I used to try pretty hard to free my life from difficult people.
I’ll even shamefully admit that I’ve ghosted a close friend or two when they became a bit too much for me to deal with.
I’m here to tell you that I was wrong.
The combination of avoidance, ghosting, and my old favorite standby — silent suffering is in many ways the easiest strategy for dealing with difficult people.
It is also the laziest.
And it stunted my growth.
(I am under five feet, so we didn’t have much to work with from the get-go.)
So for the last few years, I’ve been intentionally tackling difficult people in my life, like a beefy football player on steroids — with close friends and, uh, my therapist cheerleading me from the sidelines.
Just kidding — more like, I’ve been gingerly easing myself into the uncomfortable zone of sticking it out when people frustrate me.
Why? I’m getting older, and decided it was high time for me to put on my big girl panties, take some (self) growth hormones and practice techniques to bring a healthier dynamic to my relationships.
This is an improvement over other reactions I used to have — such as picking up and moving to the other side of the country, which I’m sorry to say I may have done. A couple of times.
My self-experimentation has given me significant gains in my inner strength muscle group. I am now convinced that there are solid benefits you can get from sticking it out with a difficult person.
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Difficult People Can Help You Earn a PhD in Emotional Intelligence.
Purposeful interaction with people who aren’t the easiest to get along with can be a great way to self-educate.
After all, who doesn’t want to be an expert-level people person? Having a high IQ is fun (so they tell me — I wouldn’t know), but it’s the people with high EQ who greatly increase their chances at life success.
Want to see your emotional intelligence grow by leaps and bounds? Embrace the art and science of figuring difficult people out and meeting them where they are.
You can try to avoid difficult people, but I’ve got news for you — life is amazingly full of them. Like that game of whack-a-mole, as soon as you smash one down, the next one is going to pop right up.
Each difficult person has their own unique combo of challenging traits — but they’re not such special snowflakes that you will never meet anyone like them ever again.
I think of difficult people as a box of chocolates. Some of them are nuts, I mean, come with nuts. These nuts are often crusted all over on top in plain sight, but sometimes they’re hidden inside, so when you bite into them — surprise!
Others disguise themselves by looking deceptively sweet and creamy until you eat one and find out too late that they are 99.9% dark chocolate with that bitter, medicinal mouthfeel.
But in the end, people are made from the same basic ingredients.
As you continue to figure each one out, you will expand your mastery of every ingredient. After a while, you’ll start to realize these chocolates are mostly like each other, just with a slightly different taste.
You’ll soon swiftly recognize individual flavors and know exactly how to deal with them the next time they come around.
When it comes to difficult people —train yourself to be a gourmet chocolate connoisseur. You will become a pro at picking up overlapping similarities and be able to handle each difficult trait with ease.
Eventually, you’ll graduate with your PhD in emotional intelligence. This will come with big payouts for your own life and happiness.
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Difficult People Need People Too.
Take the time to get to know a difficult person. Be open-minded and open-hearted enough to really listen, and you’ll likely find out that they suffered significant emotional trauma as children or young adults.
If they did not get adequate help to cope and heal during this critical phase in their life, they will struggle to self-regulate as adults. Difficult people are difficult simply because they have not learned the art of self-control.
This is why I try to err on the side of giving people grace. We’re all going through invisible things we don’t tell each other about. You may not know what your difficult person has dealt with in the past or present.
Is this an excuse for anyone to misbehave with you? No. But it is a ripe opportunity for you to practice compassion in another human being’s life.
To be honest, this practice mostly has benefits for yourself, first and foremost. However, you’ll be surprised at how the smallest gesture of kindness can make the biggest difference to another person.
Being a cynic, I don’t carry high expectations that people will change. This is why it’s fun when once in a blue moon, a special snowflake shocks me by melting into a sweet little drop of water.
You could be the sliver of sunlight that caused the thaw. Don’t count on it, but enjoy it if it happens.
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Difficult People Are Loyal.
My theory is that difficult people know at least subconsciously that they are difficult. And if you genuinely persevere with them, they’ll be grateful you’re still there.
In my experience, once you’ve won their trust, these people tend to be highly loyal and dedicated in a friendship or relationship. The key for you is to learn how to strike a healthy balance and manage your dynamic with them so it doesn’t crash and burn in hell before it has a chance to cool down into solid gold.
Here’s a real-life example:
My longtime friend Beth and I regularly take long walks together. We call it “exercise,” but mostly, we exercise our mouths the entire time. This is why I know everything there is to know about Beth’s difficult co-worker, Diana.
Beth and Diana are co-teachers in the same classroom at the school they work at. Diana frustrated Beth from day one. Being the senior teacher, she made sure Beth was under her thumb all the time.
Some of the “fun” things I heard about: Diana was rude and often complained about Beth to peers and supervisors for no good reason. She enjoyed dumping loads of work on Beth that wasn’t in Beth’s job description. She would pester Beth any time or day, even on weekends, and expect Beth to be available to help her plan lessons.
I must have listened to a hundred hours of rants about Diana over two years.
But Beth persevered.
At first, this was mostly because she had no choice. It wasn’t an option for her to request a different classroom in the middle of a school year.
So Beth got super smart and figured out ways to manage her relationship with Diana while drawing healthy boundary lines. She used immense patience and grace and learned not to take things Diana did or said personally.
At the end of the first year, Beth surprised herself (and me) by deciding not to ask for a different classroom for the next year even though she now could. She had figured out a rhythm to working with Diana and was able to transform their dynamic. They were even headed toward becoming friends.
None of this involved allowing Diana to step on Beth’s toes.
After two years of working together, Beth decided to transfer away from that school for personal reasons that had nothing to do with Diana. She broke the news to Diana that she was searching for new positions at other schools.
Beth spent weeks looking for a new job, but it was a long, stressful process, and nothing was working out smoothly.
Then, around the time Beth gave up and decided to stay, Diana called her and said, “An opening just posted at that school you really wanted. You should apply!”
Beth doubted she had a shot because the school in question was one of the most sought-after places to work at. But at Diana’s urging, she sent in her resume.
Imagine Beth’s surprise when, within a couple of hours, the school called and invited her for an interview the very next day. She did not even have time to prepare.
Within 24 hours of the interview, they called Beth back and offered her the position. This is unheard of in our area.
When Beth found out how this transpired, she was stunned. It turns out — Diana knew the principal at the other school well. She also knew it was Beth’s dream place to work at.
So she took it upon herself to personally call the principal and urge her to hire Beth.
Beth’s difficult person stuck her neck out for her.
Persevering with difficult people can pay off in unexpected ways.
***
It’s About That Time — Disclaimer Time.
I’m going to add one tall disclaimer here before anyone starts yelling at me:
Some of us find ourselves in long-term relationships with truly toxic people. These are usually relationships with an imbalance of power, such as a parent, spouse, family member, or authority figure.
These types of long-term, abusive relationships can cause permanent damage to you. I am in no way suggesting that we stubbornly stick it out in these cases.
Where there is abuse or codependency — please, take care of yourself first. Often this will mean getting out. If you can’t get out, it may mean separating yourself emotionally and physically from the toxicity as much as you’re able to. Therapy helps.
But this doesn’t mean every difficult person in your life is abusive or impossible to deal with. Some are simply so trapped in their own struggles that they don’t know how to separate themselves from their issues. So their baggage spills out onto you.
You then get to decide if you can deal with them in a way that is conducive to your own growth.
***
I have come to believe that it’s absolutely worth it to keep most difficult people in your life.
You could boost your EQ, make a difference in another human’s life, and potentially find your most loyal friend and supporter.
You may even acquire your own personal advocate when you least expect it.
So go do your homework and earn your free PhD. It’s all about the science experiments. Melt those snowflakes. Eat the entire box of chocolates with relish.
You’ll be a better person for it.
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This post was previously published on Medium.
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Photo credit: Farzan Lelinwalla on Unsplash