Have you ever found yourself ruminating and overanalyzing what someone said to you hours after a conversation? This serves as a clear sign that you probably take things a little too personally, and care too much about what others say and think. Of course, everyone falls victim to this way of thinking from time to time. Getting validation and acceptance from others prompts us to rely on other people to make us feel good about ourselves, and when they don’t agree with us or say something hurtful, we might become hypersensitive.
Here are five ways to stop taking things personally:
1. Take time to react.
We often don’t even give the other person a chance to explain before we jump in and speak our minds. Make sure you slow down, take some deep breaths, and listen to the other person before jumping to conclusions. You might end up totally misconstruing their meaning, or mishearing them altogether. Oftentimes, when we react immediately after someone finishes speaking, we haven’t even allowed ourselves the time to process the words coming out of the other person’s mouth.
Use your active listening skills, and try not to give a response until you have thoroughly heard the other person out.
2. Ask questions to clarify meaning.
Many things get lost in translation, either because we don’t understand the language and context of what another person says or we don’t listen as well as we should. It happens. But make sure to follow up with questions to avoid taking things personally when you could have clarified the meaning better. Misunderstandings happen all the time. But we could avoid it by affirming the context of what someone says and asking important questions.
3. Distance yourself from toxic people.
Toxic people can drain you of all your energy and keep your emotions running on high. We can easily take things personally when people constantly push our buttons and try to bring us down. Toxic people enjoy making a scene, causing distress, and stealing energy from others. They don’t want to work on themselves or take responsibility for their own feelings because it seems too difficult or painful for them. So, they rely on sucking the life out of others to survive. You might recognize these people as energy vampires, so if you ever encounter them, please refer to our article here about how to protect yourself from energy vampires.
4. Stop relying on others to fuel your self-esteem.
Oftentimes, we take things personally when we care too much about what others think. Don’t look to others to boost your self-esteem; instead, give that validation to yourself, so you don’t have to rely on other people to make you feel worthy of love and care. It’s natural to want to feel accepted and loved, but don’t give your power away to other people. When you don’t feel confident in yourself, you will always seek that feeling from other people, but it will never totally satisfy you.
Make sure you go within to access the deepest form of love imaginable, because you already have everything you need inside you. Love and attention from others should serve as a bonus to what you already have cultivated within. If you’d like some tips on how to increase your self-confidence, read our article about that here.
5. Make sure you make plenty of time for self-care.
Finally, if you don’t make enough time to care about yourself, you will likely have gaping holes in your energy field. In other words, you won’t feel complete, so everything someone else says or does will bother you. However, if you give yourself the self-care and love you deserve, you will feel so high on life that other people’s actions and words won’t get to you as much.
Final Thoughts on Learning to Stop Taking Things Personally
People do annoying, painful, unimaginable things daily, but that doesn’t mean you have to let that get under your skin. When we don’t go within to heal ourselves, we tend to take things personally because we seek others to patch up our wounds and make us forget about our pain. However, people will likely let you down and won’t always be there to lift you up, so put that responsibility on yourself.
The more you focus on things that make you feel good, the less you will take things personally, and the more you will enjoy life.
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