10 Ways To Spot Bitter People Before They Make Your Life Miserable

Bitter people will bring you down.

An elderly person with short gray hair, wearing glasses and a colorful scarf, is angrily holding a landline telephone receiver and shouting into it. The background is blurred, focusing attention on the person's expressive face and gesture.

Sometimes, people who are handed lemons don’t make lemonade.

They’re either not interested in turning the sour hand they’ve been dealt into a sweeter one, or they’ve had so much thrown at them that they haven’t been able to find a way to do so.

Someone who feels bitter isn’t always the easiest of people to deal with. They can be pretty unpleasant company and being with them can make you feel negative too.

Unfortunately, there’s not much you can do to help someone who’s bitter. Only they can help themselves.

But you can certainly try to avoid them. To do that, you’ll need to spot the signs before you get too embroiled in their misery. Here are a few to look for.

1. They generalize.

A woman with shoulder-length brown hair is seated on a grey couch, making a frustrated or angry facial expression while pointing her finger forward. The background includes a lit floor lamp and a brick wall.

Someone who’s bitter and jaded is generally so as the result of one or multiple experiences.

Yet, they’re often not just angry with the individual who’s wronged them, but whole groups of people.

They might feel anger toward all men, all women, all members of a particular profession, or maybe even a certain ethnic group, all because of an experience they’ve had with just one person.

Or, they might just think that absolutely everyone in the world is out to get them.

They will often make sweeping statements that show they’ve judged a person or situation without bothering to try to understand the circumstances.

2. They hold grudges.

Two women are sitting on a gray couch with their arms crossed, facing away from each other. One wears a yellow shirt and glasses, the other wears a white shirt. The background features a green wall with framed pictures. They seem upset or in disagreement.

We all get angry sometimes, but misunderstandings and arguments are normally cleared up and forgotten.

Even if two people don’t see eye to eye, they understand that there’s no point in wasting their energy by holding a grudge.

Those who are bitter, however, will find it very difficult to let something go, even when everyone else has forgotten about it.

3. They like the sound of their own voice.

An older man with short gray hair and sunglasses is wearing a black and white striped sweater. He appears frustrated or angry, with his hands raised and teeth clenched. The background is solid yellow.

A bitter person’s favorite topic of conversation is likely to be things that have happened to them.

They generally won’t ask questions about your life and things that are going on with you. They just want to complain to you about what someone said to them, something that happened to them, or just the state of the world in general and how it affects them negatively.

4. They’re jealous.

Close-up of two women, one in sharp focus and the other blurred in the foreground. The woman in focus has a serious expression and is wearing a gray top, while the blurred woman in the foreground wears a black top. The lighting creates shadows on their faces.

Rather than be happy for a friend or colleague when they get a promotion or when something’s going well in their life, they’re just jealous that things aren’t going as well for them.

5. But they make no changes.

Close-up of a young woman with long, messy blonde hair, looking directly at the camera with a serious and slightly annoyed expression. She has furrowed brows and slightly pursed lips, set against a plain, neutral background.

They think they should be the one getting the promotion or getting engaged, but they take no steps to change things to help them get there. They stay exactly where they are, wondering why things don’t fall into their lap.

6. They seek attention.

Two women sitting on a blue couch, both holding mugs. The woman on the left, with long brown hair, looks sad and is looking down. The woman on the right, with blonde hair, appears to be comforting her by placing a hand on her shoulder. Both are wearing plaid shirts.

A bitter person isn’t likely to keep quiet about the way they feel. When they feel like life is treating them particularly unfairly, they want sympathy and reassurance that what they’re feeling is justified, because deep down they know it isn’t.

7. They struggle to accept advice.

A woman with dark hair sits in a café, raising her hand to her temple, looking concerned as she speaks to another woman with light brown hair. A man in a suit is seated behind them, looking at his phone. The café has a colorful menu board in the background.

Whilst they love to complain, if a friend that genuinely cares about them tries to offer some helpful advice, they quickly go on the defensive.

They are blind to those people in their lives who do care about them, focusing on those that they feel are out to get them.

8. They don’t like cheerful people.

Two women are sitting outdoors at a table, engaged in conversation. One has blonde hair and is seen from the back. The other has dark hair with bangs, red lipstick, and is stirring a drink, looking attentively at the blonde woman. The background is blurred with greenery.

Being around cheerful, optimistic people throws their behavior into sharp relief, meaning they’re confronted by their own negative attitude; not something they want to face up to. So they tend to just avoid naturally happy people.

This can mean they start to become pretty anti-social, preferring to spend their evenings mulling over why the world is against them rather than being out socializing and making the most of life.

9. They never congratulate others.

A man and a woman are sitting at a table engaged in a conversation. The man is gesturing with his hands, while the woman listens attentively. Both are dressed in business attire, and a document with charts is visible on the table in front of them.

Their jealousy means that they find it difficult to genuinely congratulate anyone else on their skills or achievements. You never hear them say the words “well done,” and they wouldn’t dream of giving anyone a thumbs up.

10. They gossip.

Four women in colorful retro clothing engaged in an animated conversation. The older woman on the left has white hair and wears pearls. The woman in the center right, with afro-textured hair, appears to be making a surprised or expressive face. The others listen intently.

They love to spread stories they’ve heard about things that other people have done wrong. They are the person you’ll find at the water cooler or down the pub spreading that juicy bit of gossip they’ve heard about a co-worker.