More Thoughts On Dealing with Hard to Deal with Folks

In my column last week I spoke of our need to deal with the negative people in our life in a positive way. By negative people, I simply do not mean those with cynical attitudes, but I mean those who literally stand at the epicenter of conflict and strife. By negative people I mean those whose behavior is destructive not only for themselves but for those persons who have relationships with them.

Last week I noted that there is nothing that we can do to change the negative people in our lives. Indeed one of the hardest lessons that I have had to learn in life is that I cannot change anyone.

God can change people; yet, even God does not force himself on people. One has to allow God into one’s life in order that God may do his life changing work.

My essential point was that while we cannot control others, what we can control is how we respond to the negative people in our lives. How we relate and interact with the negative people in our lives is something that only we can control and it is the only thing that we can control.

This week I would like to expand some of those thoughts on dealing with the negative folks in our lives in a positive way. One thing that my life’s experience has taught me is that in dealing with anyone one must first understand what motivates them. This is even more important with negative people.

When I was in elementary school there was a woman who lived across the street from the school that I attended that was a very hateful and hostile woman. She would scream at any children that stepped on the edge of her yard when they walked to school. (Yes, children once walked to school, though we didn’t have to walk to school barefoot in the snow like my parents did.)

She would curse the mailman when he brought the mail. She would often call the principal of my elementary school and complain that the children on the playground were making too much noise.

I later learned that this woman’s husband had died at a very young age, leaving her to raise a small child. That child walked out in front of an oncoming car one day when her mother had sent her to run an errand on her behalf. The child died in the accident. This of course left this woman grief stricken, angry and bitter. Granted she could have dealt with her grief in a better way, but never-the-less one could be more understanding of her after knowing her story.

This woman was motivated by the pain and grief that life had sent her way. Others are motivated by different things. For some it is money. For some it is the need for security. For others it is the pursuit of pleasure. For others it is a need for acceptance.

Regardless of what it is, we all have something deep within us that makes us tick. When we learn what makes the folks around us tick we can better understand why they sometimes do the things they do and say the things they say. This doesn’t always make their actions right and it doesn’t lesson the pain and the damage their actions might cause but in the end it does give us some insight into understanding their actions.

I recall an occasion shortly after my wife and I were married when she and I traveled back to her home town for a banquet celebrating my father-in-law’s retirement. We arrived at the home of my in-laws and prepared for the dinner. As I dressed for the evening I discovered that I did not bring appropriate shoes with me.

There wasn’t time for me to go and purchase new shoes so I borrowed a pair from my brother-in-law. My brother-in-law is a pretty big guy like I am, except for his feet. He wears a size ten and a half and I wear a size twelve triple e. Somehow I put on the shoes and made it through the dinner. I spent an evening walking in brother-in-law’s shoes but it was painful.

Sometimes walking in someone else’s shoes can be painful, but in doing so we learn their story and feel their pain. In turn, we might find ourselves being a little more forgiving and a little more understanding. When we can do that, we can better deal with the negative people in our lives in a positive way.