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    Take the Bully by the Horns: Stop Unethical, Uncooperative, or Unpleasant People from Running and Ruining Your Life
    Take the Bully by the Horns: Stop Unethical, Uncooperative, or Unpleasant People from Running and Ruining Your Life
    Take the Bully by the Horns: Stop Unethical, Uncooperative, or Unpleasant People from Running and Ruining Your Life
    Ebook333 pages5 hours

    Take the Bully by the Horns: Stop Unethical, Uncooperative, or Unpleasant People from Running and Ruining Your Life

    By Sam Horn

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    About this ebook

    In Take the Bully by the Horns, Sam Horn offers simple, prescriptive verbal techniques for dealing with bullies.

    How often have you wished you knew how to defuse the difficult people who wreak havoc on your life? Whether it's a neighbor who keeps disturbing your peace, an employer who manipulates you into unpaid overtime, a spouse who criticizes and controls your every move, a colleague who uses scare tactics to intimidate you, or a student who teases your child without mercy, Take the Bully by the Horns will give you real-life strategies stop people from taking advantage of you, including how to:

    * Adopt a "don't you dare" attitude
    * Refuse to play The Blame-Shame Game
    * Beat em to the punch...line
    * Stop paying the price of nice
    * Put all kidding aside
    * Act on your anger instead of suffering in silence
    * Savior Self from martyrs and guilt-mongers
    * Not be victimized by crazy-making Jekyll/Hyde personalities
    * Adopt the Clarity Rules and Rights

    With these tools, you can take back your peace of mind and your sanity. You'll be able to fight back constructively and prevent harassment by bullies, from the workplace to the schoolyard. The bold suggestions in Take the Bully by the Horns will show you once and for all how to convince unfair or unkind relatives, co-workers, customers, or strangers to either behave cooperatively or leave you alone.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Publishers
    Release dateSep 9, 2003
    ISBN9781429975612
    Take the Bully by the Horns: Stop Unethical, Uncooperative, or Unpleasant People from Running and Ruining Your Life
    Author

    Sam Horn

    Sam Horn, president of Action Seminars, has presented her real-life workshops to more than 400,000 people since 1981. Her impressive client list includes Young Presidents Organization, National Governors Association, Hewlett-Packard, Four Seasons Resort, the Fortune 500 Forum, the US Navy, and the IRS. She was the top rated speaker at both the 1996 and 1998 International Platform Association conventions in Washington DC, and is the emcee of the world-renowned Maui Writers Conference. She is the author of Tongue Fu!, What's Holding You Back?, and ConZentrate, which have been featured in Readers Digest, The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Cosmopolitan, Entertainment Weekly, Family Circle, Bottom Line Personal, and Executive Female, to name a few. She is a frequent media guest who has appeared on numerous TV and radio shows, including "To Tell the Truth" and NPR's popular "Diane Rehm Show." She lives with her sons Tom and Andrew in Virginia.

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      Book preview

      Take the Bully by the Horns - Sam Horn

      Way I. Bully for You?

      At the age of four with paper hats and wooden swords

      we are all generals—only some of us never grow out of it.

      —PETER USTINOV

      A WOMAN SAID, WHEN I THINK OF BULLIES, I PICTURE SOMEONE like Bluto out of the Popeye cartoon. You know, a big brute with hairy arms and bulging biceps. Is that what you’re talking about?

      Nope, that’s not what we’re talking about. Bullies don’t necessarily wear black hats or have bulging biceps. They come in all shapes, sizes, genders, ages, and professions. Ninety-year-old grannies can be bullies. Ministers can be bullies. Coaches can be bullies.

      A bully is someone who knowingly abuses the rights of others to gain control of the situation and the individual(s) involved. Bullies deliberately and persistently use intimidation and manipulation to get their way. The key words here are knowingly, deliberately, and persistently.

      All of us are difficult on occasion. Bullies are difficult on purpose. We may be uncooperative or unpleasant in particular situations. Bullies are uncooperative and unpleasant as part of their strategy. Most of us respond to reasonable efforts to get along. Bullies reject reasonable efforts to get along because they don’t want a win-win—they want to win.

      Bullies Aim Below the Belt

      He couldn’t see a belt without hitting below it.

      —MARGOT ASQUITH

      The following questionnaire can help you determine whether a challenging individual in your life qualifies as a bona fide bully. The question is, does s/he hit below the ethical belt accidentally or aim below the ethical belt intentionally? If you are dealing with several difficult individuals, take the time to fill this out separately for each one. Answer the questions, rating the frequency of these behaviors from 1 (Rarely) to 3 (Occasionally) to 5 (Often). Go with your instinct. Your first answer is usually the most honest because it comes from the gut, not the intellect.

      35 or below: This individual is not a bully. He/she may be unpleasant to deal with once in a while; however, win-win communication on your part will enable the two of you to coexist cooperatively most of the time.

      36–55: This person may occasionally exhibit bully behavior. You may need to escalate your response in those situations so s/he understands that that particular behavior is inappropriate. If you keep your cool and communicate constructively, you’ll usually be able to resolve what’s wrong, repair the relationship, and move forward, not much worse for wear.

      56–75: Uh-oh. It looks like you’ve got a full-blown bully on your hands. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200. Get your pen out, sit down, and start taking notes so you can begin planning how to stop this individual from running and ruining your life.

      No One Deserves to Be Bullied

      Chaos, panic, and disorder—my work here is done.

      —T-SHIRT SLOGAN

      Do you have someone in your life who scores higher than 35 on this test? You’re in the right place because we’re going to address how to handle every single one of the behaviors mentioned above. We’re not going to dwell on how to deal with ordinary difficult people. There are plenty of books that already do a good job of covering that topic. We’re going to focus on how to deal with egregiously difficult people whose goal is to spread chaos, panic, and disorder.

      A woman in a seminar asked, Why do bullies act the way they do? It’s hard for me to understand why anyone would deliberately harm another person. Good question. The next chapter explains what’s behind bully behavior. Knowing why they do what they do can keep us from being knocked off balance when they try to pull one of their dirty tricks.

      Action Plan and Discussion Questions

      Think of the most challenging individual in your life. Does s/he qualify as a bully? Why or why not?_____________________________________________

      _____________________________________________

      _____________________________________________

      Does this individual exhibit other destructive behaviors that weren’t on this questionnaire? What are they?_____________________________________________

      ______________________________________________

      _____________________________________________

      Which of these behaviors does s/he indulge in most? Give an example of how s/he does this to you_____________________________________________

      _____________________________________________

      _____________________________________________

      Now, take the test for yourself. Do you exhibit some of these characteristics? Which ones?_____________________________________________

      _____________________________________________

      ___________________________________________

      If you discovered that you sometimes behave like a bully, are you willing to read this book and look for ways you can treat people more compassionately? Explain._____________________________________________

      _____________________________________________

      _____________________________________________

      Summary

      Way 2. Understand the Nature of the Beast

      Were we fully to understand the reasons for other people’s behavior,

      it would all make sense.

      —SIGMUND FREUD

      YOU’VE HEARD THE PHRASE KNOWLEDGE IS POWER? WELL, understanding why bullies act the way they do gives us power because we’re not caught off guard by their tactics. If we know what they’re trying to achieve, we can often outwit them instead of being at wit’s end.

      People bully for a variety of reasons; the main ones being (1) they feel inferior and they’re compensating; (2) they feel no remorse; (3) they feel justified; and (4) they lack another way. Look over the following causes and reflect on which might be contributing to the destructive disposition of the bullies in your life. Note that bullies may have one, some, or all of these triggering factors. Check yes or no by the ones you think might be motivating your bully to act the way s/he does.

      Some People Bully Because They Feel Inferior

      The better we feel about ourselves, the fewer times we have to

      knock someone down in order to feel tall.

      —ODETTA

      The classic explanation that people bully because they have low self-worth is true much of the time. Look beneath a bully’s brusque exterior and you find someone who constantly compares him or herself to other people and comes up short. Bullies hate feeling that others are more talented, popular, or successful. Instead of taking the mature, responsible route to improve themselves so they become better, they take the immature, irresponsible route and make others feel bad so that they can feel better. Many of their aggressive behaviors are designed to prove to the world and themselves that they are superior instead of inferior.

      Think about it. Confident people like themselves as they are. They feel no need to put other people down to feel big. Bullies, on the other hand, don’t like themselves and compensate for it in a variety of unhealthy ways, including:

      FAULT-FINDING. By keeping attention on other people’s perceived or projected shortcomings, bullies hope to keep attention off their own. This was humorously pointed out in a classic Peanuts cartoon strip. Linus asks Lucy: Why are you always so anxious to criticize? Lucy responds, I just have a knack for seeing other people’s faults. Linus protests, What about your own faults? Lucy answers, I have a knack for overlooking them.

            Does the bully in your life pounce on your every mistake? Does s/he focus on your foibles to avoid having to examine or admit her or his own? ____ yes ____ no

      TAKING CONTROL. During a Larry King Live TV show on CNN, real estate mogul Donald Trump showed his bully stripes. Trump disingenuously asked King, Do you mind if I sit back a little? Because your breath is very bad. It really is. Has this been told to you before? King, taken aback, replied, No. Trump trumped with, "Okay, then, I won’t

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