There are times when we are so caught up with our troubles that we refuse to see the good things that people around us are doing to help us. Since the mind forgets, the conscience does not believe in thanking. The result is that we become ungrateful people. And no one likes ungrateful people.
Who Are Ungrateful People & Why are They So?
SUMMARY
Ungrateful people are those who forget to be thankful for all that they have in life.
Imagine when you do something for someone and they do not have the time to acknowledge it? The hurt sounds familiar doesn’t it?
Being grateful or expressing gratitude is an extremely crucial step towards being happy. In the rat race to achieve our materialistic goal, we forget to be thankful or grateful for the help that others provide. Don’t expect friends or family members to stand by an ungrateful person.
It is important to understand that we feel entitled because the people around us invest time to help us manage our routine. You need to start by being grateful for the smallest things in your life. This includes tasks like thanking your maid for the morning cup of tea, your partner for just hearing out when you were frustrated, your children when you were not around, etc. The list is endless.
Showing gratitude to the people in your life will make them happy. They will be more than willing to come forward and help you.
How Ungrateful People Change A Generation?
Before we answer this question, we need to get ourselves acclimatized to the changing definition of happiness for an individual/community. Over the years, this definition of happiness has changed. Today, happiness revolves around accumulating things. However, this rarely ever gives us any satisfaction. So, what led to this change?
Well, the definition of happiness has evolved with the increasing number of ungrateful people in the community. Ungratefulness is a contagious virtue. It easily passes on from one person to another. And why not? When you are ungrateful, i.e. you choose not to acknowledge the favor or return it, you are teaching the other person to do the same. Unfortunately, this is a vice that spreads like wildfire. People start becoming self-centered.
As the vice spread its wings in the community, we all learned to focus just on ourselves. Why bother about the world when they will never be grateful? This thought starts to make its home in our minds. You stop seeing the other person’s point of view. As generations pass, the thought only becomes stronger, more and more people believe in it. Until one day, someone gives you jolt-urging you to wake up and smell the coffee!
The Historic Importance of Being Grateful
Gratitude or gratefulness is a virtue with a legacy. It has a certain historic value. Unfortunately, with the passage of time, most of us have forgotten this historic importance. Ungrateful people have never inspired anyone for any action. But when people are grateful, it fuels action. Each time you express gratitude, you feel indebted to return the favor. The simple sentiment works wonders when it comes to keep you grounded.
Quite the contrary, when you choose to be an ungrateful person, you develop certain selfishness. This selfish attitude stops you from seeing the greater good in the situation. As a result, you are not willing to do your bit for the other person.
20 Signs of Ungrateful People
Ungrateful people are all around us. You will come across a few, in your day to day life as well. If you are wondering what makes people ungrateful? The answer is simple. People do not have the time to express gratitude. In the race to accumulate more, they forget about the importance of expressing gratitude.
This makes it impossible for people around them to tolerate their behavior. Handling ungrateful people is tough. However, before you even learn to handle them, you need to understand how to identify them.
Here is a basic guide on the 20 signs that you need to watch out for when identifying ungrateful people.
1. Ungrateful people are always dissatisfied
Ungrateful people are never satisfied. Their expectations from life and people may seem unreasonable but they still want all of it. In most cases, they will always be busy chasing one goal or the other. Simply put, for them, the race never ends.
2. Ungrateful people are jealous
They often feel jealous. Interestingly, this is linked to their constant dissatisfaction. Since they are never happy with what they have in hand, they are forever complaining. To them, the other person is better off. Ungrateful people are likely to exhibit jealousy and complaint about the milestones that they could not achieve.
3. Abuse their privileges
Another issue with ungrateful people is that they consider themselves to be privileged. They believe they are entitled to a lot of things from the world. As a result, they end up abusing their privileges.
4. Always helpless
Ungrateful people will always be seen asking for help. The constant self-doubting leads them to believe that they are incapable of doing things on their own.
5. Ungrateful people have selfish behavior
Since they are constantly dissatisfied and chasing goals, they are likely to be selfish. To such people, only their world matters, all of us are pretty much like pawns in a game of chess.
6. Always judging
If you are not able to live up to their expectation they will never let you forget it. They will constantly judge every move that you make.
7. Ungrateful people are very demanding
They are the demanding ones in a relationship. As long as you are fulfilling a purpose in their life, they will maintain a relationship with you. Once you have served your purpose, they will not hesitate to cut ties.
8. Pretend to be a victim
The ungrateful kind love to play the victim card, almost always. Gaining sympathy from others is a part and parcel of their conduct.
9. Feedbacks and criticism is not appreciated
They are never open to any feedback. The minute you offer them to advise, they will open their box of complaints and pay no heed to what you are saying.
10. Never bother to meet partner’s expectations
Ungrateful people will easily forget the efforts that you invest to sustain the relationship with them. This means that they can expect you to do stuff but you can’t expect them to help you.
11. I, me and myself
Ungrateful people will always work to fulfil only their needs. Their needs are always a priority for them. In the process, they will not bother to consider the other person’s well being.
12. Ungrateful people are always thankless
They will take things for granted therefore thanking or expressing gratitude is never a part of their behavior.
13. Never count blessings
Ungrateful people never appreciate the things that they already have. For them, the glass is always half empty.
14. Ungrateful people carry negativity
Ungrateful people have a negative attitude towards life. For them, nothing is ever good enough. Unfortunately, they bring this baggage of negativity to every relationship in their lifetime.
15. Always complaining
The constant complaining makes it impossible for ungrateful people to see the happier side of life.
16. They spread ungratefulness
Ungrateful people have this unique ability to make others around them equally ungrateful.
17. Ungrateful people never appreciate others
Such people refuse to acknowledge the greatness of character in the other person.
18. Avoid confrontations
The ungrateful kind always finds it easier to run away from confrontations or conversations.
19. Ungrateful people never say sorry
For them, the other person is always at fault. They will never say sorry.
20. Not supportive
In a relationship, an ungrateful person will never be around when the other person needs any help or emotional support.
10 Habits of Ungrateful People
Now that we have highlighted the tell-tale signs of ungrateful people, let us take a look at some of their habits. These habits are not guaranteed but even a few of them indicate an individual’s ungrateful behavior.
1. Ungrateful people lack a spiritual connection.
These people are so obsessed with accumulating materialistic pleasures that they refuse to see the benefits of spirituality. If we choose to acknowledge the existence of conscience and the importance of practices like aparigraha to lead a happy life, it can teach us to be grateful for all that we have.
2. Overindulgence in media
The ungrateful people are obsessed with media –traditional and digital. They love to read the news and make their own interpretations. All of which would mostly be negative.
3. Ungrateful people love to over commit
Ungrateful people believe in committing the moon and the stars. Unfortunately, the passion to live up to these promises may fizzle out a little too soon.
4. Ungrateful people love to look at the negative side
For most of us, a challenge is an opportunity to improve. But for the ungrateful people, the challenge is the time to further fuel the negativity in their life. As a result, they find it impossible to look for a solution.
5. They have a constant deficiency of something or the other
Ungrateful people will always look at all the things that they could not get. In their obsession to identify the list of things they don’t have, they ignore the large number of things that they already have.
TIP
If you have someone in your friend circle who is constantly demanding your time and attention without being thankful, he or she is an ungrateful person.
6. They always want it first
Ungrateful people will always want to be the first ones to ask for their share. They fear losing their share and therefore want to be the first to claim.
7. Ungrateful people can never appreciate others
If someone does something good or commendable, ungrateful people are the last ones to appreciate.
8. Chaos is their favorite
Ungrateful people love to live in chaos, this further helps them to avoid listening to their conscience or working on clarity of thoughts.
9. Ungrateful people hate it when confronted
You can never make an ungrateful person count their blessings. They will usually run away from such conversations.
10. Ungrateful people find it difficult to stay calm
Since ungrateful people are always complaining, they find it hard to keep their calm and focus on the positive side of life.
How To Deal with Ungrateful People?
Ungratefulness is not a good virtue. It brings along a lot of negativity. They are very difficult to handle because of the constant nagging and complaining. Unfortunately, we come across a lot of the ungrateful kind in our day to day life.
If you let your relationship continue with the ungrateful people, it will be emotionally draining. Their complaining is likely to take a toll on your mental health. Gradually you will lose your confidence as well. The only way to avoid this is to learn to deal with such people.
Here are a few ways to deal with ungrateful people
1. Start with a confronting conversation. It is very difficult to talk to ungrateful people and explain the issues to them. The conversation needs to focus on how you feel about the other person’s behavior. However, while talking to them, work with the assumption that they are not doing things deliberately.
2. Step into the other person’s shoes because that will give you a chance to understand their viewpoint. This will give you an advantage when it comes to understanding their behavior.
3. Draw a line and stick to it. While we all love our friends and family, we have our personal place as well. This personal space is something where you intend to spend time with yourself. Do not let the ungrateful people invade this space for their personal benefit.
4. Step away consciously if you come across ungrateful people who are demanding too much of your time. This may seem difficult but it will be extremely helpful.
5. Show compassion to their needs but tell them that they can’t be over-demanding. Teach them to look beyond their needs but do not let yourself adapt to their behavior.
6. If they keep throwing demands at you, smartly shift the conversation. Talk about anything under the sky that will help them shift their focus.
7. Identify the benefits of walking out of an ungrateful relationship. Teach your mind to see the advantages of a happy and healthy relationship. These reminders will make it easier for you to move away from ungrateful people.
8. Keep yourself updated with the realities of the relationship. If it takes a turn for the worst, be bold enough to walk away from it.
9. Make it clear that they have to respect you if they expect you to respect them.
10. Last but not the least, stay true to yourself. The ungrateful people will try to bring you down to their level. However, you need to stay firm and not go down to their levels.
20 Ungrateful People Quotes
There is nothing like a few quotes to inspire you in your task of dealing with ungrateful people. Many thought leaders have shared some fantastic thoughts that can go many miles as an inspiration.
1. “He that’s ungrateful has no guilt but one; All other crimes may pass for virtues in him.”
– Edward Young
Ingratitude is a vice that ruins a personality.
2. “You will never see a happy ungrateful person.”
– Zig Ziglar
Truly said, the secret to a happy life lies in the ability to express gratitude.
3. “Gratitude is often caused not by gain but by loss.”
– Mokokoma Mokhonoana
4. “A complaining tongue reveals an ungrateful heart.”
– William Arthur Ward
This simply shows that people who complain are never grateful.
5. “Never be ungrateful.”
– Lil Peep
Expressing gratitude is one of the simple ways to live a happier life.
6. “I have been blessed in my personal life and career and I have never been ungrateful for what I have.”
– Mandy Patinkin
One must learn to count their blessings before complaining about what they couldn’t achieve.
7. “In every class of society, gratitude is the rarest of all human virtues.”
– Wilkie Collins
Gratitude or the ability of being grateful is a rare virtue.
8. “I have too many flaws to be perfect. But I have too many blessings to be ungrateful.”
– Zig Ziglar
Again a beautiful saying that reminds us about the importance of being thankful for what we have.
9. “Ungrateful people forget what they are not grateful for.”
– Ana Monar
Since the ungrateful people are always worrying about what they don’t have, they never count their blessings.
10. “It is impossible to lose everything and still be alive.”
– Mokokoma Mokhonoana
The simple mantra for a happy life is that as long as you live you will always have something to be grateful for.
Selfish ungrateful people quotes
11. “A grateful person is rich in contentment. An ungrateful person suffers in the poverty of endless discontentment.”
– David A. Bednar
Leading a life of contentment improves an individual’s mental and physical well being.
12. “A grateful dog is better than an ungrateful man.”
– Saadi
A dog’s loyalty and gratefulness teaches us to adapt the same attitude in life.
13. “Every greed is the root of ungratefulness.”
– Lailah Gifty Akita
A human being can be greedy and this greed is the reason for being ungrateful.
14. “Ingratitude is the essence of vileness.”
– Immanuel Kant
Another beautiful saying that explains the issues that ingratitude brings with it.
15. “To do good to the ungrateful is to put rosewater in the sea.”
– Latin Proverb
Their minds are polluted to such an extent that they refuse to see the beauty of gratefulness.
Sarcastic Quotes about Ungrateful People
16. “Hell is full of ungrateful people.”
– Spanish proverb
Even religious scriptures talk about the importance of being grateful.
17. “The wicked are always ungrateful.”
– Miguel De Cervantes
Those who are viscous at heart can never express gratitude.
18. “Making the ungrateful grateful will bring tears to your eyes, tears of blood bleeding from the heart.”
– Ana Monnar
You can never teach an ungrateful person to be grateful, that feeling has to come from within.
Most of us realise the value of gratefulness only when we have lost something.
19. “He that forgets his friend is ungrateful to him, but he that forgets his Savior is unmerciful to himself.”
– John Bunyan
Friends are saviours, but if we remain ungrateful to them, they will walk away.
20. “An ungrateful man is like a dog under a tree eating acorns, but never looking up to see where they come from.”
– Timothy Dexter
This proverb beautifully highlights the inability of a blessed individual to count their blessings and how it impacts the personality.
Conclusion
Being grateful makes you a kind and compassionate human being. We must not forget the little things that people do for us. No matter how small the contributions are, we should be grateful for all our blessings
