How do you manage to remain unfazed and “kill them with kindness” when already at the end of your tether?

14 comments

1. I try to see it in a perspective. In a week/month/year when i remember the situation I’d much rather know that I was collected and reasonable then acted out of emotions and definetly didn’t get my point across

2. Sometimes we don’t have to be the bigger person. We can be petty.

3. I double down on the kindess, especially in customer interactions. I’ll look like the calm and collected one and the aggressor will end up looking like a huge jerk.

4. Honestly I’ve had to learn to remain calm and collected. I consider who I’m dealing with and if they are worth that much of my energy to unleash the wrath. 99% of the time they are not, and I find many want to provoke and get that negative reaction.

5. By walking away. But if they act abusive I don’t hold back, tell them to fuck off and leave their life.

6. Doormats aren’t being kind, they’re being stepped on. You can be kind but firm and still hold boundaries. A calm voice that tells someone you’d be happy to continue the conversation when they’re ready to be more respectful. A nod and a word of caution that you’re willing to be helpful but not be abused. Speaking your willingness and holding firm. We’ve got you down for a table at the bake sale! “Oh great. I’m happy to bring a plate of brownies.” We put you for a table! “I’ll set my brownies on it! Thanks for including me.”

7. It actually takes less energy to just be kind. If you fight back it just prolongs the fight whereas being kind eventually makes the other person uncomfortable and they stop or leave you alone for good in some cases,which is great

8. Sometimes distance is the kindest thing you can do. It’s ok to set boundaries and not engage with someone that is either hurting you or that you can’t handle a civil conversation with.

9. I remind myself that losing my cool will make me look just as stupid and as unhinged as they are being and I don’t want people to think that about me. I try to remember that I cannot control how they think or act, all I can do is control myself. I’ll use an example from when I worked in retail.

   Scene, a guy wants to return a shirt for being too small for his child, I say no worries and ask for a receipt, he doesn’t have one, so I asked if he used a card, he said yes and I told him I could look up his receipt that way. This time the shirt has been in a bag I hadn’t seen it yet. So I find the receipt and the first think I notice is it’s well outside our return dates, honestly though we rarely held people to that, I was allowed to process at my discretion. I then proceed to pull the garment out of the bag. No tag it had obviously been washed MANY times and it had literal food stains and chunks of food on the front of it. I knew this was going to go downhill. I told him I could not process the return the garment had been well worn washed and was covered in food. Naturally he decided to argue that his kid grew out of it. I tried to calm him down but he started getting more irritated so I went into full shut down mode.

   I printed up our return policy, highlighted the sections thay showed he was not eligible for a refund, then repeated them out loud. Every time he stopped speaking I repeated myself, even if he was trying to yell over me. I didn’t raise my voice. Finally he asked for a manager, which a coworker had already called. She then repeated what I had told him. We about had to call security.

   When it comes to people talking to me about politics or religion or any hot button issues I generally just don’t engage. If I am caught in the middle though when they stop talking and ask what I think I just say “I don’t agree, and you won’t agree with me this conversation isn’t going to get anywhere.” If they get loud or aggressive, especially if it’s a man I say “Sorry I just can’t have a nice discussion when you’re so emotional, I’m going to go now.” And walk away. That one’s always fun.

   Anyways long and short of it sometimes you just can’t kill them with kindness so you just shut down and get away. Engaging with them will just bring you down to their level and it’s not worth it ever.

10. When people are acting aggressive it’s probably a projection and coming from a place of fear. Don’t go to their level, make them come down to yours if they want to have a conversation. Only thing you control is yourself.

11. I exit as soon as possible, and give them over to someone who’s paid the big bucks to deal with those kinds of people.

    If we’re talking about personal relationships, I end the conversation and walk away to collect myself.

12. I keep a smile on my face as best I can and take a deep breath if necessary. As a teacher, this is how I’ve handled difficult situations with my students’ parents.

13. Always remember not to stoop to their low level.

14. i’ve only ever seen this work in a distant relationship where it’s possible to remain cordial/even kind while maintaining a looong psychological distance

    but if you’re employing this tactic in a close relationship that’s how you teach someone that it’s okay to mistreat you because clearly there are no negative repercussions to treating you poorly

    so i think if you have the ability to distance yourself from this person completely then that’s something you should try to do or at least work towards