Do you know a BDA? A battery draining app. Someone who drains your energy. You walk away from an interaction with a BDA and you feel empty, exhausted and depressed.
I had a table next to a BDA recently. It’s an event I’ve sold my soaps at for 6 years and each year I am placed next to her. She complains about everything. The lack of pedestrian traffic. The lack of serious buyers. The lack of advertising for the event. The clothing on people who pass by. Their weight and hairstyle. How long it took her to get to the event. The food at the event. How much they want for the food at the event. The other vendors. Another vendor has the same items she is selling. No one is coming over to her table. (I can’t imagine why…)
She complains that I am not listening to her. In 6 years, nothing I have said to her makes a difference. So, yes, I am no longer listening to her. I set up my table and positioned my chair to have the least amount of interaction with her as I can. I don’t mind being an occasional sounding board. We all need to vent sometimes and I’ve done my share. This however, is relentless. I can feel my breathing become shallow and my muscles tense. She says something and I ignore her. Am I being rude to her? Probably. But I believe by engaging her I am being disrespectful to myself and not valuing my limited resources.
The site Live with Confidence has some good ideas on how to handle negative people. I like to imagine I’m inside one of my soapy bubbles and their complaints just bounce right off. Silly, I know, but for me it works.
How do you protect yourself from a battery draining app?
Yours in Gratitude,
Angela
You already know how I feel about that topic!
I sure do Roberta! 🙂
You’re not being rude. You can’t let people like that bring you down. It doesn’t matter if you listen or not, or give the best advice or not. Everyone’s happiness is up to themselves. And you choose to be happy by tuning her negativity out.
Thank you Donna. I did feel like I was being rude, but I knew I couldn’t listen to her anymore without feeling depleted. I do choose to be happy.
There is usually always a positive side, I try to point it out. It can be a losing battle, changing the subject helps. I love your idea about a soap bubble.
Thanks Sharon, my bubble helps me feel protected from all that negativity.