We are all so different and although I do try to be pleasant some days, I don't feel like being pleasant. Last week..for some unknown reason, I nearly screamed at someone. Where ever we are if she comes across us, she has to sit beside me. I've never asked her to join us and although she appears to be a very pleasant person, I just don't like her. I can't explain why, apart from leaning over me up close, she hasn't actually done anything to me, so what is it about her that I find to dislike? Some of her comments are barbed, and she must be either hard of hearing or plainly down right rude, because she starts to talk when you are still talking and answering her. I've tried to analyse why I don't like her, but I don't know why.
When we first met some of my relatives in Australia, they were all very nice , but one, Coral the wife of Lance, who is a second cousin of my late mother (got it??) I didn't just like her, I loved her, right from the beginning, why? I couldn't tell you. We had written letters to each other, not emails, actually 'snail mail' letters. It all started when one cousin of my mother, wanted to write to someone from the 'old' country, Wales.. and as I was the one who wrote for my grandmother to her sister, my name was put forward. We wrote for quite a while, I got to know him quite well and secretly sort of loved him. When I learnt he had been killed in a car accident; I was very upset and took a day off work. His sister asked if I'd like to write to her as evidently my letters were shared. When she died her daughter in law, saw my last letter with a Christmas card and wrote to tell me, and that's how we got to know each other. What was it about Coral that I loved? I don't know, we are still in contact, now via the internet. She has a warm way about her that appealed to me from the first moment I met her, and I still love her!
So why do we like some people and not others?
Chrisxx
We can't like every one we meet. Some just hit us the wrong way and some we just connect with right away. I don't think there is any explanation for it. I think we can be kind to everyone even if they are not our favorite person.
ReplyDeleteThis is an all too familiar thing. I too have some people I like and some I don't. That's because they have some traits I like and I don't respectively. Those characteristics might be very obvious, they might not be.
ReplyDeleteThe way around is to minimise association with people we don't like, and maximise the association with people we like.
By the way, glad to note about the snail mail habit. I have a friend in Britain, and we both write snail mails.
I have a neighbour just like the woman you dislike, she is very vocal in her views, I stopped going to my BSL group because she car shared with me (she had her own car) I got fed up of her views and was worried she might tell someone I agreed with her. We have not spoken for months and I hope to keep it that way.
ReplyDeleteIt's not normal to like everyone and not normal to hate everyone. There has to be some middle ground. Who you choose to like has something to do with how you value yourself. If you insist on being everyone's best friend, eventually they expect more from you than what you are willing to give. Happy says we can be kind to everyone. I don't think you can, and nor should you have to. Spend more time with people you like, and less with people you don't like.
ReplyDeleteI guess the short answer is we like people who like us. In the dim dark past England was called the mother country, and working holidays to the UK were the thing. The main form of O/S communication was aerogrammes. It was a two week turn around and how exciting it was to receive a letter from home. Phone calls were expensive and no one on a working holiday was rich. With instant communication that excitement is no longer there. I treasure the aerogrammes I still have, saved from a different era.
ReplyDeleteWe cannot like everyone or expect to be liked by everyone. It's hard when you like someone and that feeling is not reciprocated.
ReplyDeleteIt is strange how some people raise the hackles instantly and how often those same people seem totally oblivious to the effect they have on others. An ex-neighbour springs to mind - outwardly smiley and friendly, yet I couldn't warm to her and I my instincts proved right when she turned out to be pure poison. Trust your instincts. Our ancestors did and that's why we are all here to tell the tale today.
ReplyDeleteGood question. It will be worth money if you can figure it out!
ReplyDeleteIt is odd, isn't it? I have noticed tvat my husband dislikes loud men, and usually doesn't like professional men, until he allows himself to get to know them i think it's his inferiority complex talking there! There are not many people i really dislike, but those who talk and don't listen, i have little time for. Because if they are not interested in me, why in the world should I care about them?
ReplyDelete