When someone who wronged you becomes successful

[toepick]

How do you feel?

Ideally we move on, heal and become indifferent

Of course before SM we often wouldn't know what becomes of the people who hurt us

I don't stalk but because I use SM inevitably someone who really hurt me and is linked through friends/groups has popped up

They have had success and it hurts

If someone has wronged me I try and give them as little attention as I can. Thinking about them or seeing them on SM is really more than I owe them.

Interesting one.
I can think of two people and my reaction is different because one of them I feel has won her success fair and square. Part of me feels I would actually have not liked her not to be successful, because she deserves it and I don’t actually want the world to be an unfair place.
The other one I think has achieved his success through manipulation and hypocrisy and I don’t like what it says about the world we are in.

Mine makes me look bad, but I just have a little bit of irritation about it. I was friendly with a girl during uni. She had a crush on a boy, I didn’t know she did as we weren’t that friendly but she saw us leaving a bar one night and she was with some other friends of ours so we all stopped to chat. She was drunk and yelled to him, “I hope you wrap it up as she gets around.” I had 3 boyfriends at uni, each lasting a year and dated a handful of men in between. According to her, that was getting around a lot and she started shouting about me being a slut who stole her man. Never spoke to her again. But kept her on social media.

We both went on to start businesses. Mine full time, it’s what I do. Hers was a pocket money thing. Five years later, she still only has a couple hundred followers on social media. I have thousands. Now, what she does is good but she just wasn’t good at business. I shared her page and wrote about what she did at about 6pm. When I logged on the next morning, she had gained thousands of followers overnight. The comments on the post I made sharing her were endless, loads of orders, loads more shares. It was amazing. Again, what she did was a great idea and she deserved it but she’d been doing it for 5 years and couldn’t get a foothold. I shared it once and she was everywhere. A couple weeks later, she was interviewed on BBC breakfast. And really… it was because of me. But I can’t say that in real life because I sound petty, and I sometimes feel a little annoyed about her success because of how awful she was to me… and I handed it to her!

Her success does not take away from mine, and I chose to share her page because I wanted to do something nice and I did to after years of not speaking at all so she didn’t even ask. But her success still annoys me!

I've see a few people who have engaged in frankly horrible behaviour get their comeuppance in time.

For me, Karma is real.

Is their sucess because they wronged you or are the two completely unconnected?

No, but they “wronged me” and then years later, I thought I’d be nice as she kept making post after post and wasn’t getting anywhere so I shared it and wrote about it and then she had this overnight explosion. And I just think, she was an awful person and part of me wishes I hadn’t done it because I don’t think she deserves it. But part of small business is supported other small businesses so I did do it. And she never thanked me!

Their success isn't a product of how they wronged me

And perhaps they deserve it in some ways

I could have been part of their success but walked away because they bullied me and made me feel shit

I have my own success now so I know I shouldn't even give it airtime but I'm human and flawed and it bugs me

It doesn’t matter if it’s unconnected. Mine is the same. Success has nothing to do with the bad experience with the person, but it still makes you think “yuck” just a little bit.

I think there’s no point in beating yourself up for not rising above it. It’s easier said than done. Obviously no point in wallowing and constantly checking but you are allowed to be annoyed, especially if they pop up in your life rather than you seeking them out.

I don’t believe in karma though. The world is bleak and random. Sometimes people will get their comeuppance because of natural consequences like people they wronged not helping them, but others will continue to profit from bad behaviour.

Well, we would all like to get what we personally deem as justice but the world doesn't work that way.

There's luck involved in everything, including success. However, if someone who was horrible to me got success in great part by doing the things I didn't do - unrelated to the horribleness, just sticking it out and doing the hard work that I didn't do - then it's hard for me to make the connection, to be honest. If they're routinely nasty to people they may well find they don't have support when they need it, but if they do the hard work on, say, a weight loss regime or a personal or professional project... that honestly is completely unrelated.

Different if they bullied you out of that same project, I guess, but sometimes, if you want success, you just have to accept you'll come across nasty people and not let it stop you.

I walked away and started my own business

So I suppose I didn't let them stop me

But I also think I'm very sensitive and really find it hard to brush off nasty people

It is a fact if life. It will never change. By human nature some people are dicks.

But I have a huge sense of justice and it's hard

I also find it hard that people who you've found to be horrible always seem to have adorers and support

Why can't others see what I see?!

The world is a strange place sometimes

Well it's possible that the relationships aren't borne of genuine liking and so on.

But it's also true that some people just don't get on and don't bring out the best in each other, but do get on with other people and bring out the best in each other. It's honestly pointless wondering why nobody else cares about X wronging you as much as you do... and in some circumstances (couldn't say with yours, I don't know enough about it), expecting third parties to effectively punish and reject the other person for you, for your falling out, is not an appealing act.

I don't expect others to fall out on my behalf

I just don't understand why anyone wants to be associated with or in a relationship with a bully

But the world is complicated. I get that

Mm...not trying to be horrible but the first and second paragraphs sound a bit contradictory.

It might be that they are scared of the bully, don't see them as one or don't see what happened as relevant to their own relationship with the person. Whatever the reason, it's basically not in their interests to cut the person off.

Not especially successful but still. Then later her life (by any measure) went to shit.

a mutual acquaintance told me and I was surprised that I truly didn’t care.
you never know how someone’s life will turn up or down, so it is much better to focus on your own.

Most people base their friendships on what they themselves actually experience of that individual. I’m guessing this person’s friends don’t see them as a bully or think that they’re horrible. People don’t stand stuck still in the moment they were in when our lives diverted: whatever somebody did to you years and years ago doesn’t define who they are forever nor every interpersonal relationship. Are you exactly the same person you were years ago, completely unchanged and behaving identically?

Sometimes it is because they are scared. They would rather be part of the crowd doing the bullying than the next target and they don't want to lose the greater friendship group.

It's also true to say a lot of bullies can be quite charismatic and fun to be around in a superficial sense (provided they are not bullying you of course). Not everyone has the strength of character to call them out on it - a lot will just go along with what ever is happening in the hope of not being singled out as the next target.

It's common in social groups of younger people where people are relatively insecure about their position in the world and need to feel popular and valued and "belong" to a group.

As you get older you tend to become less willing to put up with shit behaviour for the sake of appearances.

some people find it easier I think, bullies can be very intimidating and it can be easier to manage them than to fall out with them.

No I've grown

But I wasn't a bully

I suppose people can grow and change for the better and I accept not everyone experiences people the same way

I think I triggered this person. I don't think deep down they liked me although they pretended too. Then it came out

I suppose we were just not suited as friends or business partners

I absolutely accept people should move on and it says a lot about me that it bugs me. I need to work on my own inner peace

People’s views on ‘wrongs’ can vary and be so subjective (and to suit individuals perceived power play/ in social groups/life for example). It’s so much more complicated and open to interpretation. I’m not sure I believe in Karma and try not to hold on to negative feelings about a person but there is one individual who I would gag at them becoming successful. Very childish of me 😀

I think this thread has been helpful thanks

I need to work on myself

I made someone wildly successful, more so than they ever dreamed. It hurt until I went and made myself wildly successful, it has taken a long long time but happy in the end and it didn't hurt that the person I made wildly successful gave it all to a fraudster and lost their money, their house and their family once the money dried up. Karma, she's a BITCH! 😂

we all do... some things bother us more than others, thats human. You'll work it out

I assume there was some reason you weren't pleased to have made them successful.

The problem with this approach is that it turns a fraudster into an agent of "karma", which most people misunderstand to be an external agent of justice and vengeance (usually entirely personal), and not a shitty lying thief. They become a force for good. If that's the case, how do we know that what the other person did to you wasn't also karma, making them a force for good?

It also messes up cause and effect. This person didn't get comeuppance for supposedly wronging you, they got the outcome of being a crime victim.