Ep 189: How to Deal with People Who Have a Problem With You (Midlife Drama #3 of 3)

It's about having the clarity , self-confidence and unstoppable belief to go after and get everything you want . If you'll come with me , I'll show you how Well . Hello , friend , I hope you had an amazing week . Today we are going to finish our three-part series on drama at midlife . So two weeks ago we did our first episode on time drama .

So I don't know about you , but I can certainly relate to that . I think most of us can in this day and age . We have lots going on at midlife and there's never really quite enough time to do everything that we might want to do in a day .

And you know , there's always this feeling , I think too , at midlife of saying , oh , you know , the clock's starting to tick and time feels like it's starting to speed up , and we feel like maybe we don't have as much time to do the things that we want to do with our life . And yet we tell ourselves you know , we better get going .

And then we also tell ourselves what's the point , because it's too late . I should have already done this and I don't have enough time to do it . So that's a really great episode .

If you're somebody who dramatizes time and legitimately has a lot of things vying for your time and attention and yet you also have a lot of things that you want to go , do and accomplish , that's a great episode to go back and listen to . So if you haven't listened to it yet , I encourage you to do that . And then last week we talked about money drama .

Now I cannot believe it , but last week was the first episode I've ever done on money , which is crazy , because money is only like the premier source of conflict and problems in almost every area of our life , like it's the biggest problem inside of marriages . It's probably the epitome of the challenges and stuff that we have in our career .

We never feel like we're making quite enough money . And then , when you look at just pure midlife , there's all of these conflicting priorities around money and places our money needs to go and things our money needs to do for us in order to have the life that we want to have .

I'm sorry my lawn people are here , so my apologies if you hear that and there's also this feeling at midlife that time's a ticking and maybe you don't have enough money saved for your retirement and no ability to kind of speed up those savings to bolster you , to get you where you want to go .

So that's a good episode also to listen to , which is last week's episode . But today I want to talk about the third part of the drama series and I think this is one that we're all going to be able to relate to , and that is relationship drama .

Now , there's a lot of different ways in to a conversation around relationship drama , so I wanted to put this through a very specific lens today , because there's so many different types of relationship drama , types of relationship drama .

But the drama I wanted to talk about today is if you have a person in your life that is an intrinsic part of your network of people so it's a family member like maybe a spouse , a partner , an in-law , a child , a step son or daughter , an ex-spouse's spouse , like you know , one of those people .

So if it's someone like that , if it's someone at work or a teammate or a peer , or maybe a direct report , right , so that's a work person . Third , a friend . So maybe a friend or a friend of a friend , or maybe a friend's spouse , right ? So it's someone there that's part of your circle .

And then number four , I would call it a near acquaintance , meaning it's not just a casual person that you could just avoid . It might be , but you're not close friends with the person .

So maybe it's like a next door neighbor , or maybe it's a child's teacher , a next door neighbor , or maybe it's a child's teacher , or it's maybe someone that's in a club or a group that you belong to , or a church or something like that .

So the idea here is that there's a person in your life that you don't necessarily have a problem with , but that seems to have a problem with you , and this is something that you have felt on more than one occasion Maybe it's something others have observed that there's this thing between the two of you and you feel like I don't have the thing towards them .

But I do sense there's a thing right , and maybe you don't know exactly what it is , but there's just always this needling or these jabs that are said , or just this constant state of kind of conflict and angst and passive , aggressive things that are said or whatever , and it just feels dysfunctional and it feels like there's this dynamic , that there's this ongoing

sense of conflict and like , every time you walk away from your interactions with the person , you end up feeling drained and confused and like worn out , maybe even a little crazy . Like , am I imagining this ? Like , why do I feel like this person hates me ?

You know , when , in reality , you're like , actually like I'd like to have a good relationship with a person , right , but you just don't , because it's like there's always something being said . So , over time , that can really build up , right .

You know , if it was just some casual person at , say , yoga who made little comments , you just would avoid the person , maybe go to a different class or whatever .

But if it's someone that you just have to interact with on the regular and there's this thing between the two of you , sure you can try to stay somewhat distant , but it's going to be inevitable that the two of you are going to be drawn into conflict . That's what I wanted to talk about today . I don't know if you can relate to this .

You can look back over your life , or maybe you have one or more people in your life that you can relate to this . That's what I wanted to talk about , because I feel like in that kind of a dynamic it can be very confusing on how do you work your way through it . Do you confront the person ? Do you try to attack back ?

Do you think of good snappy comebacks and digs of your own that you can do ? It's like I just want to offer up some advice .

In an issue like that , where the issue is not coming from you but it's coming from them , and there's this ongoing feeling that you have every time you interact , I want to offer up some ways to go into your future interactions with that person feeling empowered , feeling comfortable , not angstful , and for you to feel like that it doesn't really matter what they

say or do . You're still at your best , you're self-contained , you're neutral and you're feeling confident , no matter what is said . And I don't know if you can relate to this at all .

You know if you can , if you can sort of think about a dynamic with a boss or an in-law or a parent or even one of your children or whatever , where it's like you feel like you're always being triggered . That's what I want to have in your mind as we walk through some of these options and what I'm about to share with you .

I just wanted to say that it could feel like and you'll see what I mean in a minute it could feel like , but I'm telling you to just put up with it , or that you have no power , or whatever . And before I dive into my advice on how to handle a situation like that , I just want to say I am not saying to be someone's victim .

I'm not saying that anyone can say or do anything to you and you're just supposed to take it . That's not what I'm talking about . That's why I set this up in a very specific way .

I'm talking about a very specific dynamic where you have an important constituent in your life in some way and that person seems to have a problem with you and there's this ongoing history between the two of you , with things coming from them to you , and in that instance it's not so easy for you to just disengage with the person and it also isn't so easy for

you to just punch back without causing even more problems than you already have with a person . So I'm offering up the advice I'm about to offer up to keep your life and your relationship with this necessary person as neutral and as productive as it can be . Because I'm going into this , I'm recognizing that this isn't coming from you to them .

So if it was up to you , you would have a good relationship with the person . You may never be the best of friends , you may never see things completely eye to eye , but you're not the one needling the other person , the other person's sort of needling you , right . So this is advice for that situation . So I am in no way advice for that situation .

So I am in no way my final caveat . I am in no way saying put up with whatever crap people want to dump on you . I'm not saying that . But I am saying that if it's a person that's in your life that you can't easily avoid , that you're going to have an ongoing interaction with .

You need to find a way to deal with it so that you are able to be at your best and that you're not impacted by the way they choose to conduct themselves , because we cannot control what they do . The other people are going to . Other humans are going to do what they're going to do , right .

And if it's not ideal as it relates to you and it's a person that you kind of have to have this ongoing interaction with , you just want to have . You want to be able to do your part to keep that relationship in a place that's manageable , right To the best of your ability . So that is my caveat .

So the first thing that I want you to do , if you can think about that person in your mind , who is it ? Is it the gossipy woman at the PTA ? Is it the teacher who's always making snide remarks about you not volunteering at school the way you should ? Is it the boss who is always comparing you to someone else on the team ?

Is it the mother-in-law who never has a nice thing to say about you but seems to love all the other daughters-in-law Like ? Whatever it is , I want you to think about your past interactions with that person and I want you to think about your perception of the person based on those previous interactions , your perception of the person based on those

previous interactions . Because if you're human , you're probably have built up a set of your own judgments . You've probably decided that person's just nasty , that person's super mean , that person's super gossipy , that person hates me , that person is fill in the blank , right ? You've got all these judgments that you now have towards that person .

Having those judgments is not helpful , because that can come out mid interaction , through body language , your tone , your demeanor . Through body language , your tone , your demeanor , maybe even some of the words you say in response to them .

The best way to begin to exercise your fullest control because that's what we're talking about here is you being in a place where you have self-command over your emotional response to this person , no matter what they do to you .

And the first thing is to get super clear on thoughts you have about them and then trying to neutralize that and get it to a place where you're not judging them , you're not thinking nasty things like that person's mean , that person's judgmental , I hate that person , that person hates me . You're not thinking that stuff .

Instead , you're thinking you know , this is unfortunately just not a great dynamic between us . That's kind of neutral . It's like just it's acknowledging it's not fantastic and it's acknowledging that it's unfortunate . You know , you could also maybe try to have some empathy for the person .

You know , sometimes I think it helps to say what might be causing them to treat you that way , and it's probably coming from a place of judgment or a place of jealousy or comparison or something like that , and so they're lashing out in some way . That isn't ideal , right .

And so if you kind of develop an empathetic thought on who they are and , you know , having a bit of empathy for the fact that clearly you know they're in a place where they're feeling very threatened by you for some reason , and just trying to kind of neutralize how you feel about them , the second thing to do is to go into the interaction , prepared

energetically . This is going to sound a little woo woo , but I think it's very , very helpful Because when you're focused in this way in the interaction it keeps your self-awareness up so you're less likely to be drawn into whatever's being said to you . And here's what I mean .

So if in the first one I'm telling you to neutralize how you're thinking about the person , that's your mindset . But the second one is to kind of envision that between you and this other person there is this force field , this energetic force field where it's impenetrable .

So it doesn't matter what the person is putting out , what they're saying to you , the person is putting out what they're saying to you , it doesn't matter , it bounces off that force field and falls away . So it just literally rolls off and it can't penetrate in . And the beauty of that you know , kind of imagining that force field between the two of you .

It helps you maintain an emotional distance . So it truly doesn't matter what they might say . You are not in a place where you need to respond to it , because that's their energy , that's their thing , and you're just this person that's in a neutral state , that doesn't actually have any angst or animosity towards them .

So just let it sort of die away and , as soon as possible , graciously excuse yourself from the situation . That force field thing is a really really great way to kind of keep your mind on maintaining your emotional distance instead of over-focusing on the actual things that the person is saying to you .

It helps you to kind of feel safe behind this force field of energy and almost to watch them and the interaction between you two with curiosity . It's a really really helpful way of maintaining emotional distance so that you're less likely to be drawn into saying or doing something that you might later regret .

Regret , not from the perspective of it's , not that I don't think that it would feel good in the moment to punch back , because it probably would .

But at the end of the day , if this is someone that you have to kind of have this ongoing dynamic with , it's just better to kind of keep it neutral and let the person's problem be the person's problem and to not feed into that right . So , number one , get your mind set related to the person to as a neutral a place as you can .

And number two , go into any interactions with this feeling that you've got this energetic force field and that you're safe inside that force field and that whatever they do or say can't really penetrate the force field .

It allows you to feel calm and detached and a bit curious and sometimes you know it's helpful to have that sense of curiosity because you're watching this person in this semi-agitated probably not at their best kind of emotional state and you're kind of able to , you know , see things that you're less likely to see if you're drawn in or if you're letting it impact

you emotionally . So try to stay emotionally detached and that force field mechanism is a really great way to do it . Number three unless they come to you wanting you feel like with , maybe , earnestness and sincerity , if they want to engage and talk about the dynamic and putting it behind you , that's fantastic .

If you're up for it and you want to have that transparent discussion , fantastic . But you trying to extend that olive branch to them if the dynamic is coming from them and not from you , it's unlikely to work .

It's unlikely to be something that you're going to be able to do in a way that doesn't put them on the defensive right , because , think about it , it's a one-way dysfunctional dynamic . You're not participating in it .

So you trying to sit down with them and talk about how they're treating you and have them not feel defensive about that is probably not a high degree of likelihood that it's going to turn out the way you want . So my advice would be don't engage in the dynamics of the relationship , in a discussion about that , unless they reach out to you .

You trying to sit down with them and reason with them probably isn't going to work . Is advice number three ?

Number four if you have to interact , if it's someone that's like more of a neighbor or sort of a near acquaintance , like a person in a group or a club or you know the PTA or whatever , you know somebody who's just always kind of a little catty about the quality of your cupcakes or your , you know your outfit or whatever it is , it's like that's different ,

like you don't really have to engage in that . But if it's a work boss or a teammate or the spouse of a friend or an in-law or something like that . It's like , yeah , you're going to have to have a discourse .

So my advice would be , in addition to the energetic force field , I would think about your past interactions and I would try to think of neutral responses , pleasant things that you could say in response to something that they might say , that just doesn't agitate , doesn't escalate , doesn't jab back , you know it .

Just it tries to kind of just be as productive and as at your best as you can possibly be . So think of your past interactions , think of the things that might come up and try to have some pre-planned responses that you could have ready to trot out , no matter how you might be feeling in the moment .

Just try to keep it neutral and productive so that you know the goal here is it's not going to necessarily change the dynamic of the relationship , but what it's going to do . My goal is to get you through the interaction with the person in a way that doesn't cause more problems for you down the road .

And if you can have enough of these kind of neutral inner changes with the person who knows like maybe over time the dynamic will just die away and you can move on to another phase of your relationship .

But I'm just trying to get you through it in a way where you're not feeling triggered and you're not saying or doing things in response to what the other person is saying or doing . That somehow adds fuel to the fire and creates more problems for you down the road .

And the last thing I want to say is you know , it's always unfortunate when we find ourselves in a situation like this , right , because it's just this feeling of dread and this feeling of sometimes it's hard , you know , to walk away and think , gosh , why is this happening ? Like this person seems nice , why do they hate me so much ?

Like what have I done to cause this problem or whatever . And I think I just want to leave you with this thought that you know we're all humans and this might actually we're about to say might help you get to neutrality , which is the number one thing I asked you to do to get to a neutral thought .

I actually think like it's a good thing to do is to think about the person with a feeling of compassion .

Why might a person come into contact with another person and just feel the need to needle or agitate or poke at the other person that's clearly coming from a place of not feeling good about themselves or their life or whatever , and when you think about , like , how that person must feel emotionally and you can kind of probably get to a place of I don't know

compassion , you know , and and realize that for them to be jabbing another person or like always kind of coming into an interaction with you in a way that it's just a little catty or angstful or not quite , you know , on the up and up , it's like it says everything about how they must feel inside .

And I think that sometimes as a human you can think , wow , that must really feel bad , you know , and that thought can kind of be the source of your maybe having a little bit of compassion for them and thinking I'm really sorry that they don't feel better about themselves or that there's something about me that triggers that feeling of not enoughness in them .

Right , because that's probably what it is . Otherwise , think about it If it was just a regular human interaction , there's really no reason , human to human to have anything other than just a cordial interchange . If it's not that way and you've done nothing to precipitate it , then the problem is inside of them .

There's nothing you can do to change that , and that can be a very hard thing to come to terms with , but it's important to come to terms with it , because the truth of the matter is that we aren't in control of other people and what they say or do .

We can only control our response to that and try to do our very best , to be at our best , no matter how people decide to treat us . And so , again , I'll end it with a caveat I am not talking here about letting anyone treat you anyway and trying to be neutral about it .

I'm talking here about a very specific example of a relationship in your life that is unavoidable . It's sort of somebody in one of your spheres of contact and it's someone you have to engage with on the regular , and it's someone who you don't have a problem with , but it seems to have a problem with you , and that there's always this weird kind of dynamic .

That's what this episode is about . I don't know if this is something you can relate to .

I have recently coached a couple of my clients on this , and so I thought it would be a good thing to add to our drama series , because relationship drama can be the source of a lot of angst and a lot of negativity and a lot of the ripple effects of it can affect far more than the dynamic between the two of you .

It can impact other relationships in your life , it can cause all kinds of problems and really we just this episode is really just telling there's a way to get it to neutral . It doesn't really matter what they say to you or how they treat you .

You at all times have the choice of how you respond and I know that can sound like a platitude , but to me that is real strength when you can sit in the middle of a uncomfortable situation that you have no control over , that you're not causing , and you can deal with that in a way that has a net neutral impact on your emotional state and your emotional

wellbeing , and that you can simply go into that relationship prepared that interchange . Prepared , knowing , hoping it turns out well , knowing it might not , and being unaffected by it either way .

That's when you are in full command of your emotions and your wellbeing and your sense of self and self-image , because you really , at the end of the day , none of us need anyone else's good graces . We don't need anyone else's approval , we don't need anyone else's perfect treatment . It would be nice to have it , but we don't need it .

We need to fill ourselves up first and pay attention when we're in a dynamic that doesn't really serve us and go into those interactions in that dynamic in the most effective , powerful way , and that is what I wanted to talk about in today's episode . So I hope you found this episode on relationship trauma helpful .

If you have someone in your life that you have this ongoing dynamic with , that isn't maybe great . I hope this episode gave you some good tools and tips on how you can go into the next interaction a bit better prepared than you maybe have ever been before and so that you can get through it in a way where you are still at your very best .

That is my wish for you . Until next time , make it a great week . My friend , do you have a life coach ? If not , I'd be so honored to be your coach . I've created a virtual coaching program and monthly membership called Next Level . Inside we take the material you hear on this podcast , study it and then apply it .

Join me at thepurposefulcareercom backslash next level . Don't forget the purposefulcareercom backslash next level . Join me and together we'll make your career and life everything you dream of . We'll see you there .