Severe Personality clashes

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Does anyone here just flat out not like someone they know and have to deal with a lot... at all?

Some people in my life I have little time for, some, I have none. It must be a personality clash because most people seem to like them. I get along with a lot of different types of people, but some the flag goes up straight away - I don't like this persons personality. I don't have any time for them when I don't have to deal with them. Some you realise straight away, some it takes a while.

Are people so blind that they can't see through people's sugar shells to the patheticness within? Because ignorance in this way really bothers me. Maybe they can, and like them anyway... maybe two people I can't stand get along...

I've just gotten rid of an offline friend, that I've experienced personality clashes with.

The only time I don't like someone is if they do something really reprehensible.

So you never instantly don't gel with someones personality?

Yeah, the Managing Director of the last company I worked for was a major league a**hole but as his office was next to mine I used to see a lot of him, especially when he couldn't get 'the internet thingy' to work. I suffered in silence because he paid my salary every month but when I came to leave my resignation letter mentioned him a lot, and it was so good that people printed it out and put it on notice boards. WP policies mean that I can't reproduce it here but, let's say it got right to the point.

Vanilla_Slice

I don't gel with anyone, but I don't dislike anyone unless they've actually done something to bring about a reason to dislike them.

I'm not getting at the whole "I don't like you because you've wronged me) That is what I would think of someone i gelled with, AND someone I didn't if they did that.

I just mean you really find it hard to get along with someone because of their personality.

I think that no matter who you are you are going to experience personality clashes. I probably clash with more people than most because I am very opinionated.

The best way I have found to deal with them is be sort of fake-nice to them. If they say something insulting pretend it didnt happen and just say what you would normally say to anyone. The person will realise they cant annoy you no matter how hard they try and they will get bored with it and hopefully just deal with you in a distant but civilised matter.

There are very few people I dislike and I have never disliked someone strictly due to a conflict of personalities. I've met maybe three people in my life who I've generally avoided as a means to remain civil and on good terms with them.

One, I know makes a lot of effort to be a nice person, but tends to be a bit too sharp and condescending at times, and it takes a lot of effort for me not to shoot back, which I know would not be well received. So it's best we keep our distance.

The other was just...well, how do I put this. An @$$hole. The thing is, he didn't mean to be. He was the type of person who could dish it out like it was nothing but couldn't take it himself. He was completely oblivious to the impact of his words or actions on others, and when they came back at him he'd act as if he'd been poked in the eye with a stick. He actually didn't get along with anyone because of this. All of his relationships were stormy.

The last was the former gardener. He was absolutely impossible. No matter how polite we were to him, he was always pessimistic and rude. He was truly the most pessimistic person I have ever met. He never smiled, and he would sling unprovoked insults at people out of nowhere (no, not tourettes), in the middle of otherwise civil conversations, and nearly got one of the neighbors' fists in his face from it. He also destroyed some holiday decorations we had out on the lawn, which we really should have brought up with the property management but it wasn't worth my time.

Other than that, I tolerate most people....however I should also note I generally have a 2-4 hour maximum exposure limit for people in general, and much shorter if you live with me.

They don't have to have wronged me, they could have wronged someone else, or hurt an animal. Or they could have reprehensible views, like being a racist for instance, and I would dislike them. But I don't see the reason to actually not like someone just because I don't gel with them or even find them irritating. I find everyone irritating, but I don't think they're bad people because of it. I think what you're expressing is a pretty mean-spirited point of view, to be honest.

Generally no, I can't see through "sugar shells". In fact, many times I will hear my mother or sisters call someone who I thought was perfectly nice 'fake" or "superficial" and I rarely see them as that way.

I usually interpret overt niceness, when I detect it, as someone who is trying really hard to be nice, which I usually interpret as some type of insecurity...usually in that they really want people to like them and are worried people won't.

I understand some people are overtly nice when they want something and are only being nice for that reason, but in most cases where my mother or sisters have called a person superficial, I've never detected that the person wanted anything other than to be liked.

So if there is an ultimate goal here other than, which that they are trying to achieve, it's lost on me, and thus, for people who do have an ulterior motive, their tactics usually fail on me, because people have to explicitly ask me for things.

I often wonder if there is this weird "invisible" "thing" that NT's try to steal, guard, and protect, that they perceive these people are trying to get from them.

I used to work with a girl who I was quite impressed with as she was very good at being fake nice to customers. Had I been a customer I would have honestly thought she was being sincere. One thing I didn't understand is why she felt the need to be so nice when she didn't mean it. Civil would have sufficed and being super nice didn't improve her chances of getting a raise of being promoted. We weren't allowed to accept tips, and no one tried to offer her one, and she was on good terms with the boss and never reprimanded for anything or told to be that nice. So I never understood why she put so much effort into it if she didn't mean it. The only reason I could come up with was she was worried one of the customers might think poorly of her, though I'm not sure why they would if she were civil, and I'm not sure why she would care if they didn't think she was the sweetest thing on the planet.

Yes...I have this problem a lot of the time. People will rub me the wrong way through no fault of their own. I will be irritated by simple interactions..or something as petty as the sound of someone's voice and the way they say things.....and I can't be polite and pretend to like them..it just does not work that way...If I am repelled by someone, I will continue to be repelled by them and I can't snap out of it.

Overall, my social interactions have improved greatly and I want to keep doing better. Sometimes I'm strangely more comfortable around strangers than I am at building close interpersonal relationships because you can sort of have a one night stand with a stranger, metaphorically speaking. I figure a lot of times things boil down to chemistry, and there is genetic chemistry, and social chemistry. Sometimes I don't gel with a person and its not because they're a bad person or anything. Sometimes I get exhausted by people who are nothing but sunshine. I have some trouble with some of my wife's siblings. I think I freeze because they are so happy, healthy, boisterous, and carefree and I find it difficult to integrate because most of my family was either severely f****d up or quiet plus I have certain traits of aspergers/OCD. I also have some trouble being with my own brother though he is a genuinely difficult person in some regards. Around certain people and small groups I can be very charming and warm, however. I'm going to try to do better with my wife's family though, I'm the a**hole in this particular situation. I've been in a work environment where I clashed with almost everyone I worked with, particularly other youngsters.

Last edited by Shadwell on 07 Jun 2010, 10:06 am, edited 6 times in total.

Yes that can be a problem........luckily outside the world of work there aren't many people who you can't get away from pretty easily - exceptions are your parents (until you're old enough to legally escape), your own kids, and possibly spouses to some extent. There are also rules in some social circles that you stick by your relatives, though there usually isn't a lot they can do about it if you choose to break the mould. Probably more of a problem for people who socialise a lot, they might want one person removing from their group but nobody else feels that strongly, so they have to either lose the group or tolerate the one they have problems with.

So for me it's not been much of a problem.......I didn't mind having to tolerate my son, though I knew that if he'd been a mere guest then he'd have been out on his ear very quickly. I've always minded having nasty people thrust onto me at work, and that's one of the main reasons why I want to get away from work as soon as I can afford to. Socially, if I don't like somebody, I just keep away from them, even if it means leaving a group.....curiously, the most horrible people have usually eventually been cast out by the other group members, so maybe my idea of a nasty person is pretty close to mainstream thinking.

With girlfriends and spouses, once I've found that they can be harmful to me, I've often felt torn between working at solving it and ending the relationship......when I first started I very much erred on the side of keeping it going at all costs, so I was often ridiculously tolerant, then I seemed to go the other way, being rather trigger-happy with ending things......more recently I've again become more reluctant to dump partners. It's so hard to know, in a relationship, whether to give more or to read the riot act.

It's mean spirited not to gel with someone? I don't think so. If someone has an arrogance or idiocy about their personality, I don't consider it mean spirited to not understand them or find it hard to tolerate them. I never said they were "bad people" Theres nothing wrong with most of them, they just are not my type and I can't go them.

Like this one girl I sed to work with, and this other guy who was a lapdog and arrogant for example.

I know it well, both directions - the guy who walks into the room and instantaneously I KNOW I cannot deal with him, and the other one who sees me and hates me despite all my wonderful traits.

Often they are one and the same. I think the instinct is there - though some do not hear it so clearly, and others [my wife for example] try to overcome it.