Taking offense easily is a bad habit and a manipulative tactic that demonstrates the inability to control one's emotions and feelings. Claiming that someone has offended you, without addressing the root cause of your anger, resentment or hurt feelings, is simply a form of impropriety and rudeness. The fact is, this claim doesn't help you get better and is an attempt to impose your preferences over someone else's. Sometimes people can really offend, but even in such extreme situations there are more productive ways to deal with it than to claim to be offended all the time. Don't try to change others with your hurt reaction; instead the way of seeing what is presented to you changes, rationally and sensitively.
Steps
Part 1 of 3: What Does It Get You?
Step 1. Consider what you get when you take offense
This can be a difficult question, but it can also be an important one to help you avoid turning offense into a habit. Some of the more common reasons behind being easily offended include:
- The need to control the situation and make it favorable. Gain control over people and do it your way.
- An immediate aversion to the views and behaviors of others. Imposing your point of view becomes crucial in self-assessing what matters to you.
- Follow a guide of rules that exists in your head. It helps you make sense of your life and your fixations. Unfortunately, guiding the rules is not in the minds of others, because it is your guide and as comfortable as it is, it self-justifies you.
- A disorder, paranoia or neurosis can easily lead to offense. Often this coincides with an unwillingness to examine one's feelings or contributions to a situation.
- Confusing sensations with rational thinking. In the heat of the moment it is easy to get confused, which however becomes almost unforgivable for the rest of the time. But for some people, this remains a belief they live by and it creates a lot of chagrin in those who interact with them.
- Your ego is a little out of control. So, everything they say has to be about you, right?
- You like to complain. Being in the spotlight and monopolizing gives results, and over time it has become a habit.
- Consider certain topics "off limits", especially when associated with religion, politics, nationalism, racism, sexism, death, taxes, or sex. Anything that doesn't fit your point of view on the subject is patently "offensive".
Step 2. Don't confuse being easily offended with being sensitive
One can be sensitive, but without always taking offense. It is how you react that matters, not your innate personality.
Part 2 of 3: Coping With Your Emotions
Step 1. Evaluate your reactions
What hurts or makes you sick tends to upset the emotions, and it becomes difficult to think clearly and very easy to react in the heat of the moment, feeling offended. And it is precisely when you are in this state that you must try not to respond with your emotions, which in that moment are driving your reaction instead of you.
Quickly assess your emotions. Ask yourself, "Is this worth suffering for?" "Is this worth making a scene about?"
Step 2. Talk to yourself
When you feel that, despite trying, you keep thinking about the offense, have a good chat with yourself. It seems like a weird thing, but when you talk to yourself, the consolation factor takes over and you have the opportunity to distance yourself and reflect on your emotions. It also offers you the opportunity to discover effective solutions to deal with the emotions you have let surface.
Step 3. Define your standards
Continuously reevaluate whether being offended deserves emotional exhaustion. If you are feeling defensive about this, consider the possibility that drama has become a form of support for you and that you somehow enjoy being the center of attention when you take offense.
It's not worth it if the person who made or makes you feel bad feels good about it and leaves you miserable for days, weeks, or even months. Guess who's paying: you. Show others that their bad behavior or attitude hasn't left a trace on you. Instead, live your life with joy all the time
Part 3 of 3: Responding to Offended Feelings
Step 1. Be open-minded enough to recognize without judging what you just heard, saw or discovered
The question is not whether an action, comment, joke, or behavior was intended to offend you. The point is your attitude and your willingness to look beyond the initial facade of what happened. Being open-minded does not mean that you will agree or even overlook the matter, but it will allow you to find extenuating reasons or even circumstances behind what happened.
- In life you will meet people of all kinds. You will not get along with everyone and some of them will have habits, beliefs and opinions that will clash with yours. This does not mean that they will necessarily be offensive people - it means that they are different and you need to take that into consideration before deciding that their way of doing things hurts your little comfortable world.
- Some people are good and kind, others are mean, but think about what drives them. Everyone gets bad sooner or later, from lack of sleep, fear of rejection, work stress, family worries, etc. Are you aware of what is going on in the life of the person who has offended you, or have you simply chosen to think that they have acted that way towards you out of sheer malice?
Step 2. Choose an optimistic point of view
Thinking too much about the things that arouse your emotions is like a vicious circle. This will feed itself and grow more and more, until you are absolutely convinced that you are right to think so badly of another person, because he dared to hurt your sacred beliefs.
- Don't think too much about what offended you.
- Stop taking everything seriously. There are things that deserve a serious attitude, but objectively it is not about most of them. Life must be lived, without the cage of frowning and rules.
- Bad investments won't make you profit, so bad emotions won't make you happy.
Step 3. Use a sense of humor
Lighten the matter and laugh at it, instead of choosing to cry. Whenever you feel offended by something, you react with an attitude like, "ouch, that's bad, but that's okay, patience". Show that you are strong enough to acknowledge offense and not overreact, indicating maturity and courage.
Step 4. Be aware that most people do not intend to harm
Most importantly, someone who barely knows you can accidentally trigger emotions in you without the slightest intention. This near stranger can say something inappropriate about something you are very sensitive to, such as the circumstances of a relative's death, a bad job, the mental illness you suffered. But it is precisely because this person hardly knows you that they have no idea that they have entered your private minefield. Give it a chance. If he had known, he wouldn't have made that inappropriate comment. This will be evident to you from his apology and embarrassment. Be magnanimous and accept it.
Step 5. Learn a lesson from all of this
When you find that certain words, jokes, or behaviors have the ability to offend you, you can do a few things:
- Learn to spot possible signs and change the subject of conversation.
- Diverge. Learn to drop the subject and find something more constructive to discuss or do instead.
- Get actively involved, so you can have control over a situation you don't like. For example, if the group or organization has offended you in any way, don't make it your personal crusade. Instead, go to the team / board / review committee / forum, etc. and learn rather than guess.
- Avoid being the offender. There is a saying: "I am offended by your offending you." This highlights the cyclical nature of being offended, which promotes more offenses and solves very little. Break the cycle by becoming responsible for your emotions and reactions.
Step 6. Find a good way to convey your opinions, ideas, and sense of humor that allows you to be clear and assertive, rather than intimidating, manipulative or domineering
Aim to be reasonable, sensitive, thoughtful and pleasant in the company of others. It's more challenging, but less exhausting than being on your toes, offending yourself for everything and everyone.
- Learn to disagree with kindness. It is fair to have your say and give vent to disagreement. But it's how you say it that matters, not the diversity of opinions.
- Assertiveness techniques can help you say your ideas and opinions without aggression, resentment, or shyness.
Advice
- Laugh at yourself and your imperfections. This shows that you are comfortable with yourself and don't worry about making a fool of yourself. Don't take yourself too seriously. Sometimes we take offense at the most trivial things because we have too high an opinion of ourselves. There's nothing wrong with loving yourself and being sure of yourself, but accepting that you're the butt of a joke doesn't mean you don't love yourself, or that others don't love you.
- You have better things to do. You have no time to waste on what other people think or say about you. When you feel offended, it means that you have let the words of others control your life and your feelings. When you take offense, you make them win.
- Beloved. An African proverb says: "If there is no enemy inside, the enemy outside cannot hurt us". When you love yourself (and your flaws), you have built a shield around yourself that no one can overcome. Feeling offended will become a thing of the past.
- Be positive if you want to avoid getting offended easily. Smile, be friendly, and try to be the best version of yourself. Remember that offensive behaviors and jokes don't deserve to have such a strong emotional impact.
Warnings
- Take it easy. Trust the people around you. Not everyone is out there to bite into you.
- Probably, reading about being easily offended will offend you. That's okay. You at least wanted to learn something and started unearthing your weaknesses.
- There is a big difference between a harmless joke from a friend of yours and people intoxicated by the need to hurt others. Learn to tell the difference, and kick those harmful people out of your life.
