How to Handle People Who Make It Their Mission to Ruin Your Day?
How to Handle People Who Make It Their Mission to Ruin Your Day?
The internet is full of trolls, unpleasant commentators, and provocateurs. Unfortunately, we must deal with them in real life as well.
We all know these people who are always in your comments, talking trash about your opinion and work.
Not mine, of course. I haven’t reached that level of success yet. Once you have a few thousand followers or subscribers and perhaps over ten thousand readers, you’re bound to run across a few of these “special individuals.”
You can wear it as a badge of honor, a sign of success and fame. You will know you have made it when you have your first hater, especially a persistent one. (You win)
Alternatively, you could let them ruin your day and perhaps even make you quit what you love doing. (They win)
Why did I write “special,” and did I mean to insinuate something by it? Well, yes, I did. Allow me to explain.
A strange man yelling at people and throwing poop at their faces.
Imagine that you’re walking through a park in a large city. You will meet hundreds of people of all colors, sizes, ages, and genders there. Among this colorful group of people, there will be some “special” individuals.
You know of whom I speak. The ones that talk to themselves scream at people they don’t know, jump out of bushes with their ding dong flapping around. Them.
When you walk by one such troubled individual, and they yell at you some profanities that make no sense whatsoever, pick up their poop from the sidewalk, still fresh and aromatic, and fling it your way - do you feel personally offended?
“Aaaaa! One hundred dead squirrels had sex with aliens, and God said he would burn the wicked sinners in a bowl of spaghetti with balls and mushrooms! They’re everywhere. Can’t you see? Sinner! Sinner! Ye, who devours shit shall not go hungry! Here - feast on my produce and be born anew! I Cristen dee Sir Shitface McProudly,” they scream and flinch their dong in your direction. Don’t worry. You dodged that particular smelly bullet.
Think about this for a second.
The person doesn’t know you.
What they are doing is bad, sure, but is it really about you personally, or are you just coincidently a victim of their “expressions?”
Doesn’t it say more about them than you?
How do you feel about this person? Anger, rage, resentment, or perhaps sadness and compassion because you realize they are not okay. They need help. The system has failed them.
That may be a particularly stinky analogy, but the visual and aromatic illustration makes a good point, doesn’t it?
Does it only work on the “mentally challenged” or crazed drug users?
Probably not. Even if the person you walked by was some average looking individual, maybe even wearing a tie, and they began calling you all sorts of names, telling you your work sucks. That you need to repent to Jesus or something similar. They might bark at you every day you walk past them. It makes no difference. It would still mean exactly nothing.
They don’t know you.
You don’t know them.
Their bursts of rage and spills of word salat have nothing to do with you or the quality of your work.
When it’s someone you admire, like, or love, it’s another story.
What if the person giving you critique or calling you names is someone you are close to, or perhaps work with, even respect?
That carries a different sting, doesn’t it? We’re not talking about them. We’re talking about internet randos frequently visiting your comment section or profile, critiquing and bashing you when no one asked their opinion.
Trolls will troll. It’s who they are. It has nothing to do with you!
You cannot change them or avoid them completely. You have to learn to live with it. In other words, care less about the opinions of strangers.
Disagreement is okay. Being a jerk isn’t.
I disagree with a lot that I see and read online, but I have never once felt the need to go and humiliate some stranger on the internet, even if I think they are full of shit and completely wrong. If I believe it might add to the quality of the conversion, I might offer my point of view to balance things out, but that’s as far as I would go.
Don’t do onto others what you don’t want others to do to you, and whatnot.
We are all different and see things in our own way.
We like what we like and dislike what we dislike.
That is perfectly normal. What is not normal is calling other people names, picking on them, and trying to ruin them, making their lives a living hell.
If you don’t like something, don’t watch it, don’t read it, don’t waste time on it.
It’s literally that simple! Unfollow, unsubscribe, ignore, block, mute. There are tools designed to help you avoid seeing what you don’t want to see. Use them freely.
Swing the sword of personal cancelation and free yourself from the chains of bondage. Yes, I’m being gloriously tedious for a reason. Nobody is forcing anyone to read their profile and work. Unless it’s your boss. Then you’re screwed. I can’t help you there, and you won’t like my solution.
Everything else is:
An expression of your inadequacies, insecurities, or some far worse affliction being expressed through harassing other people.
Being mean toward others when there is no need for it. Essentially, you’re being a bully.
You don’t know anything and believe you’re the smartest person to have ever walked this earth, and yours is the only valid perspective.
Take your pick, or just be nice.
Angry customers and poor agents.
I ran a Customer support center for a few years and taught my coworkers about disassociating themselves from whatever the customers on the other side were saying. It was a difficult challenge for most, as our egos are fragile little things in need of defending.
Most people observing me at my work couldn’t believe how little I cared when people were raging, calling me all sorts of names, and screaming into the phone. But all I did was laugh in silence and wait them out. A little silent treatment does wonders for a raging idiot trying to bait a reaction out of you.
“How can you stay calm when they said this or that to you?!” they would ask.
“They didn’t say it to me, personally. They just opened their mouth into a telephone, and shit fell out,” would be a version of my answer. “I just happen to be one on the receiving end.”
It’s not personal. So don’t take it to heart.
While unpleasant, the experience is much less emotional and impactful once you understand that what these people do has nothing to do with you personally. If you deal with customers or complaints daily, you must learn this lesson quickly!
After I managed to help them understand that unless they were being dicks themselves, acting rude and inappropriately in this situation, the rage, anger, and venting from the clients had nothing to do with them.
People have problems at home and take it out on strangers.
They drink, smoke, and get all up in their heads.
We all have bad days and sometimes lose our nerves.
Unfortunately, the only person we can speak about them is the customer support agent. If there is a person responsible for your problems, you’re not getting to them past the dispensable agents.
Even I have had to work hard to tame my rage at some product or service and not blame it on the person in the first battle line, as they had nothing to do with it. They’re essentially a paid, voluntary verbal punching bag. To top it off, they usually get shit pay and work lousy hours.
Bad product or service? Still not personal.
Even if the product or service the client complained about was arguably at fault, it still had nothing to do with my customer support agents!
Yet, they were on the receiving end of the venting and the verbal abuse. And trust me, people can get nasty at strangers when they’re mad!
The internet is vast - you’re bound to find some “special people” on it.
I am being polite, but while I have some understanding for these rude jerks, I would prefer not to see them on my timeline. I can’t believe how crude and personal they get.
Joe Rogan has it right. Once you make it big, it’s “post and ghost” or madness and pills!
There is no need to damage your psyche by consuming all this pointless rage and nastiness.
You don’t need it, and it makes no difference. Once you cross a certain threshold, the 1% that are supposedly psychopaths represent a significant number of people. I’m not even counting mere casual bullies, trolls, and rude idiots.
If 100,000 people read you, 1,000 of them are statistically not just unpleasant but also dangerous. Now do the math for a million or ten.
Yes, there are downsides to being “big” on the internet, didn’t you know?
The old celebrity problem for the new age.
You do remember why politicians and celebrities have bodyguards and personnel who protect them from any and all threats, not just physical, right? It’s overwhelming and factually dangerous to be famous. Overzealous fans, stockers, wannabe beneficiaries, and enemies alike all want a piece of you.
We're all essentially celebrities in an era of social media and internet publishing.
Only without the money and the bodyguards! And without the know-how to deal with our newfound fame (reach).
Next time you get annoyed by one of these assholes, remember the following:
Re-frame having trolls as a sign of success. I have ten more trolls than you and a stocker. Who’s the big dog now?
Understand that whatever they do has nothing to do with you, and it says more about them than you.
You can ignore them and probably should. They opened their mouth, phone, or laptop, and poop came spilling out. You don’t have to pick it up.
Realize that happy, successful people don’t go around making other people miserable.
If you’re up for it, you can also feel some compassion for the miserable bastards (optional) who need to try to ruin your day just to feel alive and important and somehow make it through another day.
Stay sane and stay safe!
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