"Mean" People

“Mean” People

Very often people call another person “mean” and use such words as “tear me a new one,”  “brutal,” “attacking me," "cold,” “critical.” First off let’s distinguish what is meant in this article by the word “mean.”  I do not mean malignant narcissists, sociopaths, psychopaths and passive aggressive people who like to deliberately try to “hurt” you emotionally and get a reaction.  I also do not define mean as the KKK, pedophiles, spouse beaters etc. Those are violent people. By mean people, in this article I am referring to people who are simply being themselves, not trying to watch every word they say in order to not offend. In this article I am more specifically referring to Teachers, doctors, therapists, 12-Step sponsors, colleagues, all who with the best intentions of helping you (because you asked them too) either piss you off or “make” you feel attacked or threatened emotionally.  If indeed you feel this kind of person, a helper person you are working with, is attacking you, blasting you, tearing you apart etc. you should immediately discontinue contact with that person and spend time with your Self, a support group, perhaps a dear friend and keep yourself safe until you can sort things out for your Self and decide if no contact forever is the best response for you.

Where things get tricky is determining if you are indeed being attacked or if your internal unhealed wounds just got triggered and you are blaming the other person for being mean when in reality you are running away from all the unhealed and perhaps until now unconscious emotional wounds that are bringing up feelings that are uncomfortable or even threatening to you.  One place to start is to look at evidence. Did the “mean” person call you names, blame you, humiliate you, try to control you, threaten your relationships, threaten you, or get physical?  Or did the “mean” person, someone you chose to work with as a healer, Teacher, counselor etc., bring up hurt feelings, embarrass you, challenge your ideas or beliefs or “make” you feel bad? If it is the latter examples that is not a mean person, that is someone doing his/her job. 

All healing, all learning, all therapy “hurts” at times. Just like getting a wound lanced by a doctor. Learning and change are uncomfortable and can feel threatening.  However if you want to get through it you will need to choose to learn more about your reactions rather than attack or criticize the person or people you choose to work with. At the very least, you should really figure out if you were attacked before claiming to be attacked.  Did you have a conversation about your feelings of being attacked with that person or did you go to people who would listen to your interpretation and agree with you?  That’s what friends usually do, agree with you. Did you ask questions to get a different perspective?  Did you notice if this feeling of being attacked happens to you with other people? Is it a pattern or was it an event?  In other words, did you seek to learn or did you seek to be “hurt” and “right”?

No comments about you or your beliefs can hurt you unless you are already hurt in that area. You cannot feel attacked unless you already feel wounded, consciously or unconsciously.  If someone tells you that you are behaving in a passive aggressive fashion, or that you are lying to yourself or some other comment you might wish to call “judgmental” and decide that you now feel “hurt” you can bet some truth was just stated and that truth both threatened and therefore “hurt” you.  If you truly disagreed with the statement(s) you would laugh or ignore them as the other person’s imaginative thoughts. The 12-Step statement of “take the best and leave the rest” would apply. People always have opinions about others, and that is their business, but to blame or attack someone for his/her opinions about you or you in a situation is red flag that you are dodging your own work.  You may not like someone’s opinion, you may disagree with the opinion, but to launch a critical attack means you are already hurting and the Spirit used this person to bring it out in you so you could heal.  This is especially true when you are doing deep work on your Self with a healer, Teacher, counselor.  

A good signpost of evidence of you avoiding your feelings is you analyzing the other person, the one you chose to be your Teacher, healer or counselor, rather than sticking to learning about your Self, your feelings, your reactions, your choices and whether or not you want to continue to receive Guidance and help from this person that just triggered your unhealed internal issues.  Another good red flag to observe is if some small incident happens, such as a comment you don’t like, or something you did or did not do is questioned and now instead of being able to just address what happened you bring up a whole history of feelings and incidents like a dam of sewer water released. This will show you all the feelings you have  been suppressing towards this person and also will highlight your current inability to bring up issues and feelings as they occur choosing instead to suppress those feelings  to “make things work” ( a co-dependent trait) and then blowing up at some later date when some small trigger occurs and finally you “burst.” 

This kind of explosion, holding it all in then blasting it out over a comment or situation (especially if you chose to discuss the issue with someone) can become emotionally abusive to the other person who is now the target of all your repressed feelings.  Fortunately therapists, some Teachers and healers are trained to work with this behavior as can often be part of transference and it is typically a part of the healing process when working with a Teacher, healer or counselor. This does not happen in support groups as there is no one individual you can target.  If this is what you do when working with an individual, perhaps a support group would work better for you until you get comfortable talking out your feelings to an individual as that is much more challenging and intimate. Learning to feel your feelings and communicate them in person, as they occur, not holding them in and letting them build up into an explosive blaming reaction is a learned skill of both good mental health and maturity.

Doing Spiritual work is meant to help you live a more balanced and psychologically healthy life as a human. It is not something to be done to placate or avoid your emotions or to avoid the challenges this life, the life you chose to incarnate into in order to evolve as a Soul.  There are all kinds of Teachers and counselors and healers.  Some will soothe you; love you until you can learn to love your Self. Some will give you sessions to make you feel better until you can hopefully learn to feel better on your own with your own connection to Spirit.  Some will challenge you so you learn to stand up for your Self and to get you to stop trying to emotionally force or manipulate the people around you. If you have not been exposed to healthy parenting, as a child you might have learned to manipilate emotions to get what you want when you want it, to get the reactions you want,  and to hear, what you want to hear so you get to feel the way you want to feel, and doing this all of the time. These are the behaviors many people have learned as a child and kept, because they work, but only for them.

Life Path Healings (LPH) is an accelerated Path based on the Eastern traditions of a Teacher challenging you to fully engage in this current life and develop a profound connection with your Soul and Source. When you are wounded, first you fully feel your feelings, acknowledge how you have been a victim and work on self-care and perhaps eventually on making amends (which requires changing behaviors, not words).  More mature healing comes when you learn survivor skills as someone who has lived through something and now is newly formed and moving on. Finally, for some, not all, there is Soul Evolution when you step way back from the trauma or hurt and look at “How did this help me learn and grow as a Soul?”  This last phase cannot be done without first doing the work of victim and survivor. At Life Path Healings you will not be be encouraged to settle into the victim and survivor phases. You will be encouraged to go through them and given many tools and sometimes referrals (like 12-Step meetings and other modalities) to heal. You will be encouraged to move through these healing phases, not form a new identity based on your hurts, tragedies, wounds, scars, or "disabilities."

LPH focuses on Soul Evolution. Here you learn to hear comments, observations, and Teachings that are far beyond your current thinking, experience and energy levels. It all comes from love (with no agenda of wanting to make you feel good so you keep coming back) but love  and belief in you  becoming a bigger and better version of your Self. You cannot continually cater to the needs of your wounded Self. That is not self-care. That is choosing a long term identity as a victim. 

This approach is not for everyone for sure.  Old dysfunctional patterns of behavior need to be identified, and eventually updated to more functional choices that match who you are now. This can feel challenging as you will be asking yourself to give up, to release an identity you built long ago to protect yourself. Old coping mechanisms became entrenched patterns. Now you actually feel and believe they are a part of you, rather than an old protective coping mechanism. 

When working towards new choices and behaviors, you may not like them. Your unhealed wounded child will definitely become scared. Your ego will probably feel bruised and your pride that you have been using to hold yourself up will convince you that you are “right” and  the other person is wrong. There is a good chance you will spend most of your time analyzing the other person you reacted to, than self-examination.  When you are more healed, there is no “right." There is only learning, healing, .trying new behaviors and expanding your self-care.  People think and feel differently and when you are more healed you can tolerate and in fact enjoy the diversity of other people’s realities and perceptions. Your choice to “take the best and leave the rest” kicks in sooner, and more often. When you are healed your self-care skills are strong and you rarely feel threatened by others because you make choices in each moment to care for yourself without blaming others for using the “wrong” words or “wrong” tone of voice or saying the "wrong" thing to you. You become “teachable” instead of reactive and protective of your ego and your pride.

For me, reaching for Soul Evolution is a priority and it teaches you a great deal of balance.  You learn to shift perspectives and learn skills that will change your social relationships as well as your relationship with your Sacred Self.  Maintaining a healthy balance will take priority over your old patterns of manipulating situations with others to ensure you receive complements or so that you will be “left alone” or viewed as a “good" girl or boy.  When you are more balanced and invested in Soul Evolution as a priority you learn to ask for complements if you need them and you ask for space if you need it. You offer help rather than waiting for someone to tell you how to act like a responsible person.  You are able to say “no” easily and express your feelings in the moment so that you don’t stockpile toxic emotions. When you are more balanced, if someone inappropriately decides to analyze you or take your inventory you can easily address that with  boundaries or if the person will not stop, change or end the relationship. You will not be offended by what others say about you, especially when they tell you all about yourself and you have not asked them to do that (nor do you have to tolerate that behavior either.) You will have compassion for the person who has so little going on inside that they instead focus on you in a completely dysfunctional fashion in order to not feel their own feelings and to not deal with their own choices and behaviors.

So next the next time you decide that someone (especially someone you have gone to for help) is mean, is attacking you, beating you up, tearing you up here are some suggestions.  Look at the role the person plays in your life and ask yourself if s/he reminds you of a parent or an authority figure that triggers you.  Remember why you entered into a relationship with this person and review your expectations. Review those expectations and see if they were coming from your wounded self.  Go inside and see if you think this person is “making” you feel a certain way, and if so, you can bet you already felt that way about yourself and simply hate being shown a part of yourself you don’t like. See if you can get in touch with that.  

Finally, look at the evidence. Has your life improved or not, in spite of your uncomfortable feelings. And remember, you are in control. Instead of dumping your unresolved emotions like a skunk spraying someone your inner wounded child considers a danger, consider asking questions to learn more about what is happening and learn the perspective of the other person (unless of course there is real abuse involved.)  See if you can be willing to be teachable before letting your wounded self, your ego, your pride make decisions for you. You can always leave a relationship.  Staying and working it out is more challenging. 

The best way to leave a long term friendship, relationship, or time with a Teacher, counseler etc.....well that is another big discussion.  As usual, this is a short article presenting very complex ideas. If this resonates, keep learning. Read. Talk. Share. Think. Most of all, have the courage to try new behaviors. Until you do that, it is all only good intentions.

Journey On