Keys to handle difficult people?

Difficult people are like the termites of the human spirit. They can be eating away at the tender parts of you for months on end before you notice, and then, suddenly, at a work meeting or a family dinner, you lose it. Most of us encounter unreasonable people in our lives. We may be stuck with a difficult individual at work or at home. It’s easy to let a challenging person affect us and ruin our day. Below are the keys:

Maintain self-control

In heavy traffic, you tend to lose your cool. Likewise, with a difficult person, you have a tendency to become impatient. Don’t do that. Stay calm. When you feel angry or upset with someone before you say something you might later regret, take a deep breath and count slowly to ten. In most circumstances, by the time you reach ten, you would have figured out a better way of communicating the issue, so that you can reduce, instead of escalating the problem. If you’re still upset after counting to ten, take a time out if possible, and revisit the issue after you calm down.

Find help

You may try to find help. Someone who you think can guide you or act as a mediator to avoid confrontations.

Ask questions

In the complex life today, it’s prudent to have a mentor. A mentor has no conflicting interests with you. All he looks for is helping you. After you have faced the difficult person with whatever results, it is useful to discuss the entire situation with your mentor.

Listen attentively

Let them talk and you should just listen. Often the opponents will not open their cards but when you listen attentively you may be able to discover the hidden agenda which will help you to deal with him/her. Besides, people want to be listened to. They want to talk.

Don’t hurt their dignity

Respect their ego. When you don’t respect you, opponent, the situation will only go from bad to worse. This needs to be avoided so that there is no escalation of the problem.

Don’t judge people

Try to understand that before forming your opinion about them. When you have already formed an opinion, there are chances that you will not try discovering the hidden need of the opponent. Therefore keep your mind open and do not judge.

Respect them

Respect Nature which has made all human beings individuals No two people are alike; not in their physical attributes but much less in their mental makeup. Thus, it would be a sheer folly to assume a particular method to deal with one difficult person will also work when we are dealing with another. Just like one size does not fit all, one type of response will not solve the problem with another. We need to contemplate a solution after clearly understanding the situation and the concerned person.

Act defensively

Tit for tat was an old-school story. Leave it behind. It doesn’t work anymore. Times have changed dramatically and now these are changing faster than ever. So every situation needs a specific strategy suited to the occasion. Don’t return anger with anger. Intimidation is freely used and abused. More importantly, if you lose your cool, you will not be able to use tact to your advantage. Further, you must not try to justify your actions and act defensively. This may only aggravate the problem. Acting defensively will make you weaker. The best strategy is to let the opponent puff out their steam. Better sense will prevail sooner than later. Lastly don’t ever try to win an argument. As they say, when you win an argument, you lose a friend.

Thanks for reading!