This comes up so often for so many of us, right? I know this comes up a lot in my coaching sessions with individuals. In addition to my own one-on-one client coaching, each month I listen to many hours of coaching sessions for ongoing learning. To expand my knowledge and to improve my skills. A high percentage of these calls have an underlying circumstance where someone has said or done something that triggered that individual. It connected with them in some way and now they are suffering.
People around us act in certain ways and our brains instantly try to make sense of it. We allow the behavior of others to take up so much space in our brains. On one hand, we may spend so much time thinking about what they said or did, we ruminate about it, and then we use it against ourselves to judge and pick apart what we did wrong. Or on the other hand, our primitive brains take over and we will get extremely defensive and feel the need to go to war to defend ourselves.
I would venture to bet that there aren’t many of us that haven’t found ourselves in this situation at one point or another. Now, before I learned many of the mindset tools I’ve implemented, I was not managing my mind and so I was doing this as well. I was observing the actions of others and I was taking it personally. I was trying to make sense of why they would act this way towards me. I would look for what must be wrong with me. And of course, if I wasn’t tearing myself apart, I was getting defensive.
I know you may feel so attached to this belief and try to convince me otherwise that the ways they are acting are directly against you. Or they are attacking you. Or they are saying something about you that is just absolutely not true. And you feel justified in defending it.
It’s like we skip a crucial step in the process. Which is pausing and asking ourselves some very important questions. What exactly is this person saying about me? Is there any truth whatsoever to what they are saying? Have I behaved poorly in some way? We skip all the logic, and we go to acting on emotions. We know why this happens. I talk about it all the time. We all have a primitive brain that is focused on keeping us safe and watching out for threats. So it is just doing its job. But we can all get better at managing our primitive brains. We do this by intentionally going to our intelligent brains and activating our logic and thinking abilities.
Ok so here are some key takeaways
1. You don’t have to agree with how others behave. So let’s break this down. Why is it that we think we know the right way? To think this way is such a small-minded view. We all come from different backgrounds and experiences and that exposure is what determines how we view the world. Why do we think we need to correct everyone? I believe a big driver is that there is a part of us that thinks their behavior is saying something about us. So we defend and we want to change them. We will never win this battle. Sure, maybe you will defend yourself and then perhaps the relationship ends. Is that the solution you really wanted when this all began?
2. Know your triggers. We all have something that triggers us. And this is different for each one of us. One person can be highly impacted by one person’s behavior and another couldn’t be the slightest bit affected. Why is this? It is the different experiences. Look for patterns of behavior that you try to control. Or that you get most annoyed by. Maybe it is a fear you have and so this causes you to project your judgements on others. Maybe you experienced something in your life and this action someone is taking reminds you of that moment in time that didn’t feel good. Your brain will tell you to watch out. We didn’t like the way that felt before and this feels similar. Protect yourself. Once you see the patterns you can begin to gain self-control over them. You can then begin to change. You can choose when and how you want to react rather than autopilot kicking in.
3. Think about how it feels to be truly accepted. Recall a time when you were not accepted. How did it feel? Did you like being told to change? Would you like to be told your way is wrong? If the other person is behaving poorly, that does not mean that you should match their tone or energy. Really think about that. How does lowering your emotional vibration do anything to improve the relationship? Have you ever been successful at completely rewriting the way someone views the world or things that happen in it? It is a low percentage. What we end up doing is not accepting others and continuing this pattern over and over again.
4. Choose optimism and to let things roll off of you. When you retrain your brain to not take everything so seriously it will eventually get better at that. A statement that I use often is, there is nothing I need to solve here. Another I use when someone does or says something that I feel connects to me…I say to myself, It’s ok that people are wrong about me. It’s not my job to change their beliefs. I can continue to be a positive person and let things fall where they may. So practice and challenge yourself to stay optimistic instead of following where the primitive brain wants to take you.
5. Lastly, take responsibility for your own emotions. Own them. When we were kids we repeated the old saying “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words may never hurt me.” Wow, I don’t think the majority of us are able to implement this. We get so upset, so offended, so bothered by what people say. We allow it to take up space in our brains, we derail our own plans for ourselves and then we view it like we are a victim. I am feeling this way because of what that person said or did. Let’s drop the victim mentality and let’s ask ourselves, why did what they said or did bother me so much. What is going on inside my brain that allowed me to get so upset by the words of another?
So try using these key takeaways in everyday life. Think about the times you have felt the need to defend or you were annoyed by the behavior or actions of someone else.
Maybe someone cuts you off while driving.
You run across someone at dinner that is being rude.
Your friend says something that triggers you.
Your loved ones choose to live a lifestyle you don’t agree with.
A family member behaves poorly.
Someone gives you advice about your issue that you didn’t ask for.
How often are we wrong about their intentions? Sometimes we just have absolutely no idea. Maybe that person that cut you off while driving is having an awful day. Maybe the person that gives you unsolicited advice is reliving a terrible time in their life and they want to help save you from pain. You are not inside their brain so you will never really know where they are coming from. What would it look like if we just merely took notice of others’ behavior? We didn’t feel the need to control it, change it, or call them out for it? What would it take for you to just let other people be who they are and you don’t pick up the negative emotional energy they are projecting. You choose something else. You choose peace.
This is our reality. You do not have control over other adults’ behavior. The ONLY THING you have complete control over is how you react, how you respond, and how you control yourself. Problems arrive when we try to control them rather than accepting our reality. Remember, accepting does not mean agreeing.
“If you attach to the negative behavior of others it brings you down to their level.”
Guru Singh