Don’t Rain on my Parade-
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How to Deal with Negative People
Have you noticed negative or difficult people around you are affecting your otherwise cheerful disposition (and how unfair is that)? Someone who knows nothing is making your life miserable. Why do Negative Nellie’s feel they need to unload their pent up vex at an unsuspecting person? What is up with the negativity?
Studies by the
The unfortunate part is we tend to become like the people we are around the most. For instance, when you visit somewhere and people have accents you tend to take on the accent, people in groups tend to dress alike and take on similar characteristics.
This may mean because you are around negative people you may become negative too! Yikes.
Listen to people complaining endlessly about work, and you’ll find yourself starting to do the same. Add to it that negative emotions exert a more powerful effect in social situations than positive ones.
Unfortunately you can’t eliminate the negative person, but you can find ways to deal with them. If you were around someone with an infectious disease you would probably take steps to reduce the risk. Negativity is infectious so it makes sense that we should ward it off.
Negative behaviors are defense mechanisms; they protect people from developing relationships, from taking risks, from getting in trouble or making mistakes. If you can permeate the wall there defenses hold up you have a hope of diffusing toxic emotions.
Make ‘em Smile!
Anger and negativity usually stem from the anxiety, fear response in the brain, -one of the oldest, most primitive parts of our brain. Also responsible for the fight or flight response, It reacts without thinking. From a Society for Neuroscience article on Bliss and the Brain: A scrutiny of brain activity indicates that individuals with natural positive dispositions have trumped up activity in the left prefrontal cortex compared with their more negative counterparts. "Happy people think more logically. If you can make someone smile or laugh you literally force them to use a different part of their brain that is more logical and reasonable. A person cannot be negative and smile or laugh at the same time.
Let it roll off your back
Some people are just ANGRY. Negativity, hatred and disgust are boring and not worth your time. Sometimes these people are out there to help you develop your resolve to stay positive no matter what.
Distance yourself from negative people by taking a detached, impersonal view. The more you can see them as separate from yourself, the less likely you’ll be to interpret their behavior as being a personal attack against you. It’s just the way they are; you had nothing to do with it!
Adjust your tolerance. People who are easily annoyed have a low level of tolerance for inconveniences or frustrations. Think of yourself as “buoyant” and resilient in the face of stress and respond that way. Find out what triggers your anger, and then to develop strategies to keep those triggers from tipping you over the edge.
If you are confident and feel good about yourself you are more likely to be buoyant to negativity and be a force for change.
Negative people try to validate their victim hood by pulling others into their warped view.
Don’t be their prey! Think of it this way, If someone were to say “Nice job of handling that”- what would you have done to deserve that comment?
Interrupt Negativity- When someone is heralding negative assumptions simply do something to distract from it or stop it. I love to do the unexpected because it literally halts a persons point of view and gets them thinking about something different. It is the whole premise of humor. It has to be unexpected to be funny (which is why you don’t laugh at a joke if you’ve heard the punch line before).
Pass some perspective please.
Who says criticism requires anger? Who says doing overtime is a bad thing? It all depends on your perspective.
Negative accusatory people are likely inferring things that aren’t true. Their flawed assumptions are creating a negatively warped picture. Clear up the facts so you both see a clear picture.
Do you Fight? Or Flight?
My experience is under stress people either fight back or retreat. It is the classic fight or flight response at play. Your mind tends to respond to stressful situations as dangerous and immediately fights back to protect, or your retreat( run away, disengage) Physically within your body adrenaline pumps into your blood stream and stored fats turn into sugar for energy, your digestive and immune systems suppress and your focus become fight or flight.
This response was very useful for cavemen but much less adaptive for today’s society and acute sources of stress. For example, one of the key sources of dissatisfaction in the workplace today is lack of appreciation, our stress response to feeling unacknowledged would have us fight or retreat, making the situation worse. As long as all stress is seen as dangerous, which for a lot of people it is, than this fight or flight reaction can wreak havoc on your life. Prolonged continuous flight or flight reaction takes a strong physical toll on your health. The degenerative wear and tear leads to heart attack, stroke, cancer, diabetes and more.
The best thing to do is short circuit the fight/ flight response by refusing to react.
- Respond to stress by recognizing your pattern. Under stress do you typically fight (get angry, lose your temper) or flight (disengage, give in, or become passive)
- Reframe your attitude to perceive the stress as a challenge not a threat. If you feel a lack of appreciation challenge the situation and yourself to recognize why you are upset and how can you get the recognition you deserve.
Have a good laugh- we often laugh hardest when we have been feeling most tense. Just because you laugh doesn’t mean you don’t take it seriously.
Remember positive people ground your outlook so find positive people and be around them.
The next time someone tries to rain on your parade and affect your sunny outlook you will know what to do about it.
Jody Urquhart is a professional speaker who for the last ten years has motivated and inspired professionals to use humor to change there lives. Please contact us to see how we can recognize and inspire professionals at your next event. "http://www.idoinspire.com/"
Public Speaking Tips
By Mike Bova
I’m going to fess up. Public speaking did not come easy for me. I would get very nervous (which led to dry mouth), lose my train of thought and use a lot of filler words like: and, and um, um, you know etc. I have come a long way from those early days. Public speaking comes a lot easier for me now. If you would like to improve your public speaking skills, this article is for you.
Before I tell you what has worked for me, I’m going to give (just like those weight loss infomercials do) a disclaimer…results may vary. Now, here is what has worked for me.
Open with a joke or say something funny. This is a good ice breaker. Being funny will loosen up the audience and you as well. Make sure "the funny" is tasteful, and if it goes over well, your confidence will immediately build.
Be prepared. You will of course prepare before you speak. Use the internet (which is an incredible resource by the way) to do some research. If you type an outline, this will help you prepare your delivery. Just like when you took notes in school, write down your main points and your secondary points. You can definitely ad lib, but try not to create too many rabbit trails. Rabbit trails will cause you to lose your train of thought and cause you to forget where you left off. Stick to the outline, rehearse as many times as needed to know your outline by heart. Being well prepared will boost your confidence.
Create a distraction. If it’s possible, make a handout and give it to each member of the audience. Doing this will take the audiences mind off you somewhat. The handout will be similar to what you’re speaking about and you could leave some blanks the audience would have to fill in. This would be more of a teaching than a preaching.
Continue to be funny. If you can think of funny stories (either your own or someone else’s) that are related to the topic and can drive a point home, use them.
Give examples. Again using stories or situations (funny or not) that your audience can relate to. These are real crowd pleasers.
Be as animated as you can. Raise and lower your voice. Walk back and forth. Make your public speaking engagement interesting. This leads me to my next tip.
Make what you’re speaking about interesting. If what you are speaking on is boring, or if what you have prepared is boring, find a way to…. "BAM, SPICE IT UP A LITTLE!"
Use props or other visual effects. Overheads and power point presentations are good. Any props you can use are will help you as well.
Encourage audience participation. You can do things like dividing the room in two and on cue one side of the room says, "ooh" and the other side says, "ah" or use audience members to help you with illustrations.
Close with a question and answer session. This will allow for a nice finish.
Being a great public speaker, like anything, takes practice. If you have a video camera, set it up on a tripod and tape yourself. Try to be conscience of those filler words. Work on your joke telling and story telling. Practice being animated. After reviewing your videos, make any necessary adjustments. I wish you all the best with your public speaking engagements. Have fun & "break a leg."
Mike Bova is the Madison County Advertising Director & Business Columnist for Eagle Newspapers in
