The blog post that I have found to be the most influential on my life is James Altucher’s How to Deal with Crappy People (and its follow-up How to Deal with Crappy People Part 2).
I don’t remember when I read it, probably a couple of years ago, and it was a revelation to me. Just the bare fact that there are crappy people who exist and we’re allowed to acknowledge this as truth was amazing to me. And that we are actually allowed to do something about it besides silently suffering? Wow. Heady stuff.
Then I read this article last week on The Problem of Being Too Nice (an issue I’ve written a little about myself). And I realized why receiving permission from that James Altucher article to call a spade a spade was so important.
Here’s the problem. If you come from a certain background, a background that generally includes at least a few influential and crappy people (usually but not always involving a dysfunctional family), then you become more likely to attract other crappy people. You turn into a Crappy People Magnet. And you’re so used to being around crappy people, and dealing with them, and having crappy things happen, that it all becomes normalized. You assume everyone is like that, and it’s all on you to make everything work out anyway. You can’t tell who is crappy and who isn’t. They just all blur together into an incoherent pile of people.
Photo Credit: jessicalsmyers via Compfight cc
With so many crappy people involved in your life, though, things never stabilize. There always seems to be stress and drama. You’re so rarely getting what you need that you get more and more tired. It takes all your energy to keep your head above water. And the worst part is you might eventually become a crappy person yourself. After all, it’s not like you’re learning healthy behaviors.
As a young girl, it was strongly instilled in me that everyone else was good and I should tolerate most behaviors. Even now I find writing about crappy people to be really uncomfortable. The people pleaser in me wants to make a million excuses for them. But the fact is, there’s a real difference between being an imperfect human who makes mistakes sometimes and being a crappy person. Maybe the crappy person is only crappy to some people. Maybe the crappy person won’t always be crappy. Maybe the crappy person has extenuating circumstances. It’s good to be compassionate. But…
It’s even better to take care of ourselves first.
I know there are plenty of happy people out there who mostly know other good and happy people. I am so glad they exist because they are excellent role models for those of us who have more of a struggle. But this post is not for them.
This post is for those of you who do have crappy people in your lives. This post is for those of you who need permission to call a spade a spade. This post is for those of you who might need to make some difficult decisions in order to take care of yourselves.
There are people out there who are kind and care about what you need. And life without so many crappy people? It isn’t perfect. There are some things about it that are sad.
But it’s also like being able to take a full breath of air for the first time.
The Practical Free Spirit 
Good post. Indeed many of us were brought up to be too nice and walk the extra mile. It’s become a destructive habit and loses its potency. I like Julia Cameron’s phrase ‘crazy maker’ for people who suck you into their dramas.
Yes put on your own life jacket first before trying to help others.
Yeah, I really like the life jacket/air mask metaphor.
Read that James Altucher post, which I really liked (particularly the part on happy people), but I couldn’t relate to this:
“Because you have a good 20 or 30 of these in your life just like I do. They might even be former friends, relatives, neighbors, bureaucrats, whatever, whoever, whenever. They swoop down on your life and are just plain crappy and they won’t even know it.”
I feel like I do not have 20-30 people like this in my life. Maybe I have like 2 or 3…maybe. But then maybe I am somehow not recognizing it?
20-30 seems high to me, too.
I think part of it, though, is what the other article talks about, about the problem of being too nice. I think if you’re not too nice to begin with, you’re both less likely to attract crappy people in the first place, and when they do come around, you’re less likely to notice and/or be as bothered by it, because you already have adequate support and you’ll just naturally choose not to become very close to most of them, perhaps without thinking about why that is.
In addition, I’d bet you’d also be more likely to remove yourself from bad situations (for example, if you had a crappy boss, you’d be more likely to say, “Wow, my boss is really terrible” and try to find another job, rather than putting up with it forever).
That’s the theory, anyway.
That is true, no one has ever accused me of being too nice.
I do not have this problem. Clearly, it is because I am the CRAPPY!
Yay ME!
Seriously, though, you are a lovely person, Amy and deserving of the very best.
[…] fingers and say, “Look! There is where the problem is.” And I’m not saying people don’t do some crappy things to each other sometimes. They do, and it sucks, and we don’t have to be okay with that kind of […]