By: Lisa M. Hayes – Confluence Daily is your daily news source for women in the know.
Nothing will rock the world of a nice girl faster than an asshole. A nice girl just can’t wrap her mind around the behavior of an asshole. The things that make a nice girl so vulnerable to an asshole are two of the things that make a nice girl nice – she’s understanding and patient.
But let’s tell the truth about the nice girl. When being nice is an honor badge for being a pushover you can’t blame the asshole. There is a big difference between a nice girl and a grown-up woman who loves hard.
And let me tell you from experience, there is no point trying to love or even like an asshole. So, here is your guide for managing yourself with an asshole – and for the record, this is not a guide to managing an asshole, because you can’t.
1. Why someone is an asshole doesn’t matter.
If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard this sentence:
“I’m not making excuses for him, but his mother was an abusive alcoholic.”
or, my other all-time favorite, “His ex-wife was horrible to him and his divorce was a nightmare.”
Yeah, might be true. However, the why doesn’t change the what and the reason for the behavior doesn’t make the behavior go away or make it ok.
Everyone has a story. Everyone has been through some shit. Sure, some people have dealt with some very heavy shit. However, not everyone’s who’s been through really difficult things is an asshole. Just because someone is damaged is not a reason to let them create wreckage in your life.
Broken people need to get better and healing the world’s assholes is not your job if you’re not getting paid to do it. Take your energy back and quit making excuses for assholes who use their pain as a permission slip to hurt others and won’t get help. Save your energy by setting standards and boundaries and don’t just fight for them. Hold them like your sanity depends on it because it does.
2. Just because you had a dust-up with an asshole doesn’t make you a victim.
“I don’t want to be a victim.” – Right. No one wants to be a victim. However, only you get to decide how you feel about a run in with an asshole and I sure wouldn’t characterize myself as a victim just because someone else behaved badly. Someone else’s bad behavior is not your failure.
Just because you bumped up against an asshole doesn’t mean you’re weak. It doesn’t mean you have a target on your back. It doesn’t mean you a walked into a joke that started by saying, “an empath and a sociopath walked into a bar…”
Assholes will spread their shit. That’s what they do. If you happen to be in the path of a narcissist, or a sociopath, or a garden variety jerk, you cannot be spiritually evolved enough to make them different than they are. Being in the path of an asshole doesn’t make you anything. Thier behavior doesn’t say anything about you. It tells the story of who they are – that is all. Quit feeding the narrative by making it about you.
3. People change, but asshole is a hard habit to break.
It’s not always fair to judge people by their past. History doesn’t always repeat itself. However, history is the most accurate of future behavior.
Someone who’s been an asshole to every girlfriend or business partner or client before you is very likely to be an asshole to you. You’re not going to be special enough to be the asshole whisperer because no one is that special to an asshole.
An asshole who blames others and doesn’t take responsibility will probably blame you eventually. An asshole who talks shit about other people behind their backs will probably talk shit about you behind yours eventually. An asshole who has treated other people like crap, will probably eventually turn on you.
Asshole interventions are serious business. If an asshole hasn’t gone through a process of healing and reparation, chances are pretty high you’d be wise not to invest your energy there.
4. Yes, we create everything. But you didn’t turn an innocent awesome human into an asshole with your magical vibration powers. You are not to blame for the asshole.
The asshole is responsible for being an asshole. You aren’t all powerful enough to make a good person turn evil. Yes, you might have been vibrationally aligned with experiencing the shit storm of sharing air with an asshole. However, you can get yourself unaligned really quickly by not feeding and watering the asshole with your precious energy.
Your “bad vibration” didn’t turn a good person bad. Your weak boundaries with an asshole might be a problem. However, the fact that you’ve attracted one doesn’t mean you created one. It doesn’t work that way.
5. Asshole psychology defies logic.
The easiest way to let an asshole make you a crazy person is to expect them to be reasonable or do what they say they’re going to do. They won’t do either consistently.
You cannot count on an asshole.
You cannot reason with an asshole.
You cannot expect an asshole to behave like a non-asshole.
And expecting an asshole to be different than they are is insane and is not fair to the asshole.
The unpredictable is the norm for an asshole. It’s like the second chapter in the asshole manual – “Keep Them Guessing”. That means, occasionally the asshole might not be abominable. In fact, assholes can be charming a lot of the time. However, that doesn’t mean they won’t be who they are in the end.
Assuming you’re not an idiot, (and you’re not), you’ll be able to recognize the shit doesn’t make sense and the trail of tears and inconsistencies. So, when you recognize it your job is not to be a pushover. Not being a pushover doesn’t mean you can be the asshole rehabilitator. Even if you think you can, you shouldn’t.
More by Lisa:
10 Ways to Upgrade Your Relationship in 1 One Minute or Less
Lisa Hayes, The Love Whisperer, is an LOA Relationship Coach. She helps clients leverage Law of Attraction to get the relationships they dream about and build the lives they want. Lisa is the author of the newly released hit book, Score Your Soulmate and How to Escape from Relationship Hell and The Passion Plan.
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