How to Wear Down People Who Have Vowed to Hate You

1. The 'Kill them; kill them with kindness' approach.

I take sweet pleasure in picking away at the petrified toxic armor of the scads of rude sarcastic unhappy sourpuss depressed angry and depressing adults (and youth, but really there are many less youth) who flock to spend their day within the walls of our most esteemed school district. It's hard to tell which came first, the chicken or the egg on this one, since the school district does appear to cause grumbliness in the most well-adjusted happy souls. Caustic spreaders of blanket negativity, these folks require a slow but steady regiment of someone like me: grinning, laughing, happy in spite of them me. It makes them insane. They resist. They fight back. They up the ante. They say some seriously stupid, nasty shit. And I grin. I smile at them all the time. No matter what. Even when I am telling them what they said is bullshit. Which I do. A lot. But I don't engage. I just keep breathing and smile, and I say something really, really nice and yet truthful. I smile for real, the kind of smile that includes your eyes and results in what folks call "laugh lines" or "crows feet," depending on your gender and outlook on life. And it takes them a while to catch up with what just happened, by which time I am singing my way down the hall. And meanwhile, I let their poison run down my back and shake it off my legs with a twitch. Because these people? They have not met my family. So they have no idea what I can stand and what I can dish out.

I would say it takes an average of six months to have them saying hello to me, smiling and talking with me. And then I know I have broken them. I have done it so far with three adults at my school this past year alone. The Grin Approach - it leaves no visible bruises.

2. The 'Torture them; torture them like a pebble in their shoe' approach.

Equally effective, this technique involves some serious hunkering down and digging in of the heels. Luckily, my Capricorn sun/Scorpio rising origins leaves me scarily stubborn. This is an effective approach with people whose first instinct is to reject anything or anyone new or that they cannot control or don't understand.

This is the approach I have chosen to use with the professor who attempted to block my admittance into this piece of crap Masters program I am currently so disgruntled about. She first tried to ensure that I was not admitted, even though her reasoning just made their department look ridiculous (which turns out to be accurate, but nevermind). She argued that grief and loss had nothing to do with education, and I should get a counseling degree. I laid it out for her one track at a time, schooled her ass and then essentially forced my way in over her protests, basically by refusing to hear her. I call this the Insert-Fingers-in-Ears Ignore 'Em, Keep Moving, and Explain Later (widely-practiced in this good ol teaching district) while Killin'em with Kindness approach (with some logic and threatening mixed in -- it was a bit of a blended approach).

But she really didn't realize how bad it would be until she became my professor. Yes, the one who makes us highlight bullshit. Like that is a surprise. She certainly made it clear she was not having me. And yet, for the last four months, I have been wearing her down while ignoring her attempts to Alpha Male me. Again, she has clearly never met my family.

At first she tried to argue with me, push me around, discourage me, question me, get me to leave. She almost won. But slowly, she started to get it. Well, she both started to get what I wanted to do and why I wanted to do it, and she started to give up the fight. And then tonight, she sent me back a paper, saying in her most eloquent way (she is an English Teacher professor, by the way): 'I am being impressed by your good writing, Sarah. You got the talent, girl!'

Huh? OK, so she needs an editor. Whatever - we will ignore that. The point is.... She now loves me. It's actually a little disturbing. She cares infinitely more about my thesis and my completion of a masters at this point than I do. But in your face, Masters in Navel-Gazing and Piece of Shit Education. Bite me.

The long and the short of it? Don't mess with me. I got all sorts of patience and I get biblical on people, just like my name.