Recently I encountered a person that I was told was an unkind person. Hearing this news about them before I met them caused me to develop a negative opinion about them.
I had planned in my head that If I had to deal with them one on one, that I was not about to take any mess from them. I was determined that would put my foot down and put them in their place. Finally, the day came, and I had to deal with this person directly, I was ready for them. I had to respond to an email that they sent. I typed up a response with the feeling of being firm, but still polite. I sent them a response, and wouldn’t you know it they fired back with something that could come across as being mean spirited. Since I had been warned, I was not totally surprised and I was ready to fire back at them. Instead of firing back at them, I walked away and thought about how I should handle the situation. After much thought I decided that it was probably not a good idea to change my attitude to match the negative attitude of this person.
So, I waited a day and sent them a nice response, I remained firm, but caring and thoughtful. The response that I got back from them, was totally different than their first response to me. The person’s whole attitude had changed, which made
me think that the spirit of positivity and kindness can change the reaction of other people around you, so you do not have to change who you are to match the negative attitude of others.
I've had to correspond with this for person for a few weeks now and they are still responding with kindness. Mean spirited people are expecting you to have the same reaction as they do, but you can surprise them and don’t have the same negative reaction as them. I Will, Will You?
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