How Many Licks Does it Take to Get to the Center?

How many times do we have to take licks from the very difficult person in our lives before we learn what they are here to teach us? Before we get to the heart of the lesson? Before we are able to find our own center? How many verbal assaults and other forms of attack do we have to endure before we are able to get relief?

I've got news. The licks will keep on comin' if we're waiting for the very difficult person to change. Very difficult people rarely change because they, most often, are incapable of seeing how very difficult they are. In fact, they usually think they are fabulous and everyone else is messed up! And often they are charismatic enough on the front end to be able to convince others of the same... for a short while... After all, how else did they end up in your life? You were hooked by their charm in the beginning quite possibly, right? Or somebody you love was and you're in it by default.

This kind of very difficult person might be categorized by diagnostic clinicians as having Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD).  Sometimes they have a sprinkle of Borderline Personality traits and a dash of Histrionic Personality Traits. Heck, sometimes there are even some Antisocial Personality Traits.  The point of this blog is not to go around diagnosing people. Bad idea. Rather, the point of this blog is to understand what we're dealing with and make the necessary shifts and changes in ourselves and the way we are moving through the crap they hit us with and move around these very difficult people in order to heal from past pains and move onward and upward.

So, back to the licks.  Very difficult people often like to hook us in and then beat us up. It helps feed their belief that everyone else is wrong and they are ALL right.  So what to do?

1. Don't take anything they say to heart. Very difficult people are really skilled at taking one tiny thread of truth and weaving a quilt of a story that is absolutely baseless and try to smother you with it.
2. Don't defend. Defense is often a form of attack. You don't want to take anything they say personally and you don't want to get down in their mud with  retaliatory attacks. Trust me on this. It only feeds them further.
3. Ignore 'em.  Really.  Act like you don't even see them and hear them when they act out.
4. Don't react. Okay, so you're going to have an internal reaction when they are saying outrageously false things, accusing you of heinous acts that are baseless or insulting your mother. The trick is to note the internal reaction and do what you need to do to work through that emotion in  a way that is healthy (like pounding out some miles and hills on the treadmill, taking a brisk walk, deep breaths, kickboxing) and then try some meditation or yoga... really, a regular practice really helps you find center.
5. Set and maintain firm boundaries the Mr. Spock way. When you need to address their outrageous behavior and set some boundaries around what you will and won't tolerate, do so in a matter-of-fact manner. Never respond or address their behavior from a place of emotion. Get your cool, calm, clear head on first.
6. Avoid the hooks.   They love to hook you. They thrive on it. Look out. Keep conversations short. Be prepared to politely hang up when they start throwing out those hooks or walk away.

Here's the irony. These very difficult people are giving us opportunity to get to the center of who we are. To work through some junk internally (we all have junk). To hone self restraint, patience, self discipline. To look at our own actions and reactions with greater mindfulness. These very difficult people are here to teach us something about ourselves and to help us become better people. I'm convinced.