There Are No Difficult People

I recently heard an interesting definition of trauma: what happens when you spend your life trying to get difficult people to treat you well.

In one sense, I like this definition because it expands our understanding of trauma beyond bruises and humiliations. Not being seen, understood, or valued can wound us just as deeply. In one way or another, we’ve all been wounded.

But I resist the idea that there’s a special category of “difficult people.” If we’ve all been wounded, then we’re all difficult in some way, which means no one really is.

Western psychology, which emerged alongside the rise of industrial machines, has taught us to imagine relationships as frictionless exchanges. So naturally, when there's friction, we look for the faulty part of the machine.

But people aren’t machines, and friction isn’t necessarily a sign something is wrong in a relationship. Moreover, pathologizing “difficult people” causes us to stop asking the more important question: Given that everyone's imperfect, what do I actually need relationships for?

In my coaching practice, I’ve found that people rarely come to me because they’ve encountered “difficult people.” They come because they’re not really sure what they need relationships for, so they default to models that ask them to endure harm or sacrifice deeper needs.

The Buddha proposed four signs of a healthy relationship: the people in it are generous, kind, responsive, and consistent. If you have people like that in your life, hold them close, no matter how weird or dysfunctional they seem.

Maybe your partner takes forever to leave the house. Maybe your friend can't make conversation at parties. Is that really a problem? Or is your idea of relationship shaped more by social pressure than by what truly nourishes you?

At some point, you’ll come to a fork in the road and have to choose.

As always, if you'd like to be held through your own process, contact me and we’ll set up a free sample coaching call.