7. How To Be A Person: Ten Ways to Use Annoying People to Win at Life

THE NEWSLETTER FOR JANUARY 10TH, 2024

They are all around us. They drive without signalling. They talk loudly on their phones in the library. They holdup the line at the bank with all their dumb complaints. They write newsletters. But instead of letting a perfect stranger highjack your happiness perhaps they can fuel your creativity? If annoying people are inevitable then we should learn to use them to our advantage. Like Soilent Green. It’s people. Finally, someone found a use for people.

10 Ways to Use Annoying People to Win at Life

1. Remember that you are annoying too. When you talk politics (which you’re not even an expert on). When you drink, you often lose perspective. When you’re angry you’re just an unreasonable asshole. This will cutdown the amount of annoying people in your life by half when you see that you have something in common with them.

2. Annoying people are grist for the mill. Don’t let them get your goat. They’re not even looking for a goat but quite often you’re foisting yours upon them. Pay attention to the annoying. Take notes. Jerry Seinfeld has become the richest comic in history by making that which annoys him entertainment.

3. Believe the annoying. Don’t be surprised at the weird shit they say. You know they’ll do that. Look for it, hope for it. Then you’ll be proven right. Your expectations will be met.

4. Laugh at them. They’re telling you a story about their shortcomings and what emotional midgets they are. This is great. You’re better than someone today.

5. You’ll never change them. You know this so stop wishing they were different. They are fools there for your entertainment. So you can go home and talk about the idiocy you witnessed at the No Frilly’s.

Ed Sheeran. Not annoying at all.

6. When you complain over and over about them you’re staying angry. We’ve already established they’re annoying and you’re right. We don’t have to expend any more resources in this department. Don’t let them hijack your happiness. They don’t even know who you are.

7. When you point out how ludicrous they are to their face you’re asking them to change. Humans don’t like change and they certainly don’t like being told what to do. You’re setting yourself up to fail. Don’t let the annoying turn you into a failure.

8. Annoying people will be annoying people just like you will be you. Just like dogs will be dogs. Your cat is your cat. She can’t be anything else. Fuck’em. Fuck’em all as Robert Evans said. Just go with it. Be free! Freedom is in the not caring. Besides, not caring is way easier. First of all, it’s less work. Secondly, it leaves you wide open for good things to happen if you’re paying attention.

9. Practice responding to adversity. Annoying people are adversity dressed in a man-bun and Crocs. They are there as your opportunities for personal growth. When you see one, breathe deeply, stay calm. Be present. Watch as they spin out of control.

10. Annoying people need your compassion but they’re not ready for your help. Once I was doing standup at Yuk Yuk’s in Toronto and it was an awful night of comedy. An open mic night where the cynical host would play a video of plane crashes in the middle of a comic’s set if they were dying. It was punishing and petty. The kind of abuse that gives standup a bad name. The very reason Alt Comedy came into being. A young man that looked a lot like he just split from a Ren Faire went up and bombed horribly. The plane crashes began on the Television sets above the stage. He was appalled and dejected. I followed him outside. I wanted him to know that the host was at fault, that this was a horrible show and Yuk Yuk’s is an awful organization. He lost it on me. He was angry and I was a readily available target by virtue of proximity. He wasn’t ready for my help, nor did he ask me for it. Annoying people will remain annoying even if you want to help. Stop helping. Start offering quiet compassion. I should have just bought him a drink. I wonder if Yuk’s stocked flagons of mead.   

11. Practice being easy going today so that you can embody it tomorrow. This won’t come easy. But once you get better at dealing with annoying people you’ll have more friends, more peace and more space in your brain for things that matter.

Seinfeld has made nearly 1 billion dollars on turning annoying people into laughter. What can you do with them?