111. What to Do When You Don't Like Your Boss or Teacher
Episode 111
Thinking is supposed to be uncomfortable. It's supposed to be messy and fragmented and dead-endy. It's supposed to make us feel vulnerable and like we don't know the answer, the solution, or the idea.
That's the nature of thinking. It's SUPPOSED to be that way.
But more than ever, I see students and professionals quit the thinking process before they've even begun it. They outsource their thinking to AI, falling victim to the ridiculous idea that a faster answer is better than the one you came up with yourself.
In this episode of the Learn and Work Smarter podcast, I dive deep into something we could all use a masterclass in: how to think. We talk about what it's supposed to look like (in our heads and in writing), why it's hard, and a whole bunch of strategies and frameworks to make thinking easier and encourage your thoughts to flow. No AI needed (or invited to the party in the first place. humph.).
What You Learn:
Why identifying the specific thing that bothers you about your teacher or boss changes everything (most people skip this step)
The pattern recognition strategy that makes difficult authority relationships more manageable, even when you think they're being unreasonable (and even when you’re so obviously right)
How to protect your grades, job performance, and future options without compromising your values or losing your identity
The biggest mistakes people make when dealing with teachers or bosses they don't like (and why these tempting approaches backfire)
Practical tactics for getting through the really hard days when you REALLY can’t stand your teacher or boss
🔗 Resources + Episodes Mentioned:
⭐SchoolHabits University: (SchoolHabitsUniversity.com)
⭐The College Note-Taking Power System (CollegeNoteTakingSystem.com)
⭐Assignment Management Power System (AssignmentManagementSystem.com)
Episode 60 - How to Handle Workplace Conflict (with HR expert Jessica Alvarez)
Episode 46 - How to Be Professional
Never stop learning.
❤️Connect:
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The following transcript was autogenerated and may contain some interesting and silly errors. But in the name of efficiency and productivity, I choose not to spend my time fixing them 😉
What to Do When You Don't Like Your Boss or Teacher
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[00:00:00] So my second grade teacher, Mrs. Archung, was my absolute favorite teacher ever. She took me to the fifth grade classroom to get fifth grade books 'cause I out read the second grade books. She gave me extra math sheets 'cause I finished mine early, which I actually really liked that tracks, doesn't it? I felt like she saw me and she got me.
I liked her direct teaching style and how disciplined she kept her classroom. She was my absolute favorite. Now my sister is only one year older than me, so just a year before, she was also in Mrs. Archung's class too. And I remember my sister, you know, in tears all the time saying like, she's so mean and I don't like her, and she's so strict and yada, yada, yada.
So when I got to that class the next year, I was scared, but it took all of like five seconds for me to be like, yeah, no, this is gonna be awesome. Now, I'm sharing this story as the intro of today's episode to make the point that liking someone is highly subjective.
I really, really liked someone that my sister really, really did not like, and that's just the way the world works. We like people because they make us feel good and they get us, [00:01:00] and they make us feel seen and supported. And we dislike people for any number of reasons, including the opposite of all those reasons that we would like them.
Hello there. Thanks for listening today. This is episode 111, and I'm Katie. Today we're talking about what to do when you don't like your teacher or your boss. So this is obviously an episode for both students and professionals. You know, I thought about recording them as two separate episodes, but I figured the strategies are generally similar.
So here we are. If you haven't been in this situation before, where for whatever reason you don't like your teacher or your boss, how fortunate for you, and I'll tell you that it is only a matter of time because we live in a big, beautiful world that is so full of many people who do things differently than we do.
And that's part of what makes it a big, beautiful world. And that's partly what makes some aspects of our lives challenging, particularly school and work.
Now, if there is a person you know that you don't particularly like, you can stop hanging out with them. If there is a family [00:02:00] member that you don't particularly like, you can limit your exposure to them and maybe set some healthy boundaries.
If you get a bad plumber, you can call a different one next time. If you get a bad Uber driver, you can call your mom next time. Right? So there are plenty of contexts where it's easy to avoid someone that you don't like. But when that person is your teacher or your boss, so someone who is in charge and who you have to answer to, the strategy no longer becomes well just avoid them because that's impossible.
So today my goal, first of all, is to normalize not liking our teachers and our bosses. And then I'm gonna give you four overarching strategies for dealing with them. And then I'm gonna unpack some of the things that we want to avoid in these situations. Things that we are probably gonna be really tempted to do, but that would actually make things worse. And then finally, I'm gonna wrap up with some nitty gritty, like what to do on a really bad day kind of strategies. So that's the agenda, and we are ready to begin.
[00:03:00] All right, so I wanna begin with normalizing the fact that we're not gonna like everybody, okay? And that's not necessarily a sign of us being disagreeable or of the other person being disagreeable. It's just that in reality, sometimes two people are not compatible and the sooner we acknowledge that it's common to clash heads with those around us, particularly those in some kind of authority position like a teacher or a boss, the sooner we can move on to strategies that will make the situation better.
Because if we stay stuck in this drama of like, oh my gosh, the teacher's so mean, and everything's my teacher's fault, or My boss is a monster, everything that's wrong with my job is [00:04:00] because of my boss. Then we're pouring gasoline on a fire. Like I get it. The fire exists. Incompatible relationships can be so, so hard and in uncomfortable.
Trust me, I've been there in school and in work, but rather than bring gasoline to the fire in the form of righteous indignation, and oh my gosh, it's, it's all their fault. Even if it absolutely is, I'm making the case that we should be bringing water to the fire or if we can't get ourselves to that place, which is fine, at least not to pour gasoline on the fire and to just let the fire exist as fire.
Now before we proceed any further, I do feel the need to insert a disclaimer here despite all of the strategies that I'm sharing today. If you're in a situation where your professor or your boss is a threat to you physically or emotionally, or you're being taken advantage of by the authority they have over you, and it is toxic in any way, then these strategies are not for you, and I advise you to get out.
So if you're in a situation that's not safe for you to be in by your own [00:05:00] judgment, by nobody else's, then please don't use any of the strategies I shared today to try to smooth the situation over. My advice in your case would be to go to hr or if you're in school, maybe a dean, get some help or get out.
Alright. I feel some level of responsibility starting the episode with that. But assuming that the reason you don't like your boss or your teacher is because of some other kind of incompatability, maybe it is a communication mismatch. Maybe it's a clash in your values. Maybe there's a huge differences in your competence.
There are a whole bunch of reasons we don't like someone, right? But if that is your situation, then the strategies I share today should help. Now, with that said, my first piece of advice, other than to approach the situation with composure and not a lot of drama, we're gonna get to that actually, because that never makes things easier.
Right? My first suggestion is to identify. What exactly you don't like about your relationship with this person. So when we can narrow down our understanding or our articulation of what exactly irks us about another person, we can reduce the impact that they [00:06:00] have on us and see things for what they really are.
For example, I work with students all of the time who tell me that they don't like their teacher. Like, this teacher's awful. It's the worst teacher I've ever had. They're so mean. They're so not fair. They hate me. Like I hear this all the time and I never, ever, ever doubt their feelings and I never doubt their experience, but I'll often ask, okay, like, what did they do that was so mean?
What did they do that was so unfair? What specifically is it about this person that you don't like? And you know, at first it's like, they're like everything. But usually after some poking and prodding, I can get a student to say something like, well, they never explain anything good in class. Okay, maybe something like that, and then boom, there it is.
That's perfect. Fair enough. In that case, we have a classic situation of bad communication or a mismatch in communication style where the teacher is teaching the way that they know how to teach, and it's just not jiving with a student.
Trust me, I've had plenty of terrible teachers. That is a very real thing where teachers teach one way and it doesn't work for a particular student. [00:07:00] Going back to my opening story about my second grade teacher, I loved the way she taught. She was direct. She told us how it was, and it worked for me, but it didn't work for my sister.
Right? Or maybe it's your boss, and at first you're like, well, I don't like them. Like categorically, I don't like 'em. They're awful. They're unfair. But after some thinking, you realize that what you really don't like about them is that they micromanage you and it makes you feel like they don't trust you to do your job, and you really don't like that relationship style.
Boom. Right? Fair enough. I wouldn't like that leadership style either, but that's the thing that you can focus on. You don't like how they micromanage you. Okay. So then the strategies we use can be targeted toward that specific issue, or back to the teacher who maybe doesn't teach things clearly. Okay, well no student is gonna convince a teacher to change their entire teaching style.
So that's not a lever we would pull. So now it is on the student to find ways to access the information differently. Maybe from a tutor, maybe from YouTube videos, maybe switch classes, whatever it takes. We'll talk about some more strategies in a bit. We can't change the [00:08:00] boss, we can't change the teacher, but we can change what we do in response to our boss and to our teacher.
Again, I'll get to what that might look like. But we would never be open to these kinds of strategies if we didn't identify what specific thing about the teacher or the boss we didn't like in the first place, because we'd be stuck under like the drama cloud of like, ah, everything about them is bad.
That's catastrophizing. And then that takes us to the next point here is to take some time to learn your teachers or your bosses triggers. So in other words, we're talking pattern recognition. I'm gonna start with teachers and then I'll, I'll give some examples for what this looks like in the professional space.
But if you know what really bothers your teacher, even if you don't agree with it, or even if you don't understand it and you think it's lame, then just don't do those things. For example, if your teacher gets really annoyed when students pack up their stuff before class is over, or even if it's just 30 seconds early, then don't pack up early.
You might think it's ridiculous to care about 30 seconds, right? You might think that they're being petty and maybe they are. But it doesn't matter what we think about it in these [00:09:00] situations. If you know it bugs them and you keep doing it anyway, you're just making your own life harder. Or maybe your teacher hates when people ask questions that were literally just explained two seconds ago because they weren't paying attention.
Okay, well pay better attention. Or if you zone out, ask a classmate instead of asking the teacher. Would students asking questions have bothered me when I was teaching high school? No way. I loved questions. I welcomed them even if I had just answered it two seconds before, right? But all teachers are different and it's a student's job to figure out what those differences are.
Same thing with bosses. Maybe your boss values getting heads up about problems early, even if you don't have a solution yet. Like they'd rather know about an issue on Monday than have you wait until Friday to tell them, 'cause you were trying to fix it yourself. So then give them the heads up.
Or maybe your boss hates when you bring them problems without having done some problem solving on your own first. Well, so do some problem solving on your own first. Or maybe they hate being interrupted when their office door is closed, so don't interrupt them when their door is closed. I'm not saying that these things [00:10:00] are always reasonable or fair.
I'm saying that once you recognize the pattern, you have a choice. You can keep triggering them and make the relationship worse, most likely, just for yourself. Or you can work around their triggers and make your own life easier. We're not sacrificing our values here and giving up what we stand for. It's not, it's not that deep.
We're just figuring out the pattern and we're going along with it so that we can just focus on our work. Okay. Next I wanna talk about expectation management. So just by acknowledging that there's differences in the way teachers teach or or manage their classrooms, or the way that bosses or superiors demonstrate leadership or management.
That is already priming you for expectation management, but what this really means is that you're deliberately aligning your behavior with how success is measured by the person in charge. It's not so much about how we define good work or how we wish things were run. It's not about what feels fair. Okay?
Expectation management is [00:11:00] understanding what counts in their system by their standards. It's about learning how to function effectively under their authority. Because remember, there is a hierarchy here. They do have authority. I have a podcast episode number 60, where I interview HR manager Jessica Alvarez, and she gives some terrific strategies for navigating conflicts with colleagues where the relationship is not one of authority or hierarchy.
And I'll leave that episode below. But in this case, there is a hierarchy. That's what we're talking about. But sometimes when we declare that we don't like a teacher or like our boss. We're kind of relying on our own internal standards or resisting their standards out of principal, and that's creating a friction that isn't necessary in a position that's probably hard enough with teachers.
That might mean understanding how grades are truly calculated. And not how you want them to be calculated or how you wish they were. A student might think like, what the heck? Like, that's not fair. I got a D on this paper. I did really good work and I put in so much effort. But [00:12:00] expectation management is knowing that there was a rubric and the teacher grades on clarity and format and argument structure and citations, and of course, meeting the deadline.
It's not about how we feel about what we produced. I mean, I want you to feel good. But expectation management in terms of being the person under the authority, is delivering what's expected to the other person by their standards, regardless of our feelings. Now in the professional space, this expectation management is learning how your performance is evaluated by your evaluator, not by your own internal standards.
It's understanding what done means to the person that you're submitting a deliverable to. It's knowing whether they value initiative or maybe speed or precision. It's communicating in a way that works for them. An employee might think, well, I worked so hard on this project, but then the boss is actually evaluating the outcome.
Maybe your responsiveness during the project, maybe your ability to communicate the project status and how well you worked with others. Maybe they're not evaluating the [00:13:00] project on how well you worked. Let's say that your final deliverable is a PowerPoint presentation, and you worked really hard on the graphics and the design, and you found the coolest template, and you animated like every slide.
But after the meeting, your boss was like, what the heck was that? And in that case, you have to ask yourself, did I give them what they asked for? Not, oh my gosh, like My boss is so mean and doesn't appreciate my creativity. But did you honestly give the boss what they asked for and do you know what it is that they expected?
Did you do your research going into the project to understand what they liked, how they wanted things to look? Maybe you use some kind of font and they don't like that. Well then give them the font that they want.
I know that's like a small, like petty example, but it's kind of illustrating the larger point here. It's not compromising your morals. You can give in, in, in something like that. Creating a PowerPoint presentation the way your manager wants it isn't sacrificing what you believe in.
It's just under the category of doing your job. It's also not people pleasing. It's not losing your identity. It's not [00:14:00] allowing yourself to be walked all over. It's just reducing avoidable conflict so that you can protect your future options and so that you can do your job, so that you can learn what you need to learn from the class and move on. So that you can get a good performance evaluation from your boss so that maybe you can get a raise and move to a different department with someone you're more compatible with.
I am gonna give you an example from my own life. This happened recently with my son. Good thing he doesn't listen to the podcast. Uh, my youngest is 13 and he had a late assignment. I know the irony. I know, I know considering what I do for a living, but we're all human. And so he did complete it and he shared it with his teacher.
It was a Google doc.
So he shared it with her, and then inside Google Classroom, he marked it as complete, right? That's how he had been instructed by another teacher to submit work. So we assumed for this teacher, it was the same thing. Now about a week passed and his grade didn't change. So I had him write an email to the teacher attaching the assignment in the email and letting the teacher know that he had completed the assignment and that he had shared it with her.
More days passed and my son [00:15:00] never got an email back from the teacher. Not even an acknowledgement. Now, My honest opinion is that this is hogwash. He's in seventh grade. He's just learning email management, and I think this is one of the cases where schools are missing out on the opportunity to teach our kids valuable skills like email management. The teacher could have provided some positive reinforcement to at least writing the email, right? Like how many seventh graders are writing really well written emails to the teacher? Not many. My kid did. And there could have been some validation for that. Right? That's literally why I teach this stuff in school Habits University 'cause our schools don't. Anyways, this teacher would not email my son back and then part of me was like, oh, let's just do this CC method and like put mom on it. But I put my passive aggressiveness in a basket for the moment but then I went into my son's Google classroom and I scrolled way to the beginning of the year where there was a document.
Posted called like Late Work Protocol or something like that. It was a PDF that you had to scroll through. It was not easy to find. It was very long, but there was [00:16:00] like one or two lines in there that said, I accept late work, but only if you first fill out a late work form. And it, and then she said it was like a link to the form, like a Google form inside classroom.
And in reality, I was still ticked because it would've taken like two seconds for the teacher to have written my son back and said, Hey, fill out the form. Or Hey, check our late work protocol to figure out how to submit your late work. Right? Some acknowledgement in this learning phase, but that is neither here nor there.
But in truth, my son didn't do what was expected. I think there was definitely some room for the teacher to do some more compassionate educating, like I said, like five times now. But again, neither here nor there, but this is a classic case of a teacher wanting something done a certain way and the student not doing it that way.
And then feeling a sense of like, well, that's not fair, and that's dumb, but that's the expectation that it's done a certain way and my kid's job is to do the things that way. But dang, that teacher should have emailed the kid back anyways. So tying this back into pattern recognition. [00:17:00] Pattern recognition is noticing how the system works, and then this expectation management is about strategically complying with that system so that we're not pouring gasoline onto the fire.
All right. Let's talk now about emotional regulation. I feel like there is always a place in every conversation for quick chat about emotional regulation. Don't you think, especially in this one, because it is so normal to be in a tense relationship with an authority figure, maybe Really because they are truly a bad teacher or they are truly a bad boss, and we start to feel resentment. We start feeling disrespected and not seen and not heard. And then before we know it, that feeling of resentment can turn into defiance. It can turn into wanting to prove a point so bad that we behave in ways that are uncharacteristic or that don't serve us.
And of course, I'm talking about subtle behaviors like an eye roll or a huff. Or snide commented a meeting or something said under your breath during class, right? Nothing like crazy in, in terms of like, [00:18:00] you know, you know what I'm talking about, but like the, the low key subtle indicators of defiance, but none of this is ever gonna benefit us.
None of this ever helps its situation. It is so normal for authority figures to trigger stronger emotions in us than our, than our peers do. Even if our peers or our colleagues are even more annoying. But unregulated emotions will sabotage only us.
They'll truly have like no impact on the other person we're aiming those emotions at. It's like drinking poison and then expecting the other person to die. I didn't make up that expression. That's like a A saying somewhere unregulated emotions only hurt our ability to think, to learn. To make decisions, right?
And I'm not saying don't have these feelings. Heck, I have been in so many professional relationships where I've had very, very, very big feelings. And I'm sure there's been times when I've given an eye roll because I swear to God that my eyes operate on a completely different muscular system that is attached to my brain, or so I've been told, but I'm not saying don't have these feelings.
You will. But the task is to not let them [00:19:00] influence your behavior. Being right often costs way more than it's worth. And trying to prove a point to like, let's say your boss is only gonna make us look petty, even if the boss was so categorically obviously wrong. Huffing and puffing about some unfair move from the teacher is only gonna agitate your teacher more and it puts you in a worse position.
And I know that this can be really hard to hear because many people listening are in situations where the boss or the teacher really was in the wrong and they really truly are crossing the line. And if that's the case, as I said at the top of this episode, if there's a major issue where you're in danger of being taken advantage of, then that is a whole separate set of strategies.
But I'm just talking more about personality clashes or style clashes or communication clashes. Okay. That's the context of where these strategies will be most effective. Okay. So if maintaining emotional regulation were so easy, we probably wouldn't have wars and violence, would we? So it's clearly not the easiest thing to do.
We have to try and my first piece of advice [00:20:00] is to reframe the relationship as functional. It is not personal. Whether you have tension with a teacher or a boss, the relationship is essentially transactional and it is temporary. Okay? It's transactional and it's temporary. You are not married to this person.
Your interactions with this person end every single day at a certain point where you leave school or you leave the office to go home. They expect something from you and you deliver it to them. That's the transaction. And viewing this relationship that way is just kind of like this commodity exchange and one that's temporary can help us handle the feelings of resentment when they come up.
Because you can tell yourself, okay, this is gonna be over at two o'clock, or this is gonna be over at five o'clock, or whatever. And then also, this is way easier said than done, but try to detach our self-worth from their approval. Going back to some of the examples I gave earlier about submitting maybe an essay or a work project and
feeling proud of yourself and putting in your best effort or feeling like you put in your best effort. And then for whatever reason, you don't get their approval. That's not a good feeling. And in [00:21:00] those cases, I still want you to feel good about your work and proud about yourself, but then also to adjust your work for next time according to those expectations.
Because just because your teacher or your boss said your product didn't meet their standards, doesn't mean you did a horrible job conceptually or morally. It just didn't match what they were asking for. Also, almost all research about emotional regulation strategies, suggest some kind of pause or delay in your reaction as well.
So that is something to use here. So let's say that you're sitting, sitting in a meeting and your boss disrespects you in front of everybody, or you feel like your teacher berated you in front of the whole class, or they triggered you in some way, whatever it is, a normal human knee-jerk response to react in that moment or to want to react in that moment with defensiveness and some kind of protection of our ego, we have to take a pause. Even if it's a ten second pause where you count backwards, I'll make the case for actually not responding at all in that moment. Okay, but even 10 seconds pause can help bring down the heightened emotional state closer to neutral.
Maybe you can create a personal rule where [00:22:00] you wait 24 hours before sending emails when you feel really emotionally heightened, or when you're tempted to say something sharp in a meeting, you have a default response of, let me think about this and come back to it later.
It's really hard to make decisions in a moment when we are emotionally dysregulated. So having some kind of canned response like that in your back pocket can be helpful for those moments when you're tempted to throw gasoline on the fire.
I have an episode called How to Be Professional. That's episode 46. And if you're a student, the strategy is in there, apply to you too. But I do talk about emotional regulation in that episode, and I share some more strategies for remaining neutral in tense situations.
So if you want a little bit of a more of a deeper dive into how to actually do this and the scenarios where you might find the need to do this, check out that episode. That is linked below. But one of the things that I mentioned in that episode as well is that we're talking about regulating behavior, not getting rid of your emotions, right?
We don't need to feel calm and happy and peaceful to control our behavior. We can have those feelings without on them because professionalism and [00:23:00] I talk about this in that episode, that is a behavior choice. It's not an emotional state, and it's easier to be professional when our fight or flight response is not fully activated.
But remember, as I said at the top of this episode, in these situations, it's all about controlling what we can control. We cannot control the other person. We can't change our teacher's teaching style or our boss's leadership style, but we can control ourselves and that is the only thing worth spending energy on.
And so I'll say it again. Professionalism is a behavior choice. It's not an emotional state. Okay. And so sometimes that's what it takes to think about your situation from a place of, I am choosing to be non-reactive here, even though I am angry. It almost always puts some of the control back in our hands, which makes us feel better about the whole thing.
Okay, so now we've talked about some strategies that can help manage these situations. Now I do wanna talk about what not to do, because honestly, some of these are tempting as heck, but they usually just make things worse. And look, the strategies that I'm about to say, I'm [00:24:00] fully aware that it's gonna sound like a lot of work on your end when you're not the problem.
And you're right, it is a lot of work, or it can feel that way. It's not fair that we have to be the one adjusting when the other person is being the difficult one, right? But here's the reality, fairness doesn't change the situation. Strategy changes our situation. So yeah, there are things that we shouldn't do because they don't actually help you.
Number one, avoid ranting. When we feel a bad emotion, like resentment or maybe indignation, it is natural to invite others into our story so that we feel less alone. So we get get validation that we were right. But venting the classmates or coworkers or in group chats only entrenches the drama and risks word getting out to the wrong person, maybe even to the person that you're having an issue with.
And then now suddenly you're the one who looks like you have the problem. So. You probably do need to process your [00:25:00] feelings about this person, but I would say do it with a parent. Do it with a partner, or just one trusted person. Okay.
Number two, don't assume bad intent right away. A lot of frustrating behavior from teachers and bosses is because of habit.
Like that's just what they do. That's just their mode of operation. It could be due to incompetence, like maybe literally they don't have the skills needed for good classroom management or instruction or leadership. Or three, it could be due to work overload. Like they could be so overworked that this is the result, that their mismanagement and mistreatment of you is the result.
And it's not a personal vendetta against you. I know it can feel personal, but assuming bad intentions can amp up your emotions, it can cloud your judgment. You know, maybe they are just overwhelmed. Maybe they don't know how to communicate well. Not everybody has these skills. Maybe they're not great at their job.
And none of that means that they're out to get you. It doesn't also excuse their behavior, but that is the, could be the reason for it.
Okay? But if assuming incompetence instead of malice helps you kind of stay calmer in this [00:26:00] situation, it's worth trying that mental reframe. Uh, number three, don't try to teach them a lesson. I'm kind of like giving myself a pep talk here. Eye rolls. Sarcasm, passive resistance or deliberately trying to do things like your way just to prove a point, usually costs us more than it costs the other person.
You might feel righteous in the moment, but what are you actually accomplishing? Nothing or just making ourselves look petty, making the relationship worse. And in the professional space, this could end up looking like insubordination, which is certainly what we don't want here. Number four. I think this is four.
1, 2, 3. Yeah, this is four. Don't ignore stated expectations out of principle. It's kind of related to the third one, so maybe I could group these together, but refusing to comply with something because it feels unfair doesn't change the expectation. Like my son's teacher in the late work form. Was it annoying?
Yes.
Do I think the teacher should have responded to the email? Yes.
But the expectation [00:27:00] was clear and ignoring the form outta principle, which he didn't, uh, he just literally didn't see it, wouldn't have improved his grade. It just would've made everything worse. But, hey, this is a lesson for my kid.
Next, don't escalate too early. Going straight to HR or dean or higher ups without first trying to understand the expectations or the patterns can damage your credibility. Unless, of course there's a true safety or ethics issue at play. I'm not saying don't escalate when you need to. I'm saying don't make that your first move when you're just annoyed or frustrated. Try some of the other strategies I shared today first, see what you can tolerate, see what you can change on your end, and then go from there.
Um, the next one, I've lost count at this point, so we're just gonna keep saying the next one. Avoid oversharing your feelings with the person in charge. Now, in any other kind of relationship, like a friendship or romantic relationship, it's healthy and often advise to share your feelings with the other person.
If you're bothered by something, we bring it up to prevent the resentment from brewing. But in authority relationships with [00:28:00] teachers and bosses, it's a little different. It's not the place for emotional honesty or processing your feelings about the person with the person. I know we live in a culture that values vulnerability and authenticity, and those things have their place, but this isn't it.
So I say keep communication with your professor or your boss professional, goal oriented, direct. They don't need to know how you feel about them. 'cause remember, this relationship is transactional and is temporary.
Next. Don't confuse effort with results. I mentioned this already, but the effort you put into your essay or your presentation doesn't have anything to do with the expectations your teacher or boss has for your work.
I want you to feel proud of the work that you do, but if your teacher or your boss expects a certain outcome, that's what you have to give them. Like that's the job. And unfortunately, this is one of those things that can be hard to let go of because when we're younger, we're praised for our efforts, but at a certain level, it becomes about what we produce.
Next, regardless of the number. Next, don't make it your identity. The, I hate my teacher or my boss is the worst in the world [00:29:00] can so quickly become the story that we tell ourselves and we tell it so often that it starts affecting everything else. And I get it. When something makes us feel this bad, is hard not to make it central, but that story can seep into other parts of school or work that have nothing to do with this one person. You can absolutely hate working with a person without letting that hatred take over your whole experience.
And finally be careful not to burn bridges that you might need to cross later. It's hard to imagine a teacher or boss we don't like as having a role in our future lives, but because most of the time we're just looking forward to the time where we don't need to interact with them ever again, but especially in the school context, you never know when that teacher's gonna reappear. You might end up being in their class again. You might need a recommendation letter. They can be in charge of a club that you wanna join. With your boss, you may get a promotion. It all seems good 'cause you have like a new boss. But then suddenly now your old boss becomes the new boss of the other team that you just joined.
So the reminder here is that we always wanna keep things professional, not burn any bridges 'cause we never know what the future role of this person is gonna [00:30:00] be in our lives. Okay.
So those are the things not to do, but I also wanna give you some really practical suggestions for getting through those tough days when you're sitting in class or you're at the office and you're really not feeling it and you need to do something to get through the day.
So starting with students, I have four ideas.
Number one, use the class period as practice for something else you're working on. Like, okay, I have to sit through this 50 minute class, so I'm gonna use it to practice taking better notes, or I'm gonna use it to practice not looking at my phone, I'm gonna use it to practice just asking one good question, even though I don't like this teacher.
Number two, sit strategically. If possible, sit where you can minimize direct interaction with the teacher, but still stay engaged enough to not draw attention to yourself. So you're not in the back of the room with like, your headphones on.
Number three, find one thing to focus on that's neutral.
Maybe it's mastering the content itself, completely divorced from the teacher. You're not doing it for them, you're doing this for you. And then number four, seek help elsewhere. I don't love that sometimes it comes to this, but [00:31:00] that's the reality.
Because the tricky thing about teachers you don't like is that they're the ones teaching you the content. So if you need extra help, they typically are the go-to person, but you do also have some other options. If you're in college, you can go to the TA office hours instead of like to the professor office hours.
If you're in high school, you can sometimes go to another teacher or you might have to get a tutor if it comes to that.
For professionals, I also have four ideas. Number one, you can break the day into chunks. So don't think about surviving, you know, a whole eight hours. That almost seems too big. Think about surviving until 10 and then until lunch, and then until three.
Remember this, I just have to survive mentality won't be for every single day, just on the particularly hard ones. Number two, create a physical or mental distance whenever you can by taking your lunch away from your desk, maybe going for a walk. The idea is to use these breaks to reset your emotional regulation.
Number three, redirect your focus to aspects of the job that you can control or that you do enjoy. Your projects, your skill development, your [00:32:00] relationships with the coworkers that you do like. Remember, it's not all that bad.
And number four, document things Not in a paranoid, like, I'm gonna get you kind of way, but you know, if things are tense, keeping a record of what was asked of you and what you delivered, and some communication between the two of you can give you peace of mind and protection just in case.
All right, let's recap here. We covered a lot I wanna. and I wanna flow through it once more so you get the most out of your time with me. Sometimes two people just aren't compatible, and when one of those people has authority over you, it feels harder to manage, but the entire strategy becomes about what you can control.
So what can we do about it? First, identify what specifically bothers you and pinpoint the actual issue. Is it their communication style, their expectations, the way they manage the classroom or the team? Figure out what it is so you know what you're actually dealing with. Second, learn their triggers.
Use pattern recognition to figure out what bugs them, and then just don't do those things because you knowing their triggers and working around them makes your life easier.[00:33:00]
Third, expectation management. So remember that success is measured in their system by their standards, not yours. Deliver what they're actually asking for, not what you think or want them to be asking for.
In other words, it's kind of like play by their rules. And then fourth. Emotional regulation. It is easy to let resentment and frustration sabotage our actions. But remember, the relationship is transactional and it is temporary. And then there was a whole bunch of ideas or suggestions for what not to do.
Don't rant to everyone.
Don't assume bad intent right away. Don't try to teach them a lesson. Don't ignore stated expectations out of principle. Uh, don't escalate too early. Avoid oversharing your feelings with them. Avoid confusing effort with results. Don't make hating them your entire identity and be careful not to burn bridges.
And I realize all of this sounds like a lot of accommodation on your part for someone who doesn't deserve it. And you're right. But the goal here isn't to make them feel better or to be the bigger [00:34:00] person for some moral victory, although that can feel good too. The goal is to make your own life more manageable while you're stuck in this temporary situation.
I know from experience that being in a situation where you don't like your teacher or your boss is uncomfortable, and some days it's gonna feel so darn hard, but again, it is temporary. You're not gonna be in this class forever. You're not gonna work for this person forever. And in the meantime, I hope the strategies I shared today can help you get through it without making things worse for yourself, because that's really what this is all about, right?
It's about protecting your grades, protecting your job performance, protecting your future options, and protecting your sanity while you're dealing with someone difficult. You don't have to like them. You don't have to be friends with them. You don't even have to respect them if they haven't earned it fair enough.
But you do have to figure out how to coexist with them so it doesn't cost you more than it's worth. And if you try these strategies and the situation is unbearable, or you realize this isn't just a personality clash, but something more serious, it's probably time to escalate. Talk to HR, to a dean or whoever the next level is.
Don't just stay in a [00:35:00] bad situation just to prove that you can handle it. All right. That is it for today. Thank you so much for your time. Keep showing up. Keep doing the hard work, keep asking the hard questions, and never stop learning.
