Wouldn’t life be simple if we lived in an old Western where the good guys wore cowboy hats and the bad guys wore bandanas over their faces and ominous music started up to warn is of scary things? Unfortunately, life so not so cut and dry, and people are not so easily labeled as bad guys and good guys. The real life pattern at play is that a victim often becomes a bully, and we are left to make fuzzy distinction between the good guy and the bad guy.
I’m teaching a class at a seminar this week on coping with bullies on the classroom, and I’ve been thinking about how we as grown-ups are equipped to really deal with bullies. Unfortunately, even as adults we are faced with bullying at work and play, in old and new relationships, and sometimes even becoming our own bullies, using an internal self-talk that we wouldn’t dare inflict on another human. Fortunately, there are a few key tips to coping with bullying that work whether you find yourself facing that recognizable bandana-faced bully, the one in your own head, or worst of all slipping onto becoming the bully.
- Tell a grown up. Or a trusted friend, advisor, or best of all, a therapist. They can reflect with you on your behavior and choices. An outside voice can help you see where you need support, where you are reacting to hurts, and how you want to react.
- Identify what’s wrong. It seems a simple thing to state “that behavior is inappropriate” or “hey, I don’t like that” but calling something what it is, naming it, gives you power.
- Give a “no” and a “yes”. The phrase I teach children to use is “Don’t be mean to me again, but share with me as a friend.” You can translate this into grown up speak, even softening it with a little humor. “Hey, that was too far, the line is back here.”
It can be a hard thing to realize that bullying happens within your adult relationships, hardest of all to notice when you may have accidentally slipped into the role of bully. Speaking to those moments with your loved ones, knowing that the line between bully and bullied is not as simple as the playground rules would have us believe, these things can help us to be the person we want to be in our most treasured relationships.
