The Coworker You Can't Stand
You know the one. The credit-taker, the reply-all warrior, the colleague whose chewing you can hear through noise-canceling headphones. You haven't even badged in yet and your jaw is already tight. The meeting invite lands, their name is on it, and the whole day tilts. So you did what everyone does at 11 p.m.: you searched how to deal with a coworker you can't stand.
Marcus Aurelius, who ran an empire full of difficult people, opened his private notebook with a piece of advance planning. In George Long's public-domain translation, he tells himself: "Begin the morning by saying to thyself, I shall meet with the busybody, the ungrateful, arrogant, deceitful, envious, unsocial." The point isn't to stew — it's to be unsurprised. He expected friction, so friction couldn't ambush him. That's the frame. Here's the method.
The Method.
Separate the behavior from the person. Write down what actually happened — "interrupted me twice in standup," not "he's impossible." Specifics you can address; character verdicts you can't.
Sort it by control. Some things you own (your tone, your preparation, whether you take the bait); some you don't (their personality). Spend your energy only on the first column. This is the oldest Stoic move there is, and still the most useful.
Reduce the surface area. If a channel keeps causing sparks — reply-all threads, ambiguous chats — move it. Shift to a scheduled check-in, put decisions in writing, and stop feeding the format that generates heat.
Address it directly, once, and low-key. Most experts on workplace conflict recommend a private, specific, non-accusatory conversation before anything escalates. Use plain "I" statements: "When the deadline shifted without a heads-up, I got caught out. Can we sync before changes go out?" Ask for one concrete behavior, not a personality transplant.
Document if it continues. Keep a simple, factual log — dates, what happened, impact. Not ammunition; just a clear record in case you need it.
Escalate through the right channel. If the behavior crosses into harassment, discrimination, or safety, that's a manager or HR matter, and a specific, dated record is exactly what they'll ask for.
Protect your own baseline. Take the real lunch break. Don't relitigate the slight for three hours after work. The goal isn't to win them over — it's to keep one person from renting space in your head.
You will not fix their character, and you don't have to. You only have to manage the interface and keep your own footing.
Marcus expected the difficult people before breakfast — so they never ran his day. Neither should this one run yours.