We all have experience of people in our lives who treat us badly, rub us up the wrong way or appear to be constantly challenging us.

This  can be upsetting and stressful for us, particularly when they are people that we are in daily or frequent contact with.

We wish they were out of our lives, that they would leave us alone.

Some of us always seem to be encountering people like this in our lives and we wonder what we have done to deserve it.

Viewed from the spiritual perspective, these people are here to teach us a lesson about life or ourselves.

Their behaviour (and the behaviour of others like them who come into our lives) should be seen as a blessing.

Although this sounds counter intuitive, if we stop to consider for a moment, we will see that it is not.

If life is always easy, we will not grow – we will stagnate and wither.

Life, seen from a spiritual dimension, is an opportunity to learn valuable lessons and develop our own inner resources.

If everyone in our life was kind and good to us, we would not have much opportunity for growth.

We do not have to like the mean people who teach us lessons.

However, we can be thankful for them, for they present us with an opportunity to learn how to deal with them – to work out what the lesson is that we need to learn.

Once we have learnt that lesson, our reward is that we will not have people like that in our life again – and if we do, we will know how to deal with them.

So, for every person in your life that treats you badly, give thanks.

Then work out what it is that they are sent to teach you – is it to stand up to bullies, learn self reliance, find your inner warrior or how to move on in peace?

Whatever the lesson, learn it and give thanks. Then move on…