How Do You Not Let People Get Under Your Skin?

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It’s easy to let other people get under your skin and take things far too personally.

It’s even easier in online conversations as you don’t get the inflections in people’s speech and can’t read their body language.

That’s how things like Twitter storms happen.

Ideally, you need to work on your self confidence. Because that’s easily dented when people say things that we deem hurtful. Self confidence takes a while to build up and you may well need to work on it over a period of weeks or even months but you can do it.

Start by learning to shrug off some of the gentler negative things people say about you – if you can find something funny about what they said, even better. And if it’s an online comment, you can even laugh out loud because (unless you’re actually in a voice or video conversation with them at that very moment) they won’t be able to hear you. Which is quite satisfying in a weird sort of way.

It’s also worth remembering that other people’s opinions are just that – opinions. They are beliefs they hold, whether those beliefs are right or wrong or just said to get a reaction. Online trolls seem well practised at the kind of remarks that get other people to rise up but, much like bullies, they can be quite fragile underneath. Which doesn’t mean you should bait them as they can snarl really nastily online. Far better to unfollow them so they go back to hiding under virtual bridges and only terrorise others.

Obviously if someone says something completely wrong about you, it’s OK to speak up. But it’s often better to do this privately rather than have what seems like the whole world watching. In real life, you’d take someone aside. Online, a private message can work nicely. But be careful to compose your words well – write them down on paper or in something like Notepad so you don’t inadvertently send them before you’re ready. Then read your message out loud – you’ll spot any awkwardness a lot easier that way. Then, ideally, sleep on it and only send the message tomorrow if you’re still comfortable doing that.

Recognising that other people have different points of view can also help. Life would be boring if we were all alike. Sometimes comments that are made aren’t done to deliberately wind you up, even though that’s how they appear at the time. Let other people have their own views and do your best to not rise to these if that causes your own anger to rise.

And if you still need help, play yourself the hypnosis MP3 linked below this video. It’s designed to help you stop other people irritating you and getting under your skin. Listen to it now and see how it helps calm down your reactions.

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