An Open Letter | Joy M. Mills

Here we are in a new year and a new decade, and I was thinking of the people that defy logic. Some are blissfully unaware of the negative impact they have around others. They just create chaos.

Difficult people are drawn to the reasonable ones. All of us likely have had or have at least one person in our life who has us bending around ourselves like barbed wire. If you are the one continually hurt or the one constantly adjusting your behavior from being hurt, then chances are it is not you but them.

The goal of an abuser is to control you by making you feel bad about who you are, whether it is done publicly or in private. Criticism can be painful, particularly if the person doing the criticizing is only being mean and has no intention of being constructive.

Those that cuss and swear at you has nothing to do with you. These people have word poverty. Intuitively people understand profanity to be a way to intensify a statement. Now and then, this may be effective. It may also be funny. But if someone you know can only raise their voice, over talk and toss in profanity, it means they have a severe lack of vocabulary words at their disposal.

They are like a chef who only knows how to pour chili pepper over every dish. If you would not tolerate a restaurant that employed a chef like that, why would you tolerate a person in your life that has the verbal equivalence of said chef?

If you do not allow yourself to move past what happened, what was said, what you felt, you will look at your present and future through the same dirty lens. You must make a firm decision. It will not always happen naturally or automatically. Sometimes you will have to rise against the wind and say, “I do not care how hard this is. I do not care how disappointed I am. I am not going to let this get the best of me. I am leaving this behind and moving on with my life.”

Written with love.

*This article is not intended to provide and does not constitute medical, legal or other professional advice. This article was written to support, not replace medical or psychiatric treatment. Please seek professional care if you feel you have a condition.