Sometimes someone really, really dislikes you. It’s unavoidable – even if you’re a complete people-pleaser willing to always be a spineless sycophant, someone will dislike you for that. So you might as well just try to live a moral but honest life, be nice to people as a default, and let the chips fall as they may.
But you also shouldn’t worry too much about it, and here’s why: The actual danger of your enemies doesn’t come from how much they dislike you. It comes from the cross-section of how much they dislike you versus how much actual power they have to influence your life.
Sometimes you can’t make someone like you, but more frequently than you realize you can reduce the power they have. If your direct boss doesn’t like you, that can be a problem! But finding a new job is a great solution, even if you wish it wasn’t. If your neighbor doesn’t like you, that might be hard to change – but so what? What can your neighbor even do in most circumstances?
So don’t lose sleep over powerless enemies. Just be nice anyway, and live a happy life in the rest of the world.
The Opportunity Machine 