Offending someone is the least of it.

Often in life, we avoid telling others something as we fear offending them or we feel awkward about being honest to someone.

I’m not advocating brutal honesty, that is just rude, shaming and not appropriate in a case.

However, just as brutal is leaving a person guessing or engineering a way to ‘take them out’ of the picture, without being decent enough to tell them why.

The options, don’t tell people and leave them guessing, be brutally honest and upset/shame them or learn how to give feedback and deal with situations that avoid offence, that is constructive and bring about a good outcome for all parties.

We are taught not offend yet that leaves the other person feeling rejected and uncertain as to why something happened.

This is worse than offending them as they have no closure, no say, nothing but the silence of avoiding offence.

When the petrol is being tipped on the fire

There are situations in life when it is best to just step away.

When both sides have lost composure, lost their sense of perspective, when anger has come to the situation.

It is best to walk away, otherwise, we end up just pouring petrol on the flames and neither side wins and everyone loses.

Step back and allow the flames to subside.