Person A is described as miserly, grumpy, short, and abrupt. We’ll say that Person A doesn’t offer any extra information when asked personal questions, rarely smiles, and almost never makes eye contact.
Now, one way of responding to this situation is to simply say that Person A is kind of a jerk. You could sort of see how Person A is pretty unlikeable, and you could even kind of get yourself on a non-liking tangent.
While being on the non-liking tangent may have some benefits to you, it actually may not help you solve interacting problems with Person A. If anything, it may make interacting with Person A slightly worse- if not downright uncomfortable.
Assuming that Person A is someone you can’t avoid, and assuming that you could get more relaxed and self-confident around people that drive you a bit crazy- you’d probably have to do something besides walking around thinking that Person A is a jerk.
Thus consider alternative interpretations of Person A’s behavior. Start with the potential benefits of “miserly, grumpy, short, and abrupt.” I would have to guess that Person A is not a time waster- he probably doesn’t like to chit- chat. This in turn might mean that he is more efficient, which could be an attractive trait to some. He probably also doesn’t have a lot of people around that bug him very much. Who knows? Perhaps he likes his privacy. Perhaps he is lonely. Perhaps he didn’t grow up with a lot of easy going personalities. Perhaps he grew up around people that were really harsh and abrupt with him.
You see how coming up with different interpretations for Person A’s behavior can change your feelings about Person A? Alternative explanations might provide understandable reasons for behaviors that may be hard to understand. And when we can be more understanding, we can be more accepting of ourselves and of others.