighbor you try not to make eye contact with when you're outside, the coworker you can't stand, the extended family member who raises your blood pressure every holiday - we all can think of someone. And in this post I'm not even calling us to find the good in them.
Nope. What is that quality of theirs that makes every nerve in your body stand on end? Focus on that. Why does it bother you?
For me, there is often a subtle similarity to that person in myself - a tendency of mine that if allowed to go wild, would manifest itself in the form of the behavior of the one irking me. Opposite is not always what bothers us. In fact, it probably intrigues us. It's usually the traits we fight in ourselves that we dislike the most.
In the vein of the post yesterday about hearing our voice in our head vs. hearing our voice the way others hear it: I think these people in our lives can serve as the recorded version of our voices, so to speak. If someone caught you singing the song you don't want anyone to know you like with your earbuds in (because everyone sings loudly and off-key with earbuds in), recorded it, and then set it on a constant loop in the yard, cubicle, or couch next to yours - it's like that.
You may be thinking I'm a Meanie Jim (that's what we call it in our house, stolen from Junie B. Jones), but you gotta deal with difficult people somehow. Live and learn. When I am finding myself irritated to the point where I am about to bust out a nasty verbal lashing, I try to remember that perhaps, this is a reminder of what I don't want to be. For example, if someone is complaining so much that I want to hit them over the head - that's what I sound like when I complain. That's what I look like when I'm being selfish and stingy. That's what I sound like when I am being arrogant. That's what it looks like when I sit on my butt and do nothing.
This method beats becoming bitter, anyway. Not that I've mastered it. It feels good to gossip like hell in the moment. But of course that just opens an invitation to gossip like hell about me when I inevitably engage in the same behavior. Hypocrisy is even harder to resist gossiping about.
So be inspired;)
The thought will sometimes pop into my head, in a moment of irritation, that I do the exact same thing. It's easier, in those moments, to push that thought out of my head. Easier to not think about that. Easier to think that I am never capable of irritating anyone. But it would be more helpful and humbling to remember those things dwelling in me I'd rather forget.
ReplyDeleteOrtberg, the author of the book my group is finishing, says that we are all someone's difficult person. Although, Amanda, I cannot imagine who would find you a difficult person. That person must be an honest-to-goodness jerk;)
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