We want to avoid toxicity.
Toxic feelings include guilt, envy, and regret.
Toxic people are quick to criticize and cast blame.
causing unpleasant feelings; harmful or malicious: a toxic boyfriend; toxic criticism.
Scenario: It's 8AM, you open up your inbox and see a negative email. It might be news, it might be an unhappy friend or client, it might be just be someone ranting. If have always been a good sounding board, you see it. Our first instinct is to respond or react. It doesn't take much these days to get our blood boiling.
Is your virus software running? We all have a virus shield, we just forget to update it or turn it on sometimes. What the virus shield, when working properly, does is quarantine the suspecting scripts and notifies you. Negativity is no way to start the day. All it does it put you into a negative cycle.
You can block out time later in the day when you are more prepared to address the issue.
And when you do examine something from your quarantine, do so objectively - with fresh eyes and w/o history. Level up. Leave the emotion out of it.
the reality is often that the other person just needs to be heard. You don't need to solve thier problem, just acknowledge that it exists.