Hard to love

So many things that I want to discuss today...hmmm, I think I'll go with the one that seems to keep slapping me in the face over and over and continue to leave me puzzled...
I think this issue really came to light for me at CCH Spring Retreat...one of the speakers brought up those people in our lives who are really hard to love. You know those people, right? The annoying ones, the mean ones, the ones you just want to avoid. The lesson was basically about how those people might annoy the ever loving crap out of us, but it is our call to love them anyway. I mean, if we could potentially impact the trajectory of a life and someone's eternity can't we just deal with the annoyance?
Easier said than done, right?
For me, this topic shot one person to the forefront of my brain right away...then the thoughts of them and if I was really loving them like I should kept nagging at me relentlessly. On the one hand, I desperately want to look them in the eye and say, "Hey, I care about you way too much to watch you live this way. God has way bigger things for you if you'd just hand it over to Him, follow His plan, and trust Him." But on the other hand, you know they'll be on the defensive and tune you out if you just straight up said that to them.
So how do you go about such a situation? Just love them, right?
But what if you feel like they're constantly talking down about your life? What if you feel like they're laughing at the life choices you make, even when you know they're right? What if they're always bringing you down? What happens when you don't even feel comfortable around this person anymore and can't relate to them?
This is a thing in my life right now...and I honestly don't know how to approach it. For me, it's someone I feel that I no longer relate to at all...but I also feel an enormous weight of responsibility...I mean, with eternity literally on the line, can I just walk away? No. Do I want to sometimes? Absolutely.
It's tiring. Many times, it's so tiring that I just avoid the situation all together...but I know that's not the right approach either. I recently brought this whole thing to someone whose advice I very much trust and was told basically to be there for the friend that needed me but to always make sure I was being the influence and not the one being influenced. She told me to go out of my way to be the influence...but I'm not really sure what that looks like...One might think, well spend time with this person so they know you care enough to sacrifice other things in your life for them. But is that a good idea when I always walk away from our time together feel defeated and negative about everything? I can only be relentlessly positive against total negativity for so long before I just want to give up.
I just don't really know. What I do know is that this topic came up again at 8.01 tonight. What I do know is that I'm about 110% sure that God's trying to get my attention here. Maybe He's been trying to get yours, too...is there someone in your life who you could be influencing for the better? Someone who needs you to show them the unconditional love that God shows you? I know it's hard...I'm right there too, but God will always give you the words to say and the strength to get through even the most tiring and defeating of situations if you just trust Him.