How the Bhagavad Gita Helps You Handle Toxic Coworkers
Riya Kumari | Jul 03, 2025, 17:58 IST
( Image credit : Times Life Bureau, Timeslife )
Let’s be honest. Every office has that person. Or, if you’re really lucky (read: karmically doomed), several. The one who replies-all to a thread that did not need replying. The one who sighs loudly when you ask questions in meetings. The one who manages to weaponize “just circling back” into a spiritual assault. You know who I’m talking about.
Let’s not pretend the workplace is a sanctuary of peace. It's often a stage for personalities louder than logic, tempers tighter than deadlines, and egos just waiting to be bruised. And in the middle of all this, you’re just trying to get your work done, meet your goals, and maybe, just maybe, not lose your sanity. You’ve probably already been told: “Don’t take it personally,” “Kill them with kindness,” “Just ignore it.” But let’s face it, advice like that usually comes from people who aren’t in the room when things go wrong. So what if you tried something older? Something wiser. Something that doesn’t ask you to suppress your emotions or pretend everything’s fine, but actually helps you understand what’s happening and where your power lies in the middle of it all. Enter: the Bhagavad Gita. Not a rulebook. Not a sermon. Just a conversation between a warrior who’s overwhelmed — and a guide who reminds him who he really is.
1. Know Your Role and Stay Anchored In It
In the Gita, Arjuna wants to walk away from the battlefield. He’s conflicted. It’s too hard. Too messy. He says, “What’s the point?” Krishna doesn’t scold him. He reminds him.
“This is your dharma. This is your path. You’re here because you have a role to play. And walking away from it just because it’s difficult, that’s not freedom. That’s fear.”
At work, difficult people can shake our sense of purpose. They make us doubt whether it’s even worth it. But the Gita says: your peace lies not in their behavior, but in your clarity. You don’t have to control others. You just have to stay rooted in what you’re here to do. With dignity. Without ego. With a quiet kind of strength.
2. Don’t Get Pulled Into Their Story
Not everyone at work is behaving from awareness. Some act out of insecurity. Some from pride. Some from habit. The Gita calls this: guna, qualities that shape our actions. Some are led by calm wisdom (sattva), some by restless ambition (rajas), and some by ignorance or fear (tamas). And when you understand that, you stop expecting people to act like they’re wiser than they are.
“Let not the wise disturb the minds of the ignorant,” says Krishna.
You stop giving away your peace just because someone else is out of balance. That doesn’t mean you tolerate injustice. It means you stop wasting energy trying to get everyone to see things your way. Sometimes the most powerful thing you can do is to see clearly, but speak carefully. Not every battle deserves your sword.
3. Control Your Response, Not Their Behavior
You can't always avoid difficult people. But you can choose not to absorb them. When someone’s rude or dismissive, your first instinct may be to react, to defend, to retaliate, or to shut down. But the Gita teaches something radical:
Freedom isn’t in what you say back — it’s in whether their words even touch you.
Krishna doesn’t teach Arjuna to win by overpowering. He teaches him to win by mastering himself. That’s hard. It takes time. But when you begin to pause, breathe, and respond instead of reacting, something changes. You stop being triggered by everything. You stop being controlled by everyone.
You realize: you don’t need the last word. You need inner stability.
4. Let Go of the Outcome, Not the Effort
Difficult people thrive on reaction. They want to provoke. To disturb. To shift the spotlight. But the Gita says:
“You have the right to action, not to its fruits.”
In modern terms: You do your part. The result is not your burden. If your suggestion gets ignored, if credit is stolen, if someone constantly interrupts, yes, it’s frustrating. But do not stop offering your excellence just because it wasn’t received right. Your work matters. Your intentions matter. Even if someone else can’t see it.
Doing your work without clinging to the applause or outcome, that’s not passivity. That’s power. It means you can’t be manipulated by praise or discouraged by criticism. That’s the kind of steadiness people notice, even if they never say so.
5. See the Person Behind the Personality
Here’s the hardest part. But maybe the most healing. The Gita reminds us that at our core, beneath the roles, the behavior, the ego, every person is the same spark of consciousness. The same soul, temporarily confused. That doesn’t mean you have to be friends with everyone. But it means you stop seeing people only as “obstacles” or “problems.” You start seeing pain where there’s pride. Insecurity where there’s aggression. Confusion where there’s arrogance.
“The wise see with equal vision a learned priest, a cow, an elephant, a dog, and a dog-eater.”
Equal vision doesn’t mean blindness. It means compassion. It means choosing to act with integrity, not in reaction to someone else’s chaos. It means choosing peace, again and again, because you know who you are.
In the End:
You don’t need to fix everyone. You don’t need to change the system overnight. You don’t need to be perfect or passive or endlessly forgiving. You just need to remember that your work, your peace, your values, they’re yours. They’re not up for negotiation. Not even in the face of difficult people.
And that maybe, just maybe, their presence is not a punishment, but part of your training. To rise. To hold steady. To walk through the fire without losing your center. And when you can do that, you’re not just surviving work. You’re mastering life.
1. Know Your Role and Stay Anchored In It
Purpose
( Image credit : Pexels )
In the Gita, Arjuna wants to walk away from the battlefield. He’s conflicted. It’s too hard. Too messy. He says, “What’s the point?” Krishna doesn’t scold him. He reminds him.
“This is your dharma. This is your path. You’re here because you have a role to play. And walking away from it just because it’s difficult, that’s not freedom. That’s fear.”
At work, difficult people can shake our sense of purpose. They make us doubt whether it’s even worth it. But the Gita says: your peace lies not in their behavior, but in your clarity. You don’t have to control others. You just have to stay rooted in what you’re here to do. With dignity. Without ego. With a quiet kind of strength.
2. Don’t Get Pulled Into Their Story
Cry
( Image credit : Pexels )
Not everyone at work is behaving from awareness. Some act out of insecurity. Some from pride. Some from habit. The Gita calls this: guna, qualities that shape our actions. Some are led by calm wisdom (sattva), some by restless ambition (rajas), and some by ignorance or fear (tamas). And when you understand that, you stop expecting people to act like they’re wiser than they are.
“Let not the wise disturb the minds of the ignorant,” says Krishna.
You stop giving away your peace just because someone else is out of balance. That doesn’t mean you tolerate injustice. It means you stop wasting energy trying to get everyone to see things your way. Sometimes the most powerful thing you can do is to see clearly, but speak carefully. Not every battle deserves your sword.
3. Control Your Response, Not Their Behavior
Calm
( Image credit : Pexels )
You can't always avoid difficult people. But you can choose not to absorb them. When someone’s rude or dismissive, your first instinct may be to react, to defend, to retaliate, or to shut down. But the Gita teaches something radical:
Freedom isn’t in what you say back — it’s in whether their words even touch you.
Krishna doesn’t teach Arjuna to win by overpowering. He teaches him to win by mastering himself. That’s hard. It takes time. But when you begin to pause, breathe, and respond instead of reacting, something changes. You stop being triggered by everything. You stop being controlled by everyone.
You realize: you don’t need the last word. You need inner stability.
4. Let Go of the Outcome, Not the Effort
Win
( Image credit : Pexels )
Difficult people thrive on reaction. They want to provoke. To disturb. To shift the spotlight. But the Gita says:
“You have the right to action, not to its fruits.”
In modern terms: You do your part. The result is not your burden. If your suggestion gets ignored, if credit is stolen, if someone constantly interrupts, yes, it’s frustrating. But do not stop offering your excellence just because it wasn’t received right. Your work matters. Your intentions matter. Even if someone else can’t see it.
Doing your work without clinging to the applause or outcome, that’s not passivity. That’s power. It means you can’t be manipulated by praise or discouraged by criticism. That’s the kind of steadiness people notice, even if they never say so.
5. See the Person Behind the Personality
Blame
( Image credit : Pexels )
Here’s the hardest part. But maybe the most healing. The Gita reminds us that at our core, beneath the roles, the behavior, the ego, every person is the same spark of consciousness. The same soul, temporarily confused. That doesn’t mean you have to be friends with everyone. But it means you stop seeing people only as “obstacles” or “problems.” You start seeing pain where there’s pride. Insecurity where there’s aggression. Confusion where there’s arrogance.
“The wise see with equal vision a learned priest, a cow, an elephant, a dog, and a dog-eater.”
Equal vision doesn’t mean blindness. It means compassion. It means choosing to act with integrity, not in reaction to someone else’s chaos. It means choosing peace, again and again, because you know who you are.
In the End:
And that maybe, just maybe, their presence is not a punishment, but part of your training. To rise. To hold steady. To walk through the fire without losing your center. And when you can do that, you’re not just surviving work. You’re mastering life.