Dealing with difficult people.....

                 

                         Are there people in your life that you find it hard to communicate with?

 No matter how much you prepare your words, somehow the conversation goes off the rails?

Before long your intention of a "heart to heart" and very sincere exchange of words ends up in a combat zone with emotional grenades hurled about, and once the smoke settles you are left feeling like a question mark and wondering what just happened, since all you intended to do was to try to clear a few things up.

               Maybe we can all be "difficult" at times but in our fast paced, "I know what I want and want it NOW" world, there seems to be an ever increasing pool of "difficult" people.

What is one to do when after thoughtful consideration and choice of words, you finally ask your friend/partner/co-worker etc. if they wouldn't mind just discussing some recent events and they just respond with: "No, I don't wanna talk about it" or "just because you wanna talk, doesn't mean I have to" or "I have nothing further to say"and before you know it, you feel powerless and at loss for words. Often at this point one may feel compelled to withdraw and why not, hostility is not terribly conducive to good communication. On the other hand, what if the person you're trying to connect with responds with sarcasm? Such as: "Sure, let's talk, talking always works so well", or "Yeah, let's talk, or what you really mean is, you talk and I listen".

 Although covert, sarcasm is still hostility and equally not good for communication.  Then there are the times when your attempts at trying to deal with something is met with: "I never do anything right in your eyes", or "why do you always assume that I have to change" and whatever positive exchange you had in mind, has been hijacked by pessimism and whatever the issue was that you wanted to talk about, is long gone and now it's all about avoiding setting off any emotional "landmines".

      Some "difficult" people have hair-trigger reactions and any indication that there's a rejection involved in your conversation with them may produce responses like: "What have I done wrong this time?" or "I've tried my best, but my best obviously isn't good enough for you" etc. and puzzled as you may be at this response, the chances of getting past a "rejection sensitive" person's defence mechanisms will require a lot of calmness and staying on focus.

   And then there's the "difficult" person who is always right. Everything is personal no matter what you say such as: "I know what I said, you're misunderstanding" or " I know what I said, you heard wrong" .

Whatever the issue is that you need to sort, with difficult people who are always right, you will be blamed, and no matter how you try to chose your words, be patient and open minded; it will take some highly creative thinking and use of words to be able to deal positively with a person of this nature.

Maybe we can try to: chose non-judgemental words, stay on topic, be as logical as possible, listen, make sure what we heard is what they said by repeating what was said and asking for confirmation,

understand and own our emotional responses and let go of the illusion/dream that people, difficult or otherwise, will be anything else then who they are.

After all, we are who we are, are we not?

Like it says: "when silent even a fool seems wise".