Understanding

Today's Quote: "Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves." ~ Carl Jung

Today's Question: Who is irritating you? What message can you take from it?

A Bit About Me:

We are all one another's mirrors of reflection. When we have a very strong reaction to someone and say "oh so and so is so irritating and so infuriating", we may be seeing something in that person which we haven't fully accepted in ourselves yet. Let me give you an example.

A client of mine was very angry at his manager for always thinking he knew what was best for him. He was constantly being irritated by his boss's approach to his work and how he always had a better way of doing things. I asked him what the quality his manager was displaying was. He said it was controlling and egotistical. I then asked him to close his eyes and look for anytime in his life where he had displayed these qualities. He got quite passionate and said straight away, "never, I would never be like him, I couldn't. I am so not controlling and ego filled." I asked him to really dig deep and see if he had ever in his life displayed those qualities. Again he huffed and puffed and I remained quiet.

Eventually he said "well, I do tell my wife what she should wear sometimes when we go out. I wouldn't call that controlling though. I just like her to look her best when we go to work functions. I like people to see how beautiful my wife is."

I remained quiet. I heard his intake of breath and he said "That is rather controlling huh? And I guess you could even say that I my ego is telling me to promote my wife too."

So you have displayed those qualities in the past. "Yes" came his quiet voice.

So the next time you see your boss displaying those qualities, please will you let me know what happens now you can see that you have that in you too?"

He was still quite resistant but he said he would.

What happens is when we can accept the qualities in someone who irritates us and see them in ourselves then they lose their power to annoy us when we see them displayed before us.

Try it for yourself and please let me know what happened!