Stop Being a Punching Bag!

by Saalik Siddikki

Does everybody feel tempted to use you as a punching bag, any time and anywhere without expecting a counter-blow?  If so, you are trapped in a terrific situation.  What should you do – drop down to disintegrate or build resistance to be felt rock-hard and cause an agonizing reaction to the punchers? The choice is exclusively your own. 

There would have been a number of reasons for your state of being a punching bag and these reasons must have roots deep into your early childhood.  Now recall your memories when you were perhaps six or eight year old. 

·        Did everybody at home make a mockery of you?

·        Were you the only one, for everyone at home and in the neighbourhood, to be taken as a natural scapegoat for everything wrong done by others?

·        Did you always or mostly feel nervous in the company of boys of your age group or a bit elder and preferred to avoid their presence around?

·        Was it usually your mom whose lap was always the best solace for you?

·        Were you ignored by your parents, brothers and sisters for no apparent reasons?

·        Were you underweight and skinny and felt misfit in the atmosphere?

·        Did you have any other weakness in your personality that prevented you from expressing your true self before others?

·        Did your teachers treat you as the twelfth man of their team?

·        Did you take shelter in escaping from challenging situations that required leadership initiatives?

Well, nobody in the world could help you determine the reasons that transformed you, slowly, silently and irritatingly, into a punching bag.  You could never have been satisfied with yourself in accepting such a humiliating existence.  There would be moments when you might have had an irresistible urge to rebel against your helplessness, to explode like a volcano.  The question is why didn’t you?  What stopped you from breaking the shackles of torture and agonizing pain? 

Think about it seriously.  It was always you who chose to nestle in the comfort zone of complacence and retreat instead of stubbornly reacting to every blow that you received.  Perhaps no one ever extended a helping hand towards you to get you out of this quagmire that continued to swallow you like an insatiable vampire.

How old are you now? 14, 18, 25, 30 or above, and are you still the same punching bag that people love to pound?  Come on man, stop punching your ego and burst out of the shell of self pity.  Yes, self pity is the most lethal poison that is taking its toll.

How long will you be deceiving yourself?  Make up your mind now, right at this moment and get rid of the cloak of helplessness – burn it down to ashes.  It is just like burning your boats to not leave a chance to back away from the battleground of realities.

The realities are hard to face but you have to.  Do a little self talk, take a bold decision and stick to it.  Remember, God does not like you to remain like this for a single moment.  You have enough courage to defy God’s will.  Why can’t you defy people’s will?  You certainly can and you should.

You have two options now.  One, move out of the reach of people’s punching range and it is not that easy.  You cannot create your own special world minus bullies – they are in abundance everywhere.  Two, turn yourself into a bag of rock-hard cement so that when, from now on, anybody punches you, he would break his own knuckles and forget about repeating it.

You may face a little embarrassment occasionally but, ultimately you would succeed in keeping the bullies at an arm’s length. 

Do it now or you would never be in a position to do so.  If possible, look around to find a mentoring friend to help you in taking a courageous decision. 

It is only you who is to take action now.  It is only you who is to transform into a new being.  It is only you who is not to act like a punching bag any more.

How to deal with bullies?

Four Practical tips to deal with difficult colleagues.

Do you have to deal with the special species of colleagues around you who are bent upon spoiling working ambiance even without any provocation? 

They are everywhere like parasites, particularly in small organizations and every organization cannot afford to get rid of them for one reason or the other.  It could be their quality of work, relationship with any of the high-ups or the benefits the employers enjoy through them.

The price of their nasty bullying is always paid by their colleagues.  Are you stuck up in such an undesired cul-de-sac of situation with no immediate way out?  Here are four practical tips to save your neck from any mishap that could cost you the job or land you in hot waters:

1. Make your worth felt 

You may already be doing your level best to achieve the set goals and doing utmost justice to your job.  Yet, the top most action that you can take to save your face, your job and your self-esteem is to do more than your current performance. 

Demonstrate to your colleagues, your seniors and your employers that you are no less in worth, to the organization, than anybody else. 

2. Never lose your self-esteem 

Whatever reaction you get from the bullies, always hold your head high with self-esteem that is the strongest power you possess in dealing with negative forces under any circumstances.

Everybody is valued in the scale of his/her self-esteem.  Even those who are jealous of you, for any reason, hold you in high regards for your self-esteem whether they let you realize it or not.

3. Be cooperative, not subservient 

The best strategy to survive and to achieve set goals is to do your best in creating a congenial ambiance in your working place.  Thus, your proffer of cooperation should be apparent so that your colleagues could feel up to asking for it without any obligation.

Make the difficult colleagues realize that you are willing to cooperate and help them in achieving their targets sorting out whatsoever problems they have, but simply as a colleague, not as a subservient and weak person.

4. Respect them as human beings 

Since every human being deserves to be respected, you had better express your feelings, even to these difficult colleagues, through your communication, body gestures and actions.

Initially, they may take it as their victory to fuel their arrogance but, with the passage of time, they would certainly understand your character and positive attitude.

Confrontation, in these situations or any other similar like these, is never a solution.  Rather you had better understand their inner compulsions, psychological factors and human nature.

I personally had to deal with such bullies during my job/stay in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia from 1984-1987.  Thank Lord, I succeeded, through the above tactics, in transforming those difficult colleagues into friends who were crying like children when I left the Kingdom.  Why can you not do it?