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Do you often:- talk about conflicts
- complain about others
- recount your confrontations
- feel conversations should focus on your issues
- feel that you have all the answers for how others should live
Then, you may have become toxic in life.
You may not realize that you somehow always make others feel awful. When others point this out, you explain it as becoming pessimistic in life.
I can sympathize with pessimists — past trauma may have left them negative and sad. Sitting with them can make anyone feel depressed.
But pessimists don’t steal someone’s joys. While toxic people do exactly that.
Toxic people don’t sit alone with their bitter selves; they find a victim, suck their joy, and infect them with bitterness. It is their nature.
How would you know if you’re the toxic one, since we’re often blind to our own flaws?
7 Signs You Have Become Toxic In Life
Seven signs to know if you have become a toxic person:
1. You always look for and point out faults in others.
Toxic people are malicious-intent people who find pleasure in bringing and seeing others down.
Some faultfinders are helpful team members because they allow the team to spot problems before a product’s final release. But not the ones who are always hypercritical.
Such a person will take it as their mission to find flaws in everyone and everything. They will put down even the most brilliant ideas with remarks like, “But it’s not going to work because …”
That unwarranted fault-finding is a toxic habit.
If you are a narcissist, you could also try to bring down their credibility by lying about what’s wrong with what they’re doing (when they are perfectly right).
Tell you more: Unsolicited opinion is criticism.
Are you always giving others unasked-for opinions?
2. Your natural reaction to people you meet is sarcasm.
Are you the type of person who, when someone says something nice about you, responds with,
- “That’s a pathetic attempt to impress me,” or
- “What favor do you want from me?” or
- “Can you really flatter me like that?”
Then, you are the sarcastic person who doesn’t know how to be kind when someone is being good to you. Your act of making a mockery of their compliments toward you makes you a toxic person. By the way, sarcastic people are smarter than people think of them.
If you always push people around you to act happy and see the bright side of things, then you are spreading toxic positivity.
3. You are a wicked cynic who wishes bad things for others.
The American Psychological Association defines pessimism as “the attitude that things will go wrong and that people’s wishes or aims are unlikely to be fulfilled.”
Anyone can get pessimistic at times and start seeing the world in a glass-half-empty way.
But if you’re always expecting and projecting negative outcomes, even when everything is going well, you qualify as toxic.
Ask yourself heart-to-heart:
- Do you always undervalue people’s abilities?
- Are you looking for ways to demotivate others?
- Are you always focused on what could go wrong?
- Are you always bringing down people’s dreams and hopes?
- Do you jump to tell others that the risks outweigh the benefits?
Then you could be toxic. Or, at best, an extreme pessimist. Such a person often tries to deflect criticism by falsely claiming to be a realist while denying that they are toxic.
4. You impose your opinions on others while discarding theirs.
You will be considered toxic if you always try to see others through your own values.
You ignore their unique situation and set out to judge them solely based on your own righteousness.
When you witness people in misery, you feel obligated to preach to them instead of simply empathizing with them. In fact, you might not even know what empathy is.
This is a toxic attitude. It assumes that every problem must have a solution that works for you, or you think will work for them. As they say, “If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”
“One man’s gospel truth is another man’s blasphemous lie. The dangerous thing about people is the way we try to kill anyone whose truth doesn’t agree with ours.”
― Mira Grant, Blackout
5. You run away from taking responsibility for your actions.
Toxic people often project they can do no wrong. This streak of impossible perfectionism makes it difficult to admit fault. Doing so makes them feel deeply ashamed.
If you too can’t seem to take responsibility for your mistakes and flaws, you may have become toxic.
If you too are constantly pointing fingers and trying to find someone to lay the blame on for your issues, you could have become toxic.
Take a step back and reflect on your own behavior.
6. You love to engage in gossip and drama.
You indulge in rumors and gossip, which can create a toxic environment for everyone involved.
Gossip is idle talk about someone’s private or personal matters, especially when they are not there.
Wert & Salovey (2004) found that aggressive gossipers compare themselves with less fortunate people to feel better. That is a downward comparison.
Toxic people often thrive on drama and gossip, and may even start it themselves to create a sense of excitement or control.
If you find that you are usually in the thick of the drama, talking negatively about others in their absence, it may be time to re-evaluate your behavior.
If you always assume that others have a bad side that you must expose, you might be negatively harming their reputation with your half-truths.
“People are almost always better than their neighbors think they are.”
― George Eliot, Middlemarch
Beware, your “rumor-mill” behavior can harm others as well as also harm your own reputation and relationships. And, as they say, your reputation precedes you.
7. You constantly criticize and demean others.
You are always hyper-critical of other people and have a negative image of them.
If you find that you are always putting others down and never recognizing their worth, it can be a sign that you have become toxic in life.
This can also harm your relationships with others, as it can make even your closest people feel unsupported and undervalued.
Write down one thought that comes to your mind when you think about the people in your life. If the bulk of them are critical, you must start changing yourself for your own and others’ well-being.
Can You Change From Being Toxic
Yes, anyone can change their toxic nature with self-awareness, introspection, growth mindset, an open mind, and grit to become the best version of themselves.
Our personalities are shaped by life experiences, but they are not static or fixed. So, all of us can improve, sometimes with a little help from an expert.
Our results, therefore, suggest that personality can change and that such change is important and meaningful. ― Boyce, Wood & Powdthavee (2012)
How To Change Your Toxic Personality
Acceptance and self-empathy, not self-pity and defensiveness, is the first step in changing your toxic attitude.
Here are some don’ts to change your toxic nature:
1. Don’t offer unasked critiques or help.
For a change, keep your critical opinions to yourself until you are invited to share them.
While being happy to help is a healthy attitude, forcing yourself to help on every occasion is a terrible habit. Stop that today.
2. Don’t react to everything with cynicism.
Don’t be cynical all the time. For a change, say “Thanks!” with a smile when someone praises you or your efforts. Gratitude has immense power to raise your happiness levels.
- Don’t force someone to be happy when they are grieving. Grief is an individual experience and everyone can have their own time to process their grief.
- Don’t justify why someone should be sad when they just received a piece of great news. The happiness of the moment is the only real joy of living.
Instead, try to encourage others in some positive way.
The modern definition of a cynic is someone who believes that human actions are entirely motivated by selfish interests. But the original Cynics were a school of philosophers who believed that the purpose of life is to live in virtue. It was a Cynic who mentored Zeno, the first Stoic.
3. Don’t seek advice only to dismiss it.
Stop asking people for advice or help if you finally end up criticizing them rather than thanking them.
People will soon realize that all you want is their attention, time, or resources, not a genuine desire to accept the help with genuine gratitude.
And once they see your hidden intentions, they distance themselves from you.
Toxic people ask for advice, but will treat it with contempt when given.
Stop asking for people’s advice if you do not intend to value them. Don’t lead people up the garden path to satisfy your narcissistic ambitions.
4. Take responsibility for your actions.
Learning to take responsibility for your actions can help improve your relationships with others, as it shows that you are willing to be accountable and work towards resolving issues.
It can also help you grow as a person and become more self-aware. Remember, taking responsibility is not a sign of weakness—it’s a sign of strength and maturity.
FAQs
Can you be toxic to yourself?
Your overall toxicity can make you hurt yourself.
1. You may try to justify yourself after doing wrong, and end up being punished.
2. You may try to boost your self-esteem by comparing yourself to others.
3. You may stand up for yourself so strongly that others leave you in fear.
4. You may neglect self-care at the cost of scheming against others.How do you become toxic in life?
A toxic personality habit can be the result of our childhood environment. We may have had a narcissistic parent who treated us poorly when we were young, or we may have had a teacher in school who was always hard on us. The way we reacted to those situations got ingrained deeply in our brains. When we face a similar situation as adults, we may react in the same way as our parents or teachers did. We may even react with increased toxicity.
Does everyone have toxic habits?
It’s not a perfect world, so all of us may have something that seems toxic to others. 1. We sometimes spread gossip, pass unkind comments, tell white lies, vent our wrath, and gaslight without intention.
2. We may react with unexplained anger, put others down, boast of our achievements, get jealous or envious, or cheat a little.
3. We may sometimes come across as overcritical, outspoken, confrontational, revengeful, impulsive, or overthinking.What are some typical behaviors of a toxic person?
Some typical behaviors of toxic people:
1. They are usually abusive or exploitative towards those weaker or more vulnerable.
2. They damage or destroy other people’s personal and professional relationships.
3. They are intentionally harmful to others through your words and behavior.
4. They cause mental distress to others and take delight in their suffering.
5. They have no regard for the feelings or well-being of others.
6. They feel accomplished in causing others to fear them.
7. They cheat, lie, or manipulate others without remorse.
8. They don’t take accountability for their actions.
Final Words
- Personal experience: One of my professors was so outright toxic that I used to get a bad taste in my mouth when near her.
Finally, I’d ask you to give yourself some leeway.
You might not have become a toxic person if your current stress is making you act in a noxious way. To find out, look within for a poor self-image, constant anxiety and stress, and chronic anger. Consult a therapist to unearth your unresolved issues.
Toxic people carry their negativity everywhere they go. Make sure you are not the one who unconsciously gaslights a relationship into becoming toxic.
√ Also Read: How To Cut A Trauma Bond After A Toxic Breakup?
√ Please spread the word if you found this helpful.
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