A member of one of my Toastmasters clubs is in a WhatsApp group. I see a distressing message from 'F'. She wants to take legal action against C for harassing her. She demands that I support her in this. She proposes to go higher up the orgnization and says she is no longer a member of our club because of the ill-will.
I think about this. If F is no longer a member of our club, then the next level of authrity cannot hold a meeting to consider expelling a member, because the member who has left cannot take any action, and cannot herself be expelled if she is found to be the one at fault.
My experience of the internal court process is that it is very time consuming and time time wasting. Many epople have to be brought in as witnesses or potential witnesses regarding a meeting. If the event was several months or years ago, it was before the jurisdiction of the present volunteer leaders. They currently have their own priorities, which is expanding membership, with rewards, not attempting to punish people and thus lose yet another member. Certainly the stress will have an adverse effect on the productivity and morale of people at all levels.
F has health problems and her moods go up and down. She has told a religious group that she is changing her religion from theirs to another religion.
C is my close friend. She has a health problem and a relationship split. She can do without stress. (So can I!)
I try to ignore it and get on with my work.
The club President is very diplomatic. He suggests to F that they go offline and have a private chat to see if the relationship between F and C can be healed.
I phone C to find out her side of the story.
She says
a) She tired to phone F many times to help her, but the calls were not answered.
She invited F to a book launch. F accepted but never turned up.
b)
The Current F and C Altercation
I asked F about the event she accepted but did not attend.
(I did not say anything about reliability, meaning that if you say you will do somthing, or that you will be somewhere, you should go along. If not send apologies. Say, I hope it went well, or, I am glad it went well.)
F replied, that she accepted out of politeness, but had a better activity to attend.
Perhaps the solution to this is to suggest that you would like to attend but probably will not.
For example, 'I will, if I can. I am waiting to hear confirmation of a medical appointment which is scheduled for that date. If they postpone it, I will be able to come along, but don't count on it.'
F has a birthday coming up.
J replied, 'I would love to be there, but unfortunately I am overseas.' (A common prhase from those who decline is, I do hope it goes well.)
You don't have to give a real or imaginary more important rival engagement. You simply have to call it a prior engagement. if you change your mind and attend, you might say, truthfully or as a polite white lie, 'I persuaded them to change their meeting date."
I told F that C has a medical problem. (I did not say, I don't want you to stress her.) I said, People who have medical problems often get upsest with the whole world, even their friends. It's like when a dog is taken to the vet. The vet tries to help the dog, but the dog tires to bite the vet, because it is in pain and does not know the cause, so it attacks the nearest living thing.
The vet has to understand that the sick dog will probably be all friendly again as soon as the medical problem is solved. It is not the the vet's fault. He just happens to be in the way.
Sometimes people are old and sick and get grumpy. They may be upset because they know they are old and sick. or they may not even realise that they are sick, but the illness affects them and makes their mood change. They don't have the energy to cope with life.
If you can't help them, it may be in your interests just to stay out of their way.
Another Altercation F has had with S, five years ago
F says she was invited to F's private, corporate business association club meeting by a third party who was not at the meeting. S would not admit her and got the guard of the building to prevent her entering.
I said, I have had the same problem with S's condo, and with offices in the business district. Firstly, the guard is not allowed to admit you unless you are on a guest list or have written confirmation. If she tries to argue with the guard on your behalf, the guard might turn on her and ban her club from meeting there again. She is busy running a meeting and does not have time to argue with the guard, nor get stressed out. You just have to go away and make sure that next time you are invited by somebody in authority, and can present the written invitation to the guard.
Instead of getting angry because you could not attend the meeting, apologise. Why?
F complains that S told her to kill herself.
I do not know whether that was true. It sounded unlikely. Unless F had threated to do so. Even if S had threatened to kill F, that sounded unlikely. However, I was reminded of a true incident.
I said to F:
Different cultures have different views on what is an insult or a threat, whether between stranger, friends of family. Even within the same country.
For example, I went to collect my son from his schoolfriend's house. The other boy's mother came running out of the house after her son, shouting, 'I'll kill you!'
I was shocked, horrified. In my entire life, I had never heard anybody in my family say such a thing to anybody, certainly not to their nearest and dearest.
My son shrugged. He explained, "That's the way they talk.. They say it all the time. They all say it. It doesn't mean they'll do it. It's just the way they talk. Don't let it upset you."
So threatening to take legal action against somebody who talks like that would just be a waste of your time. You are stressing youserlf for nothing. If their way of talking upsets you, just keep away from them. Have nothing more to do with them. Don't talk to them.
There are plenty of people who like you and say nice things to you all the time. Don't get upset about one person who said something nasty five years ago. You have five people who have said nice things to you this year and this week.
Do you have any nice things to look forward to? Are you doing anything successful at work? Will you be doing anything important? Think about that. Put up on the notice board the event, or holiday, which you are looking forward to. Every time you think about the past wrong, forget it. You can't change the past. You need your psoitive thoughts and energy to do good things for yourself in the future. Instead look at what you have to put your energy into. A holiday. A conference. An event. A meeting. A party. A concert. A play. A contest. A game.
If you run into your old enemy, treat them as a friend. Long time no see. Glad to see you looking so well. Good of you to come. You are looking great. Love your hat. Your friends are a credit to you.
Apologise
We have a joke in England that you can identify an Englishman in a pub. You tread on his foot, and he apologises to you!
That prevents an argument. It doesn't matter who was right or wrong. What matters is to maintain goodwill.
Do you want to provoke a fight? No! Why have more stress!
Be nice, try to aplologise, and often the person will be nice to you.
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