How To Get Away From Toxic People

How can you identify toxic people? Below, we show you 5 keys:

1. There are people who are medicinal for your mood because you feel good when you are in their company. You experience the opposite sensation when you are close to someone with whom the relationship does not flow or advance positively, no matter how much you do your part. If the complexity and difficulty constitute the essence of that bond, you are surely facing a toxic person.
2. Little capacity for self-criticism. You notice that this person has the tendency to blame external circumstances or others for issues for which he or she should be responsible on an individual level, another characteristic of toxic people.
3. He recurring complaint speech. In fact, you consider this to be one of the characteristics that defines their behavior. Something common in toxic people.
4. You feel bad. Reflecting on how you feel when you are around that person takes up part of your time, especially if it is someone close to you with whom you frequently meet. You may have talked about it with someone you trust. And this feeling intensifies after a recent encounter.
5. You condition your behavior and your response when you are with that toxic person in order to avoid certain situations that you think may displease your interlocutor.

These are some of the characteristics that you can observe in a person with toxic behaviors.

It may happen that if you find yourself in this situation you have made the decision to distance yourself from that person. But how to get away from toxic people? Below we offer 6 tips:

1. Reduce contact gradually: the change in the bond may not depend on cutting the tie completely but on reducing the frequency of plans and conversations with that person. That is, reduce the time you share in person. Reduce contact to the essentials: it may happen that you meet that person at the office every day. In that case, focus your attention on dealing mainly with those issues that are part of teamwork.
2. Group plans. If you have other friends in common with that person, you can also organize meetings in the company of others instead of focusing the activity on a plan for two.
3. Inside distance. Sometimes, the main change comes from the inner freedom of those who learn that they cannot be responsible for the happiness of others or the change in the other. But you can change the way you position yourself in this situation.
4. Make a final decision. If you feel that distance is best for you and that person since this relationship does not bring you growth, you can take the step of stopping feeding this story. Before that time comes, you can also consider having a conversation. Although you may find it hard to believe, he may not be aware of how he makes you feel. Through your words you can show him this information.
5. Take care of yourself. For example, set limits by being consistent with what you want, not only in your words, but also with your actions. This coherence transmits a clearer message to the other.
6. Contextualize the situation. Far from taking this situation to a personal level, try to put it in perspective. That person lives with his own difficulties. Understanding can bring light to personal relationships. Practice this understanding but also trust your judgment to not justify certain behaviors.

Many people wonder how to deal with toxic people at work. Work is one of those places where no matter how much you want to avoid contact with someone you don’t have a good relationship with, you can’t completely do it because the context forces you to. But just because you can’t completely distance yourself doesn’t mean you can’t do anything about it. How you experience this situation influences your perspective. We give you some tips on how to stay away from toxic people at work:

1. Focus your attention on other matters. This type of relationship can make someone who suffers from a bond of these characteristics focus their energy on thinking mainly about this issue. However, your professional routine is made up of many other aspects. Projects, other work ties, future expectations, training, daily objectives, etc. To stay away from toxic people at work, increase the minutes you spend getting excited about other aspects of your work life and by your own decision reduce the time you spend thinking about this story.
2. Don’t reinforce toxic behaviors. There are behaviors for which that person needs the collaboration of another. For example, negative criticism and complaints grow from the interaction of two people who feed each other in this position. But don’t get into the dynamic of giving him advice either because it is very likely that he will not receive them as constructive suggestions.
3. You can too propose ideas through the company’s suggestion box about possible initiatives to improve the work environment In the organization. For example, an experience of coaching systemic, since those changes that occur within a group seen as a system affect the entire team. Through the coaching systemic you can become aware that you can adopt a different position in the situation.
4. Listen to the message of your emotions, don’t repress them. What you feel also offers you a message that can help you make decisions.
5. Talk to other people that are of your utmost confidence. People who are outside this workspace and with whom you can discuss this period you are going through in a private sphere. Although each situation is different, it is likely that some of your trusted contacts can expand your vision with their own story.
6. Spend more time outside the office to do activities that make you happy. To get away from toxic people at work, it is useful to do activities and share moments with people outside of work. This motivation can become an incentive that helps you reduce the stress derived from this situation.
7. Look for alternatives. When observing this situation, he tries not to interpret it as immovable. Visualize different possibilities that can occur in your professional life. For example, a change of position in the company or searching for another job. Expand these ideas with other possibilities. I would like to recommend reading an interesting book: “How to make good things happen to you“, a title by Marián Rojas.
8. Be careful with expectations When interacting with a toxic coworker, don’t expect sincere praise or recognition even if you’ve achieved significant success (it may happen, but don’t take it for granted). Sometimes it’s your own expectations of how you think that person should have responded in a given situation that causes you disappointment. But when you make this interpretation you are thinking about how you would like that person to be and not about what he or she really is.

This term is used so much that everyday language also shows the risk that exists in this association of concepts. For example, this statement makes an absolute assessment of the other. Each person has their own difficulties, their history and their life process. This term shows a way of negatively labeling someone. The excessive use of this term in everyday language can also make us look for errors in others instead of reflecting on our own aspects in the context of a personal relationship. When the expression “toxic person” is used, it is always the other person who is pointed out.

However, looking at the comprehensive scenario of the situation, you can change your perspective to reflect Also, about how you are reinforcing this bond if you have the feeling of staying at the same point with that person. It is in this present, when you observe a story that takes up more space in your life than you would like, where you can reflect on possible responses to generate a change in how you position yourself regarding what is happening in this relationship. For example, you can define new limits. Answering this test You can tell if you are in a toxic relationship.

This article is merely informative, at PsychologyFor we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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