Ep #55: People You Hate

You are listening to episode 55 of The Confident Coaches Podcast, the one where you face the facts about people you don’t like. Let’s go.

Welcome to The Confident Coaches Podcast, a place for creating the self-confidence you need to do your best work as a life coach. If you want to bring more boldness, more resilience, and more joy to your work, this is the place for you. I’m your host, Amy Latta. Let’s dive in.

Hello, hello my confident coaches. How are my Latta loves doing out there this week? I hope you’re doing fabulously. It is Thanksgiving week. Guys, we only have a couple more weeks in this year. I know. Oh my goodness, it’s the last week of November 2020, we’re doing it friends. It’s Thanksgiving week.

Now, in full disclosure, I have no idea what y’all are doing for Thanksgiving. I don’t know if you are home, I don’t know if you did do any traveling. Different parts of the country are experiencing different things. Some people are on lockdown again. So I don’t know, are you even visiting people this week?

We’re attending a small family gathering. This is not necessarily a traditional Thanksgiving, but this week is kind of a traditional time where we can get a little – we love visiting family and all that, but sometimes family can kind of bring out the worst in us, and family can sometimes rub us the wrong way. And that made me think about today’s podcast today, people you hate.

Now, maybe people you hate and visiting your family for Thanksgiving sounds a little harsh, but people you hate, people who rub you the wrong way, people that you can only tolerate in small doses. But it’s just a great reminder of what we can allow other people to do to us and that’s exactly what today’s podcast episode is about is what we allow other people in this world to do to us, and what we make it mean about us, and how we can drop this hating other people or not liking other people and just allowing other people and allowing ourselves to just be who we are.

So that is what we are talking about today, this week of Thanksgiving. As a side note, I love Thanksgiving. I do believe it’s probably my favorite holiday. I love the food, I love the focus on really appreciating all that is good in your life, and yet we frequently and really even in this year of 2020, all the more so, if this year has taught us anything, it’s how to appreciate really what is so good in our life.

And yet, I guarantee you right now, it probably won’t be that hard for you to come up with some examples of people as you’re listening to this episode, being like, there’s so-and-so over there. No matter how much personal growth that we’ve had, our brain is wired to find those people that we don’t trust, that we don’t like, that rub us the wrong way.

It’s like it’s all that kind of tribal crap from way back in our ancestral days. I don’t know if ancestral is a real word or not, but it is now. All of that stuff, it’s wired into humanity, to have those people in our life. So even when we are enlightened and we should know better, you can’t override that human brain, my friends. I know y’all got people that rub you the wrong way. I’m going to let you know what to do about that today.

Before we dive in though, I want to give a little love and a little shout-out to my July masterminders. Now, my Confident Coaches Mastermind group is – these are my July people, my July loves. They’re doing such beautiful, amazing work.

I’m telling you, every single week when we coach, it just is like, it’s a love fest in so many ways, but it’s also just this realization of shedding old shit. Like Sarah, who’s struggled between putting out B- work and being perfect. I got to be perfect, no, I can put out B- work, but maybe I’m not doing my best and that’s okay if it fails. This back and forth.

She’s really been caught up in this concept, I have this concept called hula hoop thinking, and she’s just been spinning in these hula hoop thoughts between B- work and being perfect. And she finally realized this week that she could totally drop that hula hoop and realize that what she thought needed fixing, maybe might just be what makes her awesome and is the awesome way that she gets her work out into the world.

This was a huge realization for her, so shout-out to Sarah. And I want to give a shout-out to Rachel who this month has committed to making offers every single day, no excuses. And when her Helga brain speaks up, she’s responding, thanks but no thanks lady. That right there is some of the most important work you will ever do. Learning to hear your Helga brain and not listen to her. So shout-out to Rachel.

And shout-out to Cheryl, who for the first time this year has put her Helga brain in her place, her Helga thoughts of I’ve not gotten anywhere and I’m not as far as I should be. And instead is asking herself every day, how can I serve my people today from a place of joy? I’m going to offer that thought to all of you right there. That’s Cheryl’s thought this week. How can I serve my people today from a place of joy?

For me, I’m always how can I serve my people today from a place of fun. For you, it might be from a place of love, love, joy, fun, it’s all very similar and it’s all how you are going to come and be of service to your people.

And here’s what I understood more and more as I’m working with my clients in each of my masterminds that I’m running. The backbone to confident coaches is really learning how to be okay with who you are as a person, as a coach, as an entrepreneur, no matter what results you are currently creating. No matter what is in your R line today. Learning how to be okay with who you are.

Because confidence absolutely will not suddenly arrive after you hit a certain dollar amount, or number of clients that you’re serving, or when you’re fully booked, or when you’re ready to go on to group. That’s not when confidence shows up. It just doesn’t work that way.

Confidence is knowing that no matter what result you have in your business right now, this month, you are good. You are awesome. And you can solve any problem and you can find all of your solutions. Confidence is not a luxury, my friends. It is a necessity.

I’m graduating from my own coach’s $200K mastermind group and I’m starting in her two-million-dollar group in January. I’m so stinking excited. But I can tell you right now, if I hadn’t done this confidence work before I started working with my coach Stacey in these masterminds, I would have drowned in my own self-doubt by now.

These are the building blocks. This is your secret weapon. Confidence is your secret weapon to the life coaching business you want to build. Because it’s not going to come after you’ve achieved the thing. It’s not how confidence works. It comes now and I help you create it now.

So be here with me. Keep listening to this podcast. Enroll in the next Confident Coaches Mastermind. Your last chance to enroll for 2020. It’s coming up really stinking soon. As of recording date, I can’t exactly tell you exactly sure, but you want to be on the email list. You want to sign up for the freebie at the end of this podcast and make sure you know when the applications open for your last chance to enroll in 2020.

So this week, people you hate. Not sure that was much of a segue right there. People who rub you the wrong way. People you unfollow on social media, or that you avoid. Maybe it’s family members that you have to kind of grit your teeth when you go visit. That one friend, that one that you’re like, I can only kind of take her in small doses.

Maybe it is somebody you legitimately hate. I hate this person, I do not like this person at all. Let’s talk about these people. As soon as I start talking, I want you to kind of already have an idea. You know who those people are. Those people who when they show up in your Facebook feed, you just kind of – those people who when you walk into the room together, the air kind of goes out of the room when they’re there.

They show up in different places. They might be other coaches, they might be high school friends, high school foes, they might be family members, they might be cousins, sisters, moms, it might be in-laws, it might be your family. People in the neighborhood, or maybe it’s acquaintances. But we all have those people, the best phrase that I have, just kind of rub you the wrong way.

They just kind of chafe you a little bit when you’re in their space, whether it be online space or physical space. There’s just kind of a chafing going on there. You know what I mean? Let’s talk about them. Why are these people in your life other than to just aggravate the hell out of you?

Why do they do the things that they do and why does it piss you off so much? What is it about this? Let’s really talk about the human dynamic here. Because of course, it would be so easy if they would just stop, right? So right out of the gate, let’s just acknowledge right now, in my coaching, I haven’t gone extensively into it, in this podcast in general, but I do use some relationship tools about manuals and boundaries for people.

So I’m talking about people that you have a manual for, that they should act a certain way and they should talk a certain way and they should be a certain way. Because when they are that way, you can feel better. So these people that just kind of chafe you, these people that rub you the wrong way, whatever it is about them, it makes you not feel good and you don’t like it, and it would just be so much easier if they would stop, right? If they would just comply with the operational manual that you have created for them, your life would be so much better and you could be happier, right?

But that’s not how the world works, my friends. Wanting people to change so that you can feel better, that sucks. First of all, it’s manipulative. We’re like, I need you to change, I need you to stop being who you are because it’s bothering me. Please stop. That just sucks. It’s very manipulative, right?

And we certainly don’t like it when others do that to us. Can you imagine of all the people in the world, this person has a manual for how you should act, this person has a manual for how you should act, it’s not even possible to comply with everybody’s manual for you, and do you really want to?

Do you like being around somebody who’s like, listen Amy, I’m going to need you to stop dropping so many F bombs, that ridiculous laugh that you have, can you not do that, and can you please make sure you always use words that actually are real and are in the dictionary? That would make me feel better. Fuck no.

No, right? We would not tolerate that. We would be like, no, you’re crazy. But that’s what we want others to do so that we can feel better around them, right? And here’s the thing; it’s totally an impossible goal in the first place because other people like how that person is.

Really consider this. We know that it’s just a thought that we have about these people and not fact and not truth because there are people who love that person that rubs you the wrong way. There are people who think that thing that bothers you the most is what makes them awesome. It’s what they love about them.

Like my dropping of F bombs, I’ve specifically had people reach out and say this is why I don’t follow you, and I’ve had other people specifically reach out and be like this is why I follow you. So what you hate about someone might be what someone else loves about them. What? Get out of town.

Your toxic person is someone else’s best friend. I know, it’s crazy. I also want to drop this little truth bomb in here too, it’s good to consider that you might be someone’s toxic person. Get out of town. That makes you feel a little uncomfortable, right? When you think about it that way.

And what I really want to offer you is that the people you hate, the people who chafe you a little bit, the people who rub you the wrong way, they are here for a reason. And that reason is to tell you something about yourself. These people are here to teach you about you.

So in my Confident Coaches program, in my section, so I have five steps to creating self-confidence, and step number three is becoming your own best mentor. And so I really teach you how to lean into your future self, how to learn to ask yourself your own questions and solve your own problems, and not depend on people outside of you to help you figure out how you’re going to run your coaching business, but to learn how to become your own best mentor.

And one concept that I teach is the people you admire most. So I remember being at my second mastermind for my life coach school and I’m in this room with, I don’t know, 120 coaches. And I remember sitting there and I had this realization that there were so many coaches across the spectrum, there was a million-dollar earner to people who’d not earned any money.

And I was thinking about being in this room with these people and these star earners, these top dogs in the coaching industry. And I get to be in this room with them. And it occurred to me for the first time that I used to think if I could get close to or be in the space of people that I admire, maybe some of their awesomeness would rub off on me.

And it was sitting in that room, this would probably be 2018. So this would be June of 2018. I remember sitting in that room and realizing for the first time that being around people I admire, it wasn’t that I was hoping they would rub off on me. It’s that I realized that being in their space brought that awesomeness out in me.

What I admire most in other people is a reflection of what is in me. It’s the future Amy that I’m stepping into. It’s a reflection of who I am deep down. Even if it’s not fully realized, what I admire most about other people is what I admire most about who I’m becoming, what I’m stepping into.

And this is the feel-good aspect of it. But guess what, the opposite of that is true also. The people who rub you the wrong way are showing you what’s in you, what you are struggling with about you. Stay with me here. Big group hug. I love you. I’ve already got you thinking about all these people you hate and now I’ve told you that what you hate about those people is what you hate about you.

And you’re like, well, thanks Amy, that fucking sucks, I hate this podcast episode. Stay with me here because I’m going to show you exactly what to do to work through this and why this is a beautiful realization, why this is the exact realization that’s going to help you move forward.

I mean, once you do, once you listen to this episode and move forward, and you’re like, holy cow, weight lifted. Because what our instinct is rather than deal with it, rather than face the fact that what we don’t like about others is what we don’t like about ourselves, rather than do that, what we’re doing is we’re projecting what we don’t love about ourselves onto this poor, unsuspecting person.

They’re just living their life. They have no clue, and yet they are getting all of our angst and all of our anger. The problem is we’re still getting that angst and anger too. We’re giving ourselves a double dose of it.

Let’s really break this down and take a look at this. How do we work through this? I’m going to tell you exactly how to do that right now. Here’s what I did. So I want to offer you, I literally did this exercise. I did this exercise last week.

I literally sat down with pen and paper. So I am recording this on November 17th and I’m looking at the date, I did this on November 11th. So literally a week ago, I sat down with pen and paper. How I feel about others. Other coaches, my husband’s family, my family, our friends, and I just started writing out names.

What do I think about this person and that person and this person and that person? And here’s the funny thing; as soon as I started with one name, then the second name came, and the third name came. And then after a while, I was like, and you know what, so-and-so.

I had to unfollow them on Facebook because I didn’t like that all of the time. And this person, I don’t really love hanging out with this person. As soon as I really allowed myself to admit that there were people who rub me the wrong way, I was able to come up with a good list.

Here’s a reason why we want to do this. Start out with just three. No more than five. And then ask yourself, what is it I don’t like about this person? What is it about this person that I don’t like?

So for me, I’m going to take four people that I listed here. The first one I was like, she’s just not who she says she is. I don’t think she’s as good as she puts herself out there to be, I don’t think she’s as fabulous as she kind of portrays herself to be. By the way, yeah, this is going to get real brutal. Lean in. Super fun, guys.

Person number two, she just speaks up and says whatever she wants, she doesn’t care about what anyone else thinks, she’s totally rude about it too. This was coming from a rude energy, like I can’t believe the nerve she has to say some of the shit that she has to say.

So person number three, this person just has to know everything about everybody all of the time, she’s always up in other people’s business. Nosey, all what’s going on with you, come on, back off, lady. Person number four, she’s so attention seeking, very whiny, very attention seeking.

So then what I wrote about them, I put it into question form about me. And after I put it into question form about me, I put it into a statement form. I created a thought. I found the thought that I was really thinking about me.

So if they are reflections of me, what do I really think about me? So person number one, she may not be as good as she says she is, I wonder if I’m as good as I say I am. I’m not as good as I say I am. So I took my statement about her, put it in a question about me, and then I put that question in a statement about me. And I found the thought that I can run a model on and that I can get coaching on.

Person number two about speaking up, being so rude, is it rude for me to say what I think? Is it rude for me to speak up? Turn that into a statement. It is rude for me to say what I think. It is rude for me to speak up.

Person number three, do I worry too much about other people’s business? Stuff that’s not my business? Am I nosey? Put that into statement form. I am nosey when I’m all up in other people’s business.

Person number four, am I whiny and attention seeking? Put that into thought form. I am whiny and attention seeking. I mean, now don’t you see why we project these things onto others? Ouch, this is painful stuff. I’m thinking that I’m not as good as I say that I am, I’m thinking that it’s rude if I speak up and say what’s on my mind, I think that I’m nosey and can be all too much up into other people’s business, and I think that I’m whiney and attention seeking.

No wonder, right? Because these are really painful thoughts to think about myself. No wonder I have projected them onto someone else. But by doing that, by projecting it onto them, I can’t possibly work through it myself.

And here is why we want to work through it myself. It lets them and me off the hook. Right now, using people we hate to buffer the pain of our own thoughts has us both on the hook and it only hurts us. We have these thoughts, and they are creating hurt to us on a subconscious level.

We’re thinking this about ourselves whether we acknowledge it or not, and that’s creating hurt on a subconscious level. But then because we’re projecting it onto someone else, we are thinking on a conscious level negatively about that person and again, the only person that hurts is us too.

It’s a double whammy of self-inflicted pain and it doesn’t have to be this way. You can let it all go. So what I did with each of these, I took each of these thoughts that I found and I put them into a model form. I saw how they made me feel. I acknowledged how I show up when I feel that way. I acknowledge the result that I was creating in my life because I was thinking about that.

And wow, it blew my mind. What I was feeling and what I was doing and the results I was creating from those thoughts, those thoughts that I had put on others, now I can see it just so clearly in black and white. I have this thought about me, this is what I do, this is the result I create, and it’s possible it’s not true. It’s possible that this thought that I’m thinking about myself is not real. It’s not true.

And now I can start to continue to self-coach on that, I can start to get coaching from other people on those thoughts that I have about myself, start to question them, start to challenge them, start to practice new beliefs I want to believe about myself. I couldn’t have done any of that if I wasn’t willing to do that short exercise where I put what I thought about others and I turned it into this is what I think about me.

Now I can go to work on me. Finding what these thoughts are about you, it allows you to release that double whammy of pain. It was never about them. It was always about you. And now I not only see them in a lighter light. I now see me in a lighter light.

And yes, some of it is still there. This is not a one and done thought download for me. But now I have this huge awareness that as soon as someone rubs me the wrong way, it’s an invitation. It’s an invitation to explore a part of me that I can actually learn to love.

Now, side note. I mentioned it before, manuals versus boundaries. Lest someone take this podcast and make it mean that someone who has broken a boundary of yours or harmed you is somehow a reflection of you, no. I want to be really, really clear.

This concept, this people you hate concept is not a get out of jail free card for an abuser or someone who has violated you or violated your space. That’s a different circumstance for a different day.

I am talking about people who are not operating according to your manual. I would really like you to do this and not do that very much please. People who act a certain way that you don’t like, that this people you hate concept is an invitation to find out why you care so much, why it bothers you so much. Because it’s going to teach you about you.

It’s going to help you uncover some subconscious thoughts that you aren’t acknowledging that are killing your confidence, that are undermining your success, that are undermining the confidence that’s possible for you. And that’s why this is always brilliant work to do.

Now, a little foreshadowing to next week. I want to point out the fact that because you do this at all, because you project your unworthiness onto others and you don’t go and realize that this is actual thought work that you have to do about yourself, this doesn’t have to be a problem.

The fact that you do this, the fact that you have people you hate or rub you the wrong way in your life and it’s really just a projection of what you don’t like about yourself, the fact that you do that does not have to be a problem. It’s so natural and it’s oh so very human and it’s just what we do.

The fact that you’re a coach who should “know better” is crap in a hand basket, my friends. You are human and you will always have this human brain. And now you know one of your human brain, one of your Helga brain’s little tricks to protect you from having to do the uncomfortable work.

So the fact that you even think these thoughts and you’re a coach and you shouldn’t be doing it and now you’re going to go throw a shame blanket on to yourself, I want you to put a kabash on that right now. Of course, you’re just being so very human right now.

When you have these negative thoughts about other people that are really a reflection of you, that’s just you being human. And now you too can be onto this little trick that your brain does so that you don’t have to do the uncomfortable work. There’s no need to beat yourself up that there are people that you don’t like and what that means about you.

Congratulations coach, you are a human. And it’s your humanness that makes you an excellent coach. Alright my friends, okay, I cannot wait to see what you all create. Happy Thanksgiving my friends, have a beautiful, wonderful week, no matter how, no matter where you’re celebrating. Alright my confident coaches, remember, until next week, let’s go do epic stuff.

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Thanks so much for listening to The Confident Coaches Podcast. I invite you to learn more. Come visit me at amylatta.com and until next week, let’s go do epic stuff.