In life we meet people who are kind, caring and often selfless. These people run around doing so much for others, often forgetting about their own needs almost, just to keep others happy.
Keeping a happy equilibrium can sometimes be difficult for this type of person because they are just so used to putting others first, in wanting to please them. Occasionally this can cause problems as some people who are not so selfless, tend to take advantage of the other selfless person’s kindness as a weakness and will often start to take continual advantage, manipulate and control the caring person without any empathy or guilt, just because it purely suits them.
These people are so self-absorbed, they may not even realise that they are actually doing any wrong, they just live in their own ignorance and think it is all perfectly acceptable to abuse other people.
Some people are so arrogant, with a sense of one’s own thoughts, opinions, abilities, and actions being far superior to that of anyone else, that they feel they are never wrong. This type of person can say things to another and think it is absolutely fine, yet if you point out a few home truths of disappointment, they tend to turn it around, they then highlight what they are offended by and your own original disappointment is dismissed as trivial and irrelevant.
Narcissistic personality disorder involves a pattern of self-centred, arrogant thinking and behaviour, a lack of consideration for other people; they are often sarcastic with condescending remarks, patronising and demanding. These people can show a cycle of manipulation, charismatic, and exploitational tactics to ensure their own personal needs are met. They may struggle with self-esteem and often desire to be admired by others. Their fragile sense of self-esteem can be easily bruised by criticism or rejection, their tone then becomes heated and adversarial, lashing out with rage to deflect from the conflict, changing stories to regain a sense of authority, often causing a lack of understanding the feelings of others. All this resulting with problems in relationships.
Some people may have no idea of what is right or wrong and continue to live in their own personal ignorance, hurting others without any guilt or remorse, while others know what is right or wrong, yet choose to ignore it and will do what still suits them anyway. Any apology, if you are lucky to get one at all, may be an insincere one and they are more likely to so for their own benefit to get something in return, rather than out of genuine remorse.
For those that are on the receiving end of this, it often becomes hurtful, draining, and often soul destroying. Constantly on eggshells not being able to say anything in fear of disrupting any harmony, being able to listen most of the time only.
Coping with friends and family of such nature who can’t see the error of their ways and therefore are unlikely to change, can be difficult, and if you can’t change them, because that is how they are, the only thing you can do, is to change yourself and your approach towards them.
For those awkward people we have simply made friends with over the years, we can if we choose to, just remove ourselves entirely from them so we do not have to endure any more . For those we are closely related to or work with, it may be a little more difficult to just drop them out of our lives, as we feel we are obliged to continue associating with them because it is our responsibility to do so, or we have to because it is part of keeping that work job. At the end of the day, we all need to preserve our own wellbeing, allowing another to destroy us is not acceptable, so resetting our own safe mechanism is required for self-health preservation.
Resetting, switching off and detaching personal emotions from those we may love and care for is often quite sad, but if it necessary to make another person and their actions almost insignificant, it avoids making oneself vulnerable, and then with caution, being prepared and therefore ready, almost immune for any volcanic disruptive behaviour, and with the adjustment mechanism already set, we are prepared, may continue to tolerate it, till we just don’t.
Detaching from someone means becoming less attached to their behaviour and feelings, re-evaluating your perception of connection, adjusting the level of emotional investment you have with them to a place where it feels manageable. When you learn the relationship is not healthy for you, it allows you to see the person differently and enable you to detach, discard the other persons behaviour as no longer of any importance that it will hinge you. Placing your focus back on yourself, rather than trying to change another person’s behaviour and attitudes, puts you in a better position about how it is best for you to proceed and engage in the relationship.
Don’t react immediately just respond, release emotions, write them down, keep a journal, be patient with yourself, and do the things you love to do. Redefine your relationship to what works for you, put parameters around the connection to protect your energy learning to detach emotionally while maintaining clear boundaries for peace. Remove them from an emotional pedestal. Put up a barrier so you can keep living your life, limit the relationship to what you have in common.
Some people find an emotional attachment more difficult and struggle with it. For those that can’t emotionally detach, then it may be that you must look forward, with a real physical step away to completely detach from the person altogether.
Be grateful for the lessons learned from each behaviour experience shown. Press the reset and brace up to all with heed.