How do you deal with people who belittle you ?

Posted on by Sudhir Suvarna

I always wished few people who belittle others opened their mouth only to eat food and for nothing else.

Sadly, even the most educated people, even with a degree from a reputed institute love belittling others. Such people believe the entire universe revolves around them. Hence, education or the lack of it is ruled out here.

The truth is they have a low self-esteem. They belittle others only to make themselves feel good. They believe that by passing comments on you, they can make others around them laugh.

When you feel good about yourself, you would never think of belittling others.

I always believed in life that ‘When you have a problem, fix the problem  not the person’.

Another way of looking at them is, they are not born that way. They never learned how others feel about their remarks.

Some people apologize immediately when they learn that their comment offended others and if they are not forgiven, they stay with that guilt for their life.

Some don’t learn – they have never been told politely that their comment was rude, because people tend to walk away from them and they are ignored, which adds to their low self-esteem. It is a vicious cycle. They tend to inflict their pain on others, until they come across a soul who makes them feel valued. This soul can bring a lot of change in that person.

Very few people in the world are compassionate to feel others pain. These compassionate souls are willing to hear the other person out. They accept their mistakes and that they are human.

Words are powerful.  Kind words can melt the most rude person on earth. Nobody was born rude.

Parenting plays an important role too. What kind of upbringing children get ? Do kids get a lot of unconditional love ?

Do kids learn from their parents, how to treat others ? What words they should speak to others and what words must be avoided ?

Over a period of time, most people learn eventually. However, humans being social animals crave for social acceptance.

When they get silent treatment at home, or ignored by friends and not treated well at work, it all adds up.

Hence, my emphasis has always been that we need more compassionate souls on earth and not billionaires.

17 thoughts on “How do you deal with people who belittle you ?”

  1. I agree totally with you Suvarna. Parents and upbringing play an important role in creating a self- esteem and love for oneself and when that is achieved, people would not go around belittling others.
    Once when I was a child, I went to play and a new neighbour child came to talk and be friends. I noticed her looking at my slippers( we called them that) for a long time and finally, she said, your slippers are too small for your feet. At that age, I felt very sad when she said that. I was growing fast by the day and my slippers often didn’t keep up with my growth. And the age was sensitive too but I remember thinking at that time, what a critical child she was and the funny thing is , I still remember it some 30 years hence. Perhaps she had been criticized for her looks or her something and she felt good belittling someone else in front of others, who knows /
    Very good post !

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    1. Thank you for sharing your story Susie. I agree with you, these comments stay with us but then I also feel that people at those innocent age only try to copy someone close to them, hence the importance of good parenting. But parents themselves must have learnt from someone. Perhaps, social etiquette must be made mandatory at a later stage in life.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  2. I agree with you 100% Suvarna. I was brought up on the Golden Rule. “Do unto others as you would like others to do unto you.” My mother taught me this and I passed it on to my children. A good rule to live by in my opinion.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

      1. sorry about that. I thought that the order was inverted from the way we use names. I was trying to be so smart but actually was showing my ignorance. 😦

        Like

  3. During all our lives we have all experienced some form of bullying, belittling and the list goes on. As a migrant child coming to Australia life was quite tough and I had my share of experiences. Despite all of this I have learnt many lessons and have always practices compassion and kindness and expressed my opinion if I did not like someone being mistreated. I did suffer on a number of occasions for sticking up for someone. I often wonder about some of those tough students that were at school and in our neighbourhood that left a mark on so many of us. Do they still carry the insecurities and their anger? Or have they mellowed out during the course of their life. Parenting does have a great deal to do with how children behave towards one another. As well as how parents behave towards each other as the children experience this and this impacts on children greatly.

    Like

    Reply

    1. Indeed Milanka….Thank you for sharing your story. I mentioned parents. However, parents are not always around. A lot depends on friends too. I guess where most people lack is how we treat people we don’t know well or who do not matter to us.
      They (e.g. workplace colleagues) may not matter to us, but what they say or do does impact us.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

      1. You are right Sudhir. In a workplace such matters do impact as you have to continue to work with these people. It often becomes difficult and one has to remain diplomatic? Perhaps I misinterpreted your post especially the crux of your story. 🙂 I also have taken the liberty (please excuse me) in using Sudhir and I have notices other people using Suvarna. Should I be using Suvarna?

        Like

  4. Great post and good words. I often spend time observing people and their behaviour. I used to have a few of those people in my previous job and thank god I got out of that place.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a comment