Dealing With Ignorant People

Mar 20, 2009

Throughout my life I have had to deal with a wide range of ignorant, overly negative, and fear based individuals. These people constantly hover in the negative emotional levels. Anger, fear, guilt, pride, and apathy dominate their lives.

I refer to these people as the separated ones. I’m sure you may have encountered a few of these people throughout your life. They are rarely happy, never open, extremely negative, and lack understanding of even the most basic principles. They are the kind of people that no one wants to be around.

Throughout my life I have gone through four different stages of dealing with these people, each one more successful than the last. In this article, I will briefly overview these four stages of dealing with ignorant and negative people.

While you’re reading through each of the stages, try to figure out which stage you’re on. Ask yourself, how do I deal with the ignorant and overly negative people in my life? And, more importantly, how should I deal with these people?

Stage One – Fear

In school I always tried to stay away from ignorant people. I quickly learned who the bullies and negative people were, and I avoided them at all costs. This worked fairly well, for the most part. But on some occasions I was forced to deal with them. You just can’t avoid people forever, especially if they are in the same class as you.

When this would happen I always followed the same pattern. I would just do what they wanted and try my best to make them happy. Not because I wanted to make them happy, not because it was the right thing to do, but simply because I was too afraid to face any potential conflicts. It just seemed easier to do what they said than to try to face any kind of conflicts.

I’ve found that this is the way most people deal with ignorant and negative people. They just stay away from them at all costs. They ignore them, deny them, and run away from them. On the rare occasion that there is a confrontation, most people do what I did. They submit their will to the negative, ignorant person.

Eventually I discovered that this isn’t the best way to deal with ignorant people. Why am I, someone who is intelligent strong and capable, following someone who is ignorant, negative, and incapable? It just didn’t make any sense to me. By following an idiot, I had effectively become an idiot. This was unacceptable to me.

So I stopped avoiding and submitting myself to ignorant and negative people. But this still left the question of, how shall I deal with them? And so, I naturally progressed to stage two – anger.

Stage Two – Anger

I began lifting weights and becoming stronger. I bolstered my confidence in myself, and was determined not to submit myself to any ignorant or negative people. Instead, I challenged them.

This actually worked fairly well. Many of these ignorant and negative people, upon realizing that I wasn’t going to put up with their crap anymore, simply backed off. They showed me who they really were. A disorganized group of cowardly lions.

To this day I still find this ironic. Most negative and ignorant people who try to control and manipulate others using fear, are actually the most fearful people on the planet. They are like little, cowardly lions. They are always trying to mask this fear with their physical strength and bad attitudes. How pathetic and sad.

Not everyone backed down, of course. Some of them kept on. I can only describe these people as being overly stupid. Lacking a fit body, a regular work out routine, and any kind of martial arts training, they still pestered me. I contemplated beating the crap out of them, but I decided against it.

I discovered that these people were actually playing the victim role. This is why they were pestering me so much. They actually wanted me to beat the living snot out of them so they can play the innocent victim card on the teachers and principal. They wanted to get me into some kind of trouble with the authorities. That was all.

I quickly started ignoring them. For a while they could be pretty annoying, but once they discovered I wasn’t going to do anything to them, they disappeared.

For a while this worked pretty well. Ignorant people left me alone. I left them alone. Everything was good. I realized, however, that I was slowly starting to become like them. I was becoming angry. I started inadvertently controlling others. I started getting obsessed with how much weight I could bench.

I immediately stopped this approach. If I would’ve became one of them, then they would’ve effectively won. I would be a cowardly lion, just like them.

There must be another way.

Stage Three – Reason

I decided that it was time for a new approach. I began realizing that these ignorant and negative people were actually sick. Their attitudes, beliefs, and inner reality were not healthy for them or the people around them.

Instead of focusing on myself, and getting what I wanted, I started focusing on helping them to change their ways. I pointed out how their attitudes were unhealthy. How they negatively affected themselves and others. And how their beliefs were incorrect.

Logic and reason were always on my side, and I used this to my advantage. Looking back on it, this was a big mistake. Ignorant people are, by definition, not very reasonable. It’s not that my reasoning and arguments were incorrect, it’s that these kinds of people don’t listen to reason at all. They don’t even value the notion of reason and logic. They just throw it out, because it would conflict with who they are.

As a result, every time I tried to reason with these people, it had the affect of just pissing them off even more. If you ever want to see an ignorant, negative person become really really angry, try shining the light of reason upon their ignorance and negativity. I have yet to find a quicker way to turn someone into a monster than by using this approach. It never fails.

I used this approach in dealing with ignorant and negative people for a long time. It never really occurred to me that I wasn’t getting through to them at all, or that my words had no effect.

Finally it hit me. I had an epiphany. You should only use reason when talking to someone who values and makes use of reason. If an ignorant person doesn’t make use of reason, and most of them do not, reasoning with them will not do you any good, nor will it do them any good. It’s a lot like running inside of a hamster wheel. You run, put forth a lot of effort, but you never get anywhere. They just aren’t interested in listening to you, or listening to the truth.

Instead, they need something else. Something far greater.

Stage Four – Love

Unconditional love, compassion, and acceptance. This is my current method of dealing with ignorant, overtly negative, separated, and fear based people. And it works so well that I felt the need to write an article about it.

You see, it isn’t that negative and ignorant people are bad people. It isn’t that they are in some kind of state of negativity. To negate something doesn’t mean that you have or are something else. It means that you are lacking the thing that you have negated.

So what have negative and ignorant people negated? They have negated love. So how do you help an overtly negative, ignorant, and fear based person? You show them love.

By accepting and loving negative people unconditionally, you effectively remove yourself from suffering. This heals your perception of them and allows you to communicate and interact with them from a safe position of unconditional love and acceptance. Negativity will no longer effect you, because you love and accept everything unconditionally.

This has a healing effect on others as well. Instead of setting yourself up to attack someone, you are setting yourself up to love and accept them for who they are. This allows you to work with the person, instead of against the person.

I can’t stress enough here that to deal with negative people in this manner is a tremendous benefit to both people involved. I don’t love ignorant people to try and promote them or encourage their poor thinking patterns. I don’t love ignorant and negative people unconditionally for their benefit.

I love ignorant and negative people for my own benefit. Not because it is the right thing to do. Not because it happens to help them out. But because it is the correct thing to do, and because it is the best and easiest way to deal with them.

Conclusion

In this article I have outline the four stages I have gone through in dealing with ignorant people. But the real question here is, how do you deal with negative and ignorant people in your life? And, more importantly, how should you deal with the negative people in your life?

Take a moment and reflect on your life. Are there people that you just don’t get along with? Are there people who are negative, angry, ignorant, afraid, and whatnot? How do you relate to these people? How do you talk to the people that you hate?

Perhaps, after reading this article, you will at least reconsider how you relate and treat these people.

Or not, it’s completely up to you. I’ll still love you unconditionally.