Imagine working hard and showing results through your performances in professional setting. Your colleagues come up to you, congratulate you, and praise your efforts. You are the center of attention at the social gatherings for your recent performances. But then there is one superior (or even colleague or friend) who is feeling jealous about the praises being showered onto you and makes attempt to interject the spotlight of admiration that you are receiving.
It is not difficult to find people in our social and professional circle who have a hard time witnessing our praises. Such folks may keep quiet and swallow their pride when someone is lauding our achievements or efforts. However, their most common reaction is abrupt change of topic in order to prevent yourselves to receive further adulation. If you feel subjected to such scenarios where obstacles are placed in order to prevent deserving limelight upon you, then you may have to be a little pro-active to handle such situations.
Why do some folks try to restrict the limelight onto you?
The common reason could be jealously. However, there could be a genuine reason also that your colleague or superior do not want you to get complacent and therefore try to keep your ego in check by either steering away the conversation or by downplaying your achievement. You may want to verify about the authenticity of their intent in such cases. There are ways to express downplaying of achievement for genuine reasons like
- Your superior steers away the conversation to prevent you from getting into overconfidence and cocky mode but in the end throws spotlight onto you in little dosage just to give you the right amount of confidence.
- They may praise you excessively in alone but keeps it minimal in front of others so that you don’t get complacent.
- Your superior jokes about your progress and rather inspires you to achieve 3x more results
Subtle Responses of People who are Actually Jealous of You
- They refrain from talking about anything near to the subject that might lead to your praise in some or the other form.
- They do not contribute to the conversation when others praise you in front of them. They may have a hard time in making eye contact with you during the adulation moments. Their minimal or forced reactions include a smile that doesn’t reflect in their eyes.
- They change topics abruptly, especially to unrelated ones in order to divert attention from your success.
- They try to undermine your achievement through taunts and other excuses no matter how big it is.
- They give backhanded compliments like “You are lucky; I wish I had that easy”
- They find reasons to talk about their favourite people to compliment them simply to prevent others praising you.
Funny Responses when Jealous Folks tries to steer away conversation during your praise
While you may feel like venting out frustration on seeing such tactics where your superior or colleague tries to drive the attention from you during your adulation, humor could be a better route to express your displeasure. It works best in both the professional scenario and social gathering. Let’s see some funny and sarcastic replies below.
“I think I will order the latest microscope for you so that you could find the invisible faults in my case. Kidding!” : – Although funny, it has hint of sarcasm that put them on the backfoot.
“Wow. you see that! The talks of my praise just turned into a magician and dissappeared. But thanks again for the kind words and lets not forgot our (Colleague’s name to change subjects at moment’s will.”
“Wow! That topic change was smoother than my morning coffee! Since how long you were practising them?”
“I know its one of those hard days today. You will need some help in order to sleep like a baby and I sure as hell will pray for that!”
“Just when my Oscar moment had started to roll in, this gentlemen arrives! Guess, I will have to now hold on the speeches and tears for the next time.”
“That’s an interesting take. Can you explain what you mean?” : – Using this sentence, you are asking them to shed light on their own statement. Its a reply that may put them in some pressure in order to justify their talk for undermining your success.
“Thank you everyone for the compliments. Real shout out to my colleague for keeping my ego in check by changing the subject abruptly. We can’t have it popping and causing a scene, can we? You are the real MVP here mate.”
“I am extremely confident that one day you will get a crown for steering the conversation away. Since you excel at changing topics, could you suggest ways to dodge unwanted questions at family gatherings?”
Conclusion
Humor is a great way to diffuse potential discomfort and jealously. By giving a funny and sarcastic response in such scenarios, you throw light on the real intent of the jealous folk without targeting them or making them uncomfortable.
