We don’t always like people. People are both nasty and difficult. And sometimes you want people to like you — this makes it more pleasant to be among them yourself, and this is sometimes necessary for business. Relationships are mirrored in many ways, and if we like someone, then most likely someone likes us. The opposite is also true: if we have some kind of hostile feeling towards a person, then most likely it will become mutual after a while. If we cannot directly influence another person, then we can completely influence ourselves and our attitude towards this person.
First, pay attention to your body: maybe you just feel bad or tired. When a person is sick, all the people around become more disgusting for him. You can check yourself this way: are you healthy or not. If you walk down the street and see how nice people are around you and meet you, you notice beautiful faces and kind eyes — you are healthy. If all some muzzles are crooked and there is not a single decent person, you may still get sick. Everything is simple here — take a rest, take care of your health, and you will have more positive feelings towards people.
Another basis for good feelings is normal relationships. If a person regularly runs into you, makes reproaches and claims, and tells bad things about you behind your back, it is difficult to love him and simply not quite adequate. First you need to put things in order in your relationship. If you have enough weight, if not only you depend on this person, but he also depends on you, then sometimes it is enough to talk openly and, in fact, offer neutrality, agree on normal relations. If you offer interesting conditions, it goes away with adequate people, especially since there are many other methods for improving relations. If a person is not quite adequate or you do not have leverage over him, use little tricks, namely the technique of changing the internal image: learn to see him as funny.
To make your work colleague stop annoying you and maybe even become closer to you, you can imagine him in a comical way — in ridiculous clothes, with a funny hairstyle, etc. This distracts from the negative, amuses and, as a result, improves your mood .
And sometimes it happens that a person is not bad in principle, he doesn’t do anything bad to you, but there is no relationship with him and there is no warm attitude towards him in his soul. I would like to treat him better, but somehow it does not work out. What can you do to make someone like you more?
Use the technique «We draw out the pluses.» Here you need to turn on your head and answer your questions about what is good in a particular person and what unites us. This is a well-known fact: if a person is similar to us in some way, if something unites us, we like him more. Therefore, if we want to treat a person better, we need to find in him more merits and what you have in common. Look! It may turn out that you both graduated from high school with a mathematical bias, and then a bridge will appear between you and this person. It may turn out that you both graduated from a technical university or, conversely, a humanitarian one. Maybe you love the same literature. When you find a common “we”, it becomes much easier to communicate with this person. If we notice in a person some virtues that we have not seen before, then it becomes easier for us to communicate, our attitude towards the person changes, and then after some time, not always instantly, the attitude of another person changes. It’s not a fact that you will become best friends or girlfriends, but the relationship will definitely be better than it was.
It is more difficult when we do not see any pluses in some person, only minuses. In this case, you can apply a strategy called «Gold coins and black coins.» Any medal has two sides, the same for any human quality. For example, we resent the impudence in another person, and this is the “black” side. Question: Can this side be flipped to «gold»? Of course you can. Maybe it’s perseverance, maybe directness, maybe even sincerity. And if we turn the black coin over to the golden side, then it is already easier to relate to this quality. The same can be done with other qualities. For example, some people are annoyed by stinginess. Perhaps this is frugality, thrift. After this technique is done at the level of consciousness, you can simply write out on a sheet of paper in one column those minuses that you see in a person and turn them over to some pluses or at least neutral qualities. It is more pleasant to communicate with a straightforward economical person than with a sassy greedy person. Life becomes easier, life becomes more fun, and relationships are built easier.
There is another great tool. Our feelings follow our deeds. Try, treat the person kindly — what if your feelings change after these actions? Leo Tolstoy once wrote, retelling worldly wisdom known before him: we like people not so much for the good they have done for us, but for the good that we have done for them. This is a big truth. We really become closer and more like people in whom we began to invest our care and kindness. How can I do that?
Imagine that you are giving a gift. In this case, the simplest and cheapest thing to do is to give a person the most joyful gift for him. You don’t need any money and no shops, do it only in your imagination, but do it honestly: look, think about what gift this person’s face will bloom from, what will truly please him. Approach this creatively: give this child a resilient ringing ball, give that official a thick briefcase stuffed with bundles of money, give your grandmother a long-awaited letter from your beloved grandson, give this couple a crazy ride on a boat flying through the waves, give this young man a luxury car, and to that tired woman — a huge fragrant bouquet and congratulations from friends …
If suddenly this is possible, give the person attention and help! Do it not because that person badly needs it, do it — for yourself! If you voluntarily or involuntarily helped a person, rendered assistance, then you will need to explain to yourself why you did it. Well, not foolishly? The simplest explanation that people almost unconsciously find for their good deeds is: “Because there is something (good) in this person” (see what Cognitive Dissonance is, and you will understand the psychological mechanism of this phenomenon). And after that, they treat a person with greater benevolence and sympathy.
Also, say nice things to the person. Especially good — about him and from the heart.
As one of the readers of the Psychologos, Victor, wrote: “If the person to whom I want to improve my attitude is a woman, it was very useful for me to find in her some good trait, feature, deed (it is important that for me it was truly true) and tell her from the bottom of my heart. This is usually not difficult if you observe the person a little. This woman’s attitude towards me improves after that and slightly automatically improves my attitude towards her.
The results of the experiments also support the conclusion that positive actions towards someone increase sympathy for that person. The service we have provided, the support, as a rule, increases our sympathy for the people to whom we have rendered this service or provided support. If you want to love someone more, act like it’s already a fait accompli (from D. Myers’ book «Social Psychology»).
Sometimes you will begin to perceive a person differently when you find a more positive point of view. Each person has many facets, and the attitude towards a person often depends on the position from which you evaluate a person, from what point of view you look at him. If you look at a person through the eyes of those who love and appreciate him, you will be able to discern and understand in him something that you did not notice before. Hence the reception: “And who loves him?”
One can imagine that someone loves and appreciates this “nasty” person, waiting at home — parents, children, spouses, a dog, finally! It is very precious and very important to someone. My relatives and beloved people are immediately remembered, and it becomes light and easy!
And the most trouble-free remedy — «Read in an adult — a child.» Children usually cause unaccountable sympathy. And if we manage to discern in an adult the baby that he once was, warm feelings rise in us towards this person. He used to be cute too!
Looking at a person, try to imagine what kind of child he was — for example, a first-grader. We were all small once, everyone once expected to go to school, everyone dreamed that we would go with real briefcases and sit at real desks. If this is a man, try to see in him a little boy (did he have short hair?), Who, with a knapsack behind his back, is busily walking next to his father or mother. Is he being held by the hand or is he walking on his own? In which hand is he holding flowers? What is his facial expression? Do you want to wish him happiness on his way? And if you look at a woman, then try to imagine what dress she was wearing when she went to school, did she have a huge white bow in her hair? What’s in her big baby eyes? Do you like her?
Finally, let’s sum up. If you slept well and feel good, if you have established normal relations with a person, discerned his merits and found what unites you, took steps towards him — they were the first to say kind words to him, did something kind in his direction, or at least did something virtual to him a nice gift, if you saw a cute child in him, then you will have a good day today and a good relationship will begin to develop with this person. Check it!
If nothing helps you (this happens too), then contact a psychologist or psychotherapist. This is where you need to take yourself seriously. Distrust of people, a high level of fears and anxiety, long-standing resentment, severe negativism… the reason has to be found and it will be necessary to work with yourself, but if you set the task to change all this, everything is real. Not everything happens quickly, but those who go forward reach the goal. Good luck to all of us!