Episode 76: How to deal with difficult people
9/11/24
Music
You are listening to the Life Reconstructed podcast with me, Teresa Amaral Beshwate, grief expert, best-selling author and widow. I’m so glad you’re here because in this and every episode, I shine a light on the widowed way forward.
Hello and welcome to episode 76. In this episode, I offer a fresh perspective and practical tips to deal with the people who frustrate you, and how to navigate the expectations of others.
Music
Think about the person who frustrates you the most. Wouldn’t it be nice if they would just change? Life would be simpler, easier and more peaceful if they would just correct their behavior, right?
Any time we are frustrated by another person, they are failing to meet our expectations of them.
We have expectations for all the people in our lives, in fact. We have a rule book for how we expect a person to behave. I call it The Manual.
Manuals sound like:
They need to realize that I’m not “over it.”
I can’t believe it. She told me that it’s time to “move on.”
He should have never asked me out so soon after my husband’s passing.
They shouldn’t have offered to help me if they weren’t going to actually help.
They should have invited me to the party.
She should be supporting me.
They should realize that I’m still grieving.
They should know what I need.
Most often we don’t actually tell people what’s in our Manual for them; we just expect that they should know.
And if only they would follow our Manual for them, then we would get to feel….differently. Perhaps seen, validated, understood, supported, loved.
While it seems like having expectations of other people is normal, it is actually the source of great pain because it makes our feelings dependent on the actions of another person. It robs us of our power. It gives other people power over us. It prompts us to try to control others so that we can feel better.
The truth is that adults have the freedom to behave however they choose. My number 1 tip for the people who frustrate you is to let them behave exactly as they behave. Expect them to behave exactly as you know they behave.
People who haven’t lost a spouse don’t understand the journey. Those who show up try to say the “right” things and sometimes they say the most unhelpful things. They don’t know what our needs are. Some don’t reach out in the spirit of giving us space, or for fear of saying the wrong thing.
In fairness, we were once in their shoes, and we also didn’t know what we didn’t know.
And here’s another truth: it’s our own thoughts create our feelings. So how each of us feel is an inside job, dependent only on our own thoughts, not the actions of another.
The second tip I’m offering you today is notice your thoughts, and know that your thoughts create your feelings. The feelings you would get to feel if only other people followed your Manuals are the feelings you need to create more of for yourself.
If we throw away our Manuals for other people, they can no longer disappoint us with their behavior. We can let people act exactly how they act. We can stop expecting them to understand what they can’t possibly understand. We can stop holding them accountable for how we feel.
That’s not to say that we shouldn’t set boundaries when necessary, and I’ll cover that in the next episode.
But while we’re on the topic of Manuals, it’s also important to note that every person in our life has a Manual for us: how we should act, how we should grieve, what we should and should not say. That we should be further along in our journey, or that we have launched impulsively and foolishly into our next chapter. We should cry more or cry less. We should have it together by now or we have it too together, therefore we must not have loved him enough.
Given that everyone has a different Manual for us, it would be impossible to follow them all. You probably don’t even try to. But probably there are Manuals you do try your best to follow.
Attempting to follow other people’s Manuals is a form of people pleasing, which is an attempt to control them with the very best of intentions. If we follow their Manual, we believe that we are helping them to feel better, to worry about us less, to rest assured that we are okay. We think that our actions can directly control other people’s feelings.
Which is just not true.
No matter our actions, other people get to think whatever they choose to think, which creates their feelings, which prompt their actions.
We can lose weight and one person will think we’re too thin, while another will think we are looking healthier. We can go out on a date and for every person who thinks that it’s a good idea, there will be another who thinks it’s too soon. We can break down in tears and one person will think we should be “over it” by now and another will think that we should cry more often.
We can live our lives trying to follow lengthy and conflicting Manuals, or we can live our lives for ourselves.
We can decide what’s good for us and then have our own backs.
We can recognize that we have absolutely no control over other people’s feelings.
We can decide that we’re not responsible for how much or little other people worry about us.
We can stop seeking approval and acceptance from outside of ourselves.
Because feelings come from thoughts, how we feel is an inside job. And how other people feel is their own inside job.
We learned from parents and teachers to seek approval from others, but now we’re adults. We may have received acceptance and approval from our husbands, but now we’re widowed. We have perhaps spent our lives “outsourcing” our feelings, but now it’s time to bring it in-house. It has always been an inside job, after all.
If this episode was helpful, please share it with a widowed friend. And remember that I believe in you, and I’m here for you. Take care.
Music
If you’ve found this podcast helpful, I invite you to check out my best-selling book, also titled Life Reconstructed. It has helped many thousands of people and it can help you, too. If you buy it on my website, you’ll also get the accompanying journal, plus a 3-part video series to help you feel better, starting right away. Simply go to https://www.thesuddenwidowcoach.com/lrbonusbundle to get started today.
