Posted by cav on November 15, 2005 at 19:25:55:
Have you ever known anyone who just has this habit of poisoning your thoughts? I know a couple people who have this ability (rest assured it is no one who reads this board). I don't think they do it on purpose; I really think they think they are trying to help. But they wait until I am alone and then start with this, "well you know what I've noticed about 'anyone'..." and, "I've seen that before and it means 'whatever'." The thing is it's always something negative that I should "watch out for". And then when I get around the person they talked about I keep noticing how the "advice" seems accurate, and I can't interact with them in the way I did before knowing that. The thing is, I think it's like reading a horoscope...you know, how it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. And even if it's true, said in that context it isn't going to help anyone, it only creates division.
The last time it happened I said to the person, "why are you telling me this...take it up with them!" And they replied as you'd expect, "oh, I can't, that would only hurt them/ drive a wedge/ whatever other nonsense."
So in short, I don't know the motivation and I don't want to speculate, suffice to say I can't beleive they are just trying to be evil. I know them too well. But I can't keep listening to this. Further, I've tried discussing it with them and these are the kind of people who will not hear any kind of calm airing of concerns. They immediately take it as an attack and it turns into a full scale confrontation.
So my question for everyone is how can I keep this stuff out of my head in a situation where I can't always realistically avoid being around the people? I mean I'm doing ok, and recognition of the poison is the biggest part, but I don't want to go off on them and that is my tendency when I've had enough of this kind of evil...which it is at the root. I don't think the people are trying to be evil, but the insidious nature of these comments IS evil.
Have you been there? How do you handle it?