You Can’t Change Other People. Or Can You?
Tips on how to change/improve yourself instead of others.
Many times in life you meet people who you feel would benefit if only they changed………..this or that.
Sometimes these people are family, friends, workmates, and sometimes they are even our other halves.
They are nice and you like them, but you see something they repeatedly do that you feel they should change or you would like them to change.
Maybe, because it is bad for them, it really annoys you, or causes you inconvenience at times?
Then next thing that happens is that you try to tell the other person how they are wrong or how they could do something better.
You may even be in a heated argument and yell out things that bother you about them.
Either way, they hear what you don’t like and can choose to change their behavior or not.
And more often than not they don’t make any changes and you continue to get more frustrated with them.
Can I change?
But, do you ever look at yourself and ask, ‘can I change so that the behavior of others doesn’t bother me?’
Do you ever ask yourself if you have any problems that need to be changed?
How much thought are you putting on others instead of looking at yourself and if you may also have a problem?
Popular Quotes:
- Robert HeinLein said — “you can’t change other people — you can only change yourself.”
- Mohandas Ghandi said — “if you want to change the world, start with yourself.”
It’s true that people all have little things that bother other people.
They tell their friends or family how they don’t like how, so and so, does this or that.
They spend a lot of time dwelling on how they hate what he or she is doing or how they are living.
But, how many people try to change their outlook towards another person?
Or, actually try to make a change in themself that would allow them to be ok with another’s actions?
This would be the higher action to take and would make you a happier person.
There are many famous quotes that explain how futile it is to try to change someone and what to do about it. For example:
- “you can’t change someone who doesn’t see an issue in their actions. You can only change how you react to them.” unknown
- “find the courage to let go of what you can’t change.” unknown
If you want to make a change, a good idea may be to start with changing yourself, your thoughts, or your reactions.
You will see yourself and life in a whole new way once you start looking inward instead of blaming outward.
If you don’t like how a friend talks, you may choose to ignore them when they speak like that. Or you may choose to spend less time with them…or let them go as a friend.
If you don’t like how a spouse treats you and you’ve spoken about it many times, then you may have to let them go. Or change how you look at it and be ok with what they do if it isn’t that big of a deal.
Another tool that keeps people together and less anxious is compromise.
If you compromise a little here and your partner compromises a little there, it will enable both of you to be ok knowing that you are both giving the other some consideration.
And that compromise will spread into other areas of your relationship that is troublesome.
If you learn compromise it can extend into all of your relationships if the other person is also willing to bend a little.
Conclusion:
If you decide to look more at yourself, you may see areas that would benefit you if you changed, if you grew, or if you matured.
You will be less stressed with others as you go inward, concentrate on yourself, and realize you can’t easily change someone.
Better to let others be and change yourself.
Or, you may have to let others go if they are causing too much hurt in your life.