Hi, I had never post anything in this sub. I hope someone can give me some advice.
I work for a institution that deals with research. For anyone that may or not may have the experience, research jobs are very flexible in time, there is a lot of "you don't have specific work hours" and therefore there is a big transpiration of hanging out with the same people you work with.
I talk with EVERYONE, no matter who they are or who they talk to, I try to be in a good place with as many people as I can and in my eyes everyone deserves they same treatment.
The thing is that since I started working here I had have problems with a lot of people. At the start I thought I was just defending myself but I had come to realize I have fault for it too.
- I always treat everyone like I would like to be treated, and sometimes they do things that for me are not so nice to me, so I'm very honest about these things and we get in fights. After the fights had calm down I apologize for any wrong doing, tell the person I want to talk and try to fix the situation but usually people don't want to fix things or they avoid me after we have fights.
- I easily feel attacked when people critique me, I'm honest I'm not perfect, but is someone says something I don't believe is true about myself I would be very honest, I don't insult, I don't call names, I'm respectful but I would keep defending my point for a long time and stand for myself.
- If I have a fight with someone and they make it clear they don't want to be close anymore, I distance myself, that means just go no contact and respect their space, not be in the same places they are or if I see them avoid them. I thought this was me respecting their boundaries, but it has come to people saying I'm rude and because I have a very clear poker face they had say i "Look bad at people". I'm really just trying to not show anything bad in my face as I know some people could think I'm laughing at them or assume things...it created the opposite reaction.
It has come to my understanding that people have extended these interactions to higher ups in the form of "I had a bad interaction with __________" and it has become gossip too. People now say I'm problematic and I had problems with everyone, but I don't know who these everyone's are for maybe one person. I also had hear people say I work too much...I'm at lost, they want me to be more interactive? but when I'm interactive and talk with everyone I'm bad? I was just trying to hide in my work and don't cause problems.
Again I'm not perfect, and I accept my fault, I can talk too much when I'm trying to defend myself and I address that the timing is not the best, I don't know when to stop.
I'm just in a position where It's hard to understand which was the exact part that made people feel the need to not reach out to me and instead elevate this matters to others, when I always make the opening of "I'm sorry for anything I say that made you feel bad, let's talk about it"
I'm really sad because I always thought I was treating people with respect and leaving them be if they didn't like me, I'm not trying to harass anyone but it seems it has had the opposite effect and I would like to do better.
I don't know how to deal with the feeling that being honest when someone hurts me or they do something that is not nice, makes then feel like I'm bad. Some people had tell me I should just not say anything because "That's just how some people are", so if someone hurts or says something bad to me I should just be quiet?
It kinda feels I had less problems when I was closed up and I wouldn't talk to anyone. It's starting to feel that I should not talk with anyone just like I used too, this situation is hurting a lot and messing with my brain as the work is highly intertwin with the people.