We encounter negative people in our lives all the time, be they work colleagues, friends or even partners. If you find yourself at the mercy of someone with a bleak attitude, the worst thing you can do is feed that point of view. Instead, ask simple questions to get them thinking about their problems in a different light.
Image: Sam Howzit / Flickr, licensed under Creative Commons 2.0
Over at The Muse, Aja Frost offers seven replies you can give to people who are firing out negativity, with most responses accepting the bad and attempting to turn it into a positive or learning experience.
Rather than gloss over the situation, Frost promotes exposing the good and making sure the person you’re talking to understands that reinforcing a gloomy frame of mind doesn’t help anyone.
For example, don’t immediately dismiss a person’s negative comment — it can often be better to take it on board, even if you disagree:
2. “Wow, that sucks. But I’m pretty impressed with how positive you’ve managed to stay about the whole thing.”
In the same way that telling people that they’re really hard workers motivates them to work harder and live up to that reputation, commenting on someone’s “impressive” fortitude incentivizes them to be less negative.
The Muse article contains more replies, so be sure to hit up the site to read them in full.
7 Perfect Replies to (Politely) Shut Down Negative People [The Muse]
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