Here's an interesting question...
A friend informs you that you have upset them for some reason, but in your view that person has no legitimate reason to be upset - How should you handle it? Blow them off, let time do it's work? Try to reason with them about the issue? Accept that their response is legitimate for them? I don't think you should tell them that they shouldn't be upset. That's not likely to fix the problem. In fact, it can be demeaning to them. You could certainly explain that it wasn't your intention to upset them, and try to make amends. There's even the possibility that you were in the wrong without realizing it. Call it a 'blindspot'.
What's the over-arching factor that would go in to your response?
Wow, this just happened to me yesterday...
ReplyDeleteThe advice I got was to acknowledge that they feel hurt - that experience for them is real, whether I intended to hurt them or not, for some reason they got hurt. Then also acknowledge that it wasn't your intention to hurt them and you're sorry that it did hurt them.
Now the fun (sarcasm) part is when they tell you they're upset with you for some things but they don't want to talk about it. Sooo...you have no idea what you did that they've been hurt by!
Now in this instance, if they're not willing to talk about it and you have done the above steps, then you gotta let that person deal with it on their own. Put the ball into their court and tell them you're up for playing some ball when they're ready...but you can't just sit and stew on that enigmatic statement of "you've hurt me but I'm not telling how..."
As far as it depends on you, live at peace with all...sometimes you can't resolve everything. There ya go, you got me to comment on two posts in one day and thanks for providing the impetus for it Rob!