DEALING WITH DIFFICULT PEOPLE
Can People be Hard to Get Along With? Of Course. Maybe You've Even Had a Day Like This One.
By Roy McDaniel
Monday, 7:00 a.m.--Tina Osborne scrapes the ice off her windshield and heads to work. She merges into northbound traffic on I-95, accidentally cutting off a Ford Explorer that is attempting an exit. Its driver follows her for six or seven miles, blaring his horn and blinking his headlights to let her know of her infraction. Eventually, he passes her, lowering his windows to shout insults she can barely hear.
8:15 a.m.--Tina arrives at work frazzled and nervous. Her boss glances down at his watch and mentions the fact that she is 20 minutes late. "Fifteen minutes," she thinks. "I'm only 15 minutes late." But she says nothing.
8:25 a.m.--Mary, a concerned co-worker, drops by Tina's cubicle to ask about her daughter's suspension from school. Will Tina and her husband be disciplining their child, she wants to know. What will this mean to her reputation...and theirs? Knowing any information she shares will be made available for public consumption, Tina keeps her answer short and to the point.
9:00 a.m.-- "Tina, you got a couple of quarters I can borrow?" asks another co-worker, Bob. Reflexively, Tina reaches into her purse. She won't get the money back, but what's pocket change considering the fact that Bob usually takes up hours of Tina's life asking for dating advice.
11:30 a.m.--Tina takes a moment to fix a cup of coffee and casually mentions the morning's traffic incident. "That's nothing," Betty says. "I was once held at gunpoint in my Honda by a deranged lunatic." It's not even lunchtime and Tina has already encountered a volcanic person, a controlling person, a gossip, a sponge, and a competitor. She briefly considers quitting her job, but decides not to.
Does any of this sound familiar?
Wherever you go, you will find difficult people. If you try to run away from them, you may be running for the rest of your life. Sometimes the most difficult person in your life is you. So what should you do if the person you love has parents you can't stand? What if you enjoy your job, but not your boss? How can you get along with your colleagues when you find it difficult to get along with yourself?
Dealing with difficult people involves more than setting boundaries, confronting or empathizing. It involves more than just doing certain things. It involves being a certain kind of person. If we are to make the most of even our troublesome, irritating, and difficult relationship, this means choosing to be patient, compassionate, and honest, with a willingness to extend grace, and the ability to forgive. It means loving even those we consider impossible people.
If you feel yourself becoming resentful of an irritating person in your life, remember that you, too, can be equally as irritating. All of us are controlling at some time in our lives when we care about something more than do those around us. We're all neurotic when we're convinced only we can accomplish a task successfully. We're all pushy when we make it happen. We all can be loud, obnoxious, and opinionated, overly shy, too sensitive, or insecure. When you realize that you, too, are a difficult person, admitting your own weaknesses requires humility. Humility leads to grace.
It's a lot easier to focus on the faults of your peers than it is to look beyond their frailties and accept them the way they are. Once you've admitted your own less-than-perfect personality and decided to accept others, warts and all, you're ready to draw on the reservoir of hope that empowers you to transform relationships.
Roy McDaniel is a freelance writer. If you'd like to contact him, you may write:
Roy McDaniel P.O. Box 919 Brookhaven, PA 19015
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