Ever found yourself in a relationship that drains your energy faster than water pours out of a busted fire hydrant?
In a world full of diverse personalities, there are a few you might want to avoid.
While by no means an exhaustive list, the following are a collection of some of the worst offenders.
If you allow any of these types to have any kind of real, sustained access to you, you’ll practically be gasping for air in no time.
Brace yourself as we delve into the top five types of people you’d be wise to avoid like the plague.
5 Types Of People To Avoid
1. The Dreamkiller
Do you aspire to anything in your life? Do you want a beautiful, reciprocal, loving relationship? An exciting, fulfilling career? A fit, healthy body? Well, the last thing you should do is tell a Dreamkiller about it.
A Dreamkiller has only one objective – to make you doubt yourself and disbelieve that you’ll ever amount to anything.
Dreamkillers pounce on any ounce of hope, joy, or excitement that they see others experiencing. Why? Because they allowed themselves to squash their own dreams long ago.
Either they settled for a less-than version of their dream reality, or they never even began the journey to begin with.
Either way, their mission is singular: Smother your flame, so that they feel better about themselves and their lack of results.
If you realize that you have allowed a Dreamkiller to sneak into your inner circle (i.e. your significant other, or one of your closest friends) I would strongly encourage you to discontinue and/or renegotiate the terms of the relationship. Life is far too short to allow a Dreamkiller to get direct access to your energy.
2. The Constant Complainer
As the saying goes, ‘Misery loves company.’
The Constant Complainer would prefer to bitch, moan, and complain about their lives instead of taking responsibility for changing it. And why wouldn’t they? They have learned to manipulate those closest to them to give them sympathy when they complain (at least for a time), and so they keep it up. They maintain their relationships with their fellow complainers so long as they follow the script (listen to me complain, complain alongside me, and never ask me to do anything proactively about my situation).
Unless you want your life to be a big, indulgent round of “roll around in the mud,” end these relationships before they have a chance to go deeper.
3. The Perennially Unimpressed
The Perennially Unimpressed person is about as fun as they sound.
They’ve seen everything, they’ve heard everything, and they know everything. They primarily speak the language of sarcasm, they have permanent tan lines on their forearms from keeping their arms crossed, and one of their eyebrows is always slightly raised. Their sense of humor is close to non-existent, and their least favorite type of person to be around is someone who is happy, laughing, and/or positive.
Their feigned indifference and unimpressed’ness is just a front for how brutally intense their inner critic is. They are so hard on themselves (not in a healthy high standards way, but in a brutal, self-flagellating way) that they feel they must have to project their dissatisfaction onto everyone around them.
Something may crack them open in life eventually, but I would strongly recommend not trying to be the force that does it. They have to get to their surrender point on their own (if they get there at all).
4. The Score Keeper
If tit for tat was a person, it’d be the Score Keeper.
Not only do they remember (and have a perfectly itemized mental spreadsheet) of all of the things they’ve ever done for you, they often will intentionally do things for you just to have loaded the gun to then use against you in short order.
With the Score Keeper, there is no such thing as a free lunch. There is no generosity. There is no true giving. Everything is strategically calculated. Good deeds are quickly turned against you and used as ammunition.
These people are exhausting to be in any kind of a relationship with, because everything is a game, and nothing they ‘do’ for you can be trusted. Better to remove yourself from their line of fire entirely.
5. The Scarce, Entitled User
Might I have saved the best for last? Yes, I believe I might have.
The Scarce, Entitled User combines the worst of both worlds. They simultaneously have an overarching sense of scarcity with the world (‘There’s not enough to go around! It’s a dog eat dog world out there!’), and they also feel delusionally entitled and like the world owes them for things they haven’t earned.
This kind of person will latch on to any capable person like a leech on their neck. They may appear to have a thin sense of confidence about themselves, but in reality, they have a deep not-enough wound and think that they’re worthless (which is the underlying fuel that drives them to feel entitled to things they haven’t earned).
You’ll never know when it’s coming, but at some point in the relationship, they turn a corner in their mind and they start to demand what they feel entitled to from you. It could be money, it could be power, status, prestige… whatever it is, they take you off the false pedestal and they try to squeeze you for all you’re worth.
When you sense a Scarce, Entitled User circling you (they can often be found trying to make you dizzy with flattery, or continually emphasizing how much they just want to help you and get in your good books through whatever means necessary), run in the other direction. Their nature will show itself eventually, so it’s better to get out as soon as you can before they really sink their teeth in.
What If You’re Already Tethered To One Of These Kinds Of People?
I too live in the real world, and there are instances where you cannot fully remove yourself from having interactions with one of these types of people. Perhaps you share children with one of them, or one of your coworkers (at your otherwise awesome job) is one.
In situations like these the main thing you can aim for is to both 1) do whatever you can to minimize total exposure to them, and 2) primarily interact with them while in their happy place (so that they are a better version of themselves and are that much more tolerable).
I hope that this article shed some light on these types of people, and/or gave you a sense of permission to distance yourself from them or remove them from your life entirely.
Above all, you are allowed to feel a deep sense of ease, peace, alignment, and nourishing connection across your life. You only have so much time, energy, and attention to give out… and you deserve to honor it.
Dedicated to your success,
Jordan
