Ya Know Ya Catch More Flies with Honey, Honey. (even though things can get sticky)

A little while back, I was the lucky recipient of a verbal attack, in a professional meeting, by someone I consider to be a friend. Not a disagreement, an attack. This person’s words were very out of place, out of nowhere, and unkind. I was stunned and barely responded. It was so unexpected and illogical that I just had no response. The other people in the meeting felt the awkwardness, ignored the comments, and kept the conversation moving on the appropriate topic.

In the hours after the meeting, I, of course, thought about what happened, but never got angry. I never had feelings of ill will or desire for revenge.

Now let’s go back in time. Let’s review my relationship with this person.

I have known this person for about 2 years. For the first 12-18 months, he was never too friendly towards me. Nonetheless, I would always take the initiative to say hello and try to maintain friendliness. In other words, I tried not to take his unfriendliness personally. Over the course of these many months, nothing ever changed. I was friendly; he was not. What I noticed, though, was that he wasn’t too friendly with a lot of people. When someone acts like that, it usually means that person needs more love, not less.

So, I set out on a mission to show more kindness to him and to create a better relationship. Shortly thereafter I was gifted the perfect opportunity. We had a great conversation about family and life. He confided in me about some struggles going on in his life. It was a breakthrough. I followed up our conversation with a thank you card and some words about how much I appreciated our conversation, which I did.

The unfriendliness towards me was gone. Mission accomplished.

Fast-forward a few months and then I receive this weird, undeserved verbal attack.

Now what do I do with this? Reach out to him? Attack back? I opted to do absolutely nothing. Just to LET it be.

Just over 48 hours pass and I get a phone call from my friend. I couldn’t answer so it went to voicemail. The message he left went something like this, “I owe you the biggest apology. I am mortified about what I said to you in that meeting. I don’t know where it came from but should not have been directed at you. I’ve lost a lot of sleep over it. I really value our friendship and I am just SOOO sorry. I will apologize to you publicly at our next meeting…(etc.)”.

He and I now have something to talk about. I hope I can help him deal with his issues. The point to the story is that kindness always prevails. It is better to be kind than to be right. When someone doesn’t treat you the way you think they should, it often has NOTHING to do with you. You never know what is going on in their life. They may be hurting on the inside and looking for a fight as a result. It doesn’t mean you have to give it to them.

I am not in any way lessened by this person’s actions.

Choose love and let the result be what it may. Life is better that way.