When Someone Doesn’t Like You For No Reason—When Haters Hate You

Other people’s comfort zones may be different from yours. You cannot please everybody but it is disheartening when someone doesn’t like you for no specific reason. It’s human nature to fight or flee especially when the dislike turns to hatred.

Here’s what you can do to deal with such people.

When Your Haters Hate On You

When someone just decides that they don’t like you, it can be stressful.

Most of us try to tell ourselves that we don’t care if we have people that don’t like us. However, most of us still end up wasting time and energy trying to figure out how or why a person came to dislike us.

Was it something that you said or did? Something that you didn’t say or didn’t do? Or does the person just judge people immediately and has totally missed the mark on you?

What did you do wrong to warrant these negative feelings from someone? This article will address what to do when someone doesn’t like you for no reason and how to move forward from these encounters and so called ‘haters’.

Why Are People Hateful?

Most people hate on others because of some personal issue. Often people are unkind and hate on each other because they aren’t happy with their own lives.

People hate others when they feel hurt and want to make themselves feel better. There is power in hate, and even though it’s a power that is damaging, it doesn’t often matter.

Sometimes, people act in hateful ways just because they can. Trying too hard to figure out why you’re in the hot seat and the hater has directed their anger at you is only going to aggravate you and the situation.

Some of the time, you didn’t even do anything wrong.

Most people have been in this position. You end up being confronted by haters, and try as you may to ignore the negativity that is living rent-free in your head, you waste time and energy trying to figure out what is this person’s issue with you. 

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Eventually, We All Deal with Haters

It will be nice if we can all just wave a magic wand and only have positive and friendly people in our space who can accept and love us for who we are, but unfortunately that’s just not the way life works.

We all have to deal with a hater and hurtful people at some point, and depending on the setting and situation, you still have to try to keep your self-confidence and self-esteem intact while being around them. 

This article will explain the strange relationships we have with people who generally dislike you for no apparent reason.

It will also explain the dynamics of these relationships and interactions based upon the situations wherein we may face these people.

Lastly, it will provide tips on accepting the situation and moving forward with positivity, regardless of how much a person may hate you.

When someone doesn't like you for no reason

Hate is a Strong Word

“I just hate so and so.” You hear it all the time. We’re told as kids not to judge other people and to give everyone a fair chance, but we seldom actually live by this moral.

Life is fast-paced for many of us, and we have adapted to deciding how we feel about a person immediately after meeting them.

First impressions can make or break a situation or opinion of a person and we tend to be bothered by the smallest infractions and form opinions in haste.

Not Everyone Reacts Well to Hatefulness

When someone decides to hate you and doesn’t even really know you, how does it make you feel?

You may feel confused, angry, awkward, or hurt. Or you may be on the other side of that coin and decide that tit for tat is the right move, and you decide to hate them right back, ignore them outright, or give them a good reason for them to dislike you. 

While you may not be able to control your own feelings about these things, you should always try to keep in mind that hate doesn’t help anyone. It poisons the person who is hated, as well as the person who is doing the hating.

Hate is a crippling feeling. It may feel good to act cruel or mean every now and then, but it never really benefits anyone.

If you’ve ever been the one who has hated someone for no reason, think about the amount of positive energy and time you’ve wasted on it.

You tell yourself and probably others, if you’re honest, that you hate them any time you have to interact with them.

It’s not a healthy way to live, but unfortunately, it’s a common way of life for many.

Which People Dislike You?

Many people in our lives can become a hater but how do we deal with them?

When the Hater is Related To You

If you’ve ever been married or even in a relationship, you can probably relate to an in-law disliking you right off the bat. Maybe you haven’t lived up to the standards they have in mind for your partner, so nothing you ever do will be good enough. It’s rough when a family member has an issue with you.

Maybe you haven’t been able to meet your partner’s family until further into the relationship than their family will have liked, and they’ve held it against you. Maybe your partner has vented once about something they didn’t care for that you’ve done or said. Or, and this is the worst, but it’s still pretty common: Maybe you haven’t done anything at all. 

Sometimes it’s a member of the family you grew up with. Perhaps it is a sibling or a parent who dislikes you.

Usually, this is an indicator of either a toxic relationship or the strong beginnings of one.

We know we can’t do much about the fact that we are hated on by someone, but we still have to see them for holidays and important events like funerals and weddings. So we either avoid interactions with these people or engage in passive-aggressive behavior with this person. 

It’s tough when the person who doesn’t like you is a member of your family. It creates tension and turns what should be a good time into awkward exchanges and faking kindness. And that’s if the relationship is civil for the sake of appearances.

You know that the person who hates you probably tells other people in the family how they feel about you, and that puts you on edge as well. 

So what do you do?

What To Do About It

As discussed, we can’t do a lot to avoid the person, aside from refusing to go to family gatherings. When you employ that plan of action, you ostracize yourself and open yourself up to further judgment by the rest of the family.

You don’t want to appear hurt or weak because it only gives the other person ammunition, but you don’t want to subject yourself to their shenanigans, either. No one wants to be in a room with someone who dislikes them. 

It may work to your advantage to build a civil relationship with the person. Be around them voluntarily.

As the saying goes, “kill them with kindness.” If you give them nothing but positivity, then they look like a negative and unfair person for disliking you.

Maybe if you immerse yourself into their circle and show them that there’s really no reason at all for them to hate on you, they’ll change their opinion. And if they don’t, then you will still have the satisfaction of saying that you gave it your best effort, you were classy about it, and they were not. 

When the Hater is at Your Job

One of the most annoying places to be hated for no reason is your job. You have to go there if you want to earn money. So you may cross paths with the person who dislikes you – a lot.

You also have to hope that the person who dislikes you isn’t also trying to sabotage your career and get you fired simply because they don’t like you. 

It’s hard to have a decent working relationship when the other person dislikes you, and you’ve given them no concrete reason to feel that way. It can affect your work life and your personal life. It’s hard to go out with co workers when the person who is a hater is going to be there.

You may find that if that person has more pull at work than you do, they can keep you excluded from social invitations. You start to think about it in your downtime, so you can’t enjoy your own life outside of work, and you start to dread going to work. 

What to Do About It

This one is a tricky situation to maneuver in. The best advice for cases like these is to show up for work with a smile on your face and don’t let them see that their hate bothers you.

Be confident and talk to them while maintaining eye contact. Doing so takes practice.

Perform as well as you can at your job with laser like focus. Work well with your co-worker, no matter how negative they are towards you.

Give your boss or supervisor the impression that even though this person doesn’t like you, and they’ve probably made it obvious, you can still work well with other people.

Being able to work with a negative person is a wonderful strength for most occupations, and you’re only going to impress your supervisors if you can show that you are more than capable of that. 

Also, distance yourself from that person as much as you are physically able to and don’t offer up personal information to them in the office because they may use it as ammunition against you or something to gossip about later.

When the Hater is in Your Social Group

When we have a group of close friends, it often gets expanded as time goes on. Individuals of the group bring more people into the fold, and friends of friends end up in the circle.

When you’re part of a group of friends, and someone in that same circle dislikes you for no reason, it’s hard to be around them. 

It is possible the person talks about you behind your back, talk to you with little to no respect, gets jealous when you get attention from the other members of the group of friends, and spends time trying to sabotage the friendship by creating drama and starting rumors.

Often, the hater will try to push the person they dislike out of the circle. 

Everyone likes to have friends, and the presence of a hater should not determine whether you stop seeing your friends.

Engaging in mind games or starting conflict with this hater will most likely result in drama and conflict within the entire group of friends, so be careful and tread lightly here unless you want a falling out to happen.

You can end up being pushed out of the group, or the group may end up splitting, with resentments coming from both sides of it. 

What to Do About It

You have to control yourself to the point that you can be around the negative and hateful person and still enjoy yourself. It seems like a complete oxymoron, and it is certainly a challenge, but sometimes, the best thing to do is to go along to get along. 

You don’t ever have to subject yourself to a one-on-one relationship with this person. You don’t even have to lower yourself to their level of pettiness.

Most people can coexist, at least to a point. If your other friends are already aware that one person in the group dislikes you (and they probably do), then they’ll most likely be understanding.

Seek out closer friendships within the group with the people who care about you and do like you. When you need someone to talk to, go to the people you can trust, and remind yourself that if the person you’re speaking to doesn’t care about you, then they will not listen to you.

You are cared about, and people feel connected to you outside of your haters. Get out of your head and continue with the friendships that mean the most to you.  

when someone doesn't like you for no reason

Moving Forward When Someone Doesn’t Like You

It hurts when someone decides they don’t like you because of their preconceived notions. It hurts even more, when there’s no real reason for it aside from a snap judgment. It’s important to realize in these situations that no one has to like you, they don’t owe you anything, and you don’t owe them anything. 

Build Up Your Own Self Confidence

Realize that you have the power to decide how you feel about yourself, and never let anyone else dictate how you feel about yourself. If you love yourself, then no one else’s opinion really matters. 

What we don’t often take the time to realize is that a lot of people who are cold or mean or judgmental are simply jealous or have low self esteem. They want something that you have.

They allow those jealous feelings to turn into anger, and they decide that no matter what you do, they’ll just never like you.

It does them more harm than good, in the end. 

Respect yourself, embrace the real you, and be kind to yourself. Focus on self improvement and let your own experiences toughen you up.

If you can’t manage to be kind to your haters, you don’t have to add fuel to the fire. If you don’t have anything nice to say, then don’t say anything at all.

Be the bigger person. This seems like it’s counterproductive to the goal of getting the person who hates you out of your life, but it’s not. Doing so makes it possible for you to build a better relationship.

Whether this person ever decides to let go of their grudge is up to them, but at the end of day, if you do your best to be a kind human, and you love yourself, then at the end of the day, you’ve done your best and have nothing to feel bad about or sorry for. 

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Conclusion

Even with all of the advice this article has given, it’s still difficult not to feel personally offended when someone treats you poorly or has an issue with you that you think is unjustified. Most of us can sense when someone means us ill will, whether they admit to it or not, and it feels awful to be around those people.

When you feel yourself starting to get worked up, or you feel worse than usual about yourself because of the haters in your life, turn to a close friend. Create a safe space where you can vent and not feel judged.

Spend time with a real friend who will listen, and like most people, will probably be able to relate.

Putting all of your frustrations out there can help you to shed the weight the haters are constantly trying to bog you down with.

Just try to remember that many people in the world feel the same way as you. They’re afraid to go out with friends or to work because they have to be around their haters.

They fear confrontation, and they suffer in more than one way. Dealing with haters can damage your emotional, physical and mental health.

You matter. You can move past it. Don’t let the haters dictate how you feel about yourself and affect your self worth.

Your life is up to you, and the only thing you are really ever in control of is yourself.

Haters are always going to be there. But you don’t have to care. There is more to life than someone’s negativity.

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