A victim of gossip

Source: New City Philippines
“I am the object of gossip among my closest relatives, like my siblings, how should I react?” - Jess

Gossip is and has always been a part of our daily life – housewives chatting in the market, colleagues gathered around the water cooler at break time, students exchanging text messages during recess, relatives at a family gathering or a wake… If you have ever played that party-game “broken telephone,” you know for a fact that the more people involved in passing on information, the more the facts become distorted. I can give at least three reasons why this happens.

The first is the inevitable inaccuracy of our memory. When we describe an event to a friend, we tend to omit some details and remember others incorrectly. The second is our unconscious inclination to focus attention on details that mostly depend on our mood. And the third leading cause is the deliberate distortion of reality, and here, the means of communication used are important.

Epictetus, a Stoic Roman philosopher who lived in the first century A.D. said: “Men are not disturbed by something that happens, but by their opinion about how things happened.” As a psychologist, when a client tells me that he is upset over something that another told him, I usually ask him, “Suppose you don’t know what they said about you. Would you still be as upset?” The client normally responds: “No, of course not.” To which I reply, “So then, try to think that they have not said anything about you. It was only when you came to know about it that you decided to react negatively.” If we act in this way we begin to realize that nothing can disturb us without our permitting it to. But what if, instead, we have evidence that someone has really said something against us? Again, there is no need to be irritated.

We can apply the following effective strategies: if someone spreads malicious rumours about you, right in front of your face, don’t be aggressive towards him or ask for an explanation, but respond in kindness and publicly express your esteem for that person, as if he had done you a great courtesy rather than doing you harm and as if he were your greatest friend rather than an enemy. In this way you will allow his negative action to boomerang and leave him in a quandary. Nothing, in fact is more unbearable for those who hate you than your evident kindness.

This elegant manoeuver not only neutralizes your detractors, but shows up his weakness and enhances your immunity from gossip. There is no greater revenge or effective vendetta than loving those who do evil to you.

It takes two people to fight. If the other begins to be critical of you, and you do not react to his provocations, maybe he would be angry with you, but if you don’t allow yourself to get angry with him, then there would be no quarrels between you. Indeed, after all that was done to you, if you are kind and understanding toward him, then you will be able to exact the revenge of love.

Pasquale Ionata with Ting Nolasco