Personal Growth Part 3: Dealing With Difficult People

You might wonder what handling difficult people has to do with your own growth. The connection is real. How you manage the people who get under your skin shapes your problem-solving and your emotional steadiness. I'd go further and say that learning to deal with negative people is a matter of protecting your own sanity. Has anyone ever pointed out that you cling to grudges, or that your whole mood shifts the moment someone irritates you? People have said exactly that to me. Growing as a person means getting better at this, and the steadier you keep your emotions, the more situations you can walk into without being thrown.

Licensed professionals will sometimes explain why you struggle with a certain person, and they'll offer reasons for why that person acts the way they do. Here's what helped me more than any of that: usually it isn't about you. When someone is rude or cold in nearly every exchange you have, stop auditing yourself for what you did wrong. Some people set out to make others miserable on purpose.

Three things are usually happening. There may be something about you they actually like and won't admit, which often comes down to their own insecurity. They may be carrying personal problems and have decided, unfairly, that you're the source. And occasionally a person is simply unwell in ways you can't fix. That last one isn't advice so much as an observation, but you get the idea. Someone who's mean to you is wrestling with something internal. That belongs to them.

Accept that not everyone will like you. You weren't dropped into a world where people actually live by the Golden Rule. The Golden Rule was offered as a cure for problems that still run all through human behavior; it describes an aspiration, not the default setting. So be the bigger person and put your attention where it belongs, on how you react to people who behave ignorantly.

There are real payoffs to self-control. The first is temper. In a fantasy version of life you could tell off everyone who annoys you and walk away without any fallout. I have that fantasy. I'll confess that I sometimes picture myself hitting the person while I nod and smile through their ranting. Do I act on it? No. Keeping your temper when things get heated is how you show you're learning to communicate, and it's a mark of maturity. It also means admitting, as most of us should, that anger is something you have to work on. Treat the anger as a chance to get stronger by governing your behavior even when your feelings are screaming at you to do something.

The second payoff is responding on purpose instead of on impulse. People are wired to fire back at every comment and every provocation, but walking away is sometimes the smartest move. I've developed the habit of just looking at someone and saying nothing when they get aggressive with me, and every single time the baffled expression on their face as I leave is worth it. This isn't about letting people run you over. It's about choosing the right moment and the right place to answer. A lot of people deliberately pick the worst possible setting to pick a fight, in front of a crowd, for instance, because they want a scene. Don't give it to them.

Third, there's your image. First impressions carry enormous weight. People watch what you say and do, and the part that matters most is how your reaction to bad behavior lands with everyone observing. Do you want to be read as someone who can't hold their emotions together, a hothead? Learn some meditation techniques, practice thinking before you move. You want to come across as professional and easy to be around.

Difficult people, family included, are a permanent feature of life. Irrational people act out and aim that negativity at you. You can't govern what another person does, but you can govern yourself, and from there you can start learning how to influence others. Part of growing is managing the version of yourself that reaches the public, and the first step toward holding that image steady is staying in command of your emotions while the people around you lose command of theirs.

- Heather Browning, MBA, BA