Sometimes it’s easier to harden your heart, to choose anger. It’s easier to block those that hurt you, that have betrayed your love and trust. Sometimes we think that there is no other way; that healing begins with distance and their absence, to live your life you must purge the toxicity and pain they transmitted, but we do this using their tactics. We choose anger. We choose to retaliate and become filled with infuriation; its the livid rage that we use as an excuse for our behavior. We justify our acts of retribution by remembering the acts of our adversaries.
We all like feeling right and it’s embarrassing when we’re wrong. It doesn’t take much strength to be angry, it’s simple and effortless; some would argue it’s painless but I would have to disagree. It feels good; the anger boiling inside. It’s the adrenaline at its peak that elicits such rage, but it is the feeling of being right that promotes the addiction to continue to reject forgiveness. But this feeling doesn’t last; it’s a temporary high and what follows will be one of the most excruciating painful lows.
But what are the functions of anger and its intractability? What are the ramifications that follow? If anyone could tell you it would be myself, I’ve chosen to be chained to emotions of irritability and resentment, I’ve embedded them inside my heart. They almost are defined as the forefront of my personality.
If you choose anger you will lose every time, I promise you it’s true. Not only will you lose the kind-hearted person you once were, but you will lose those around you that once saw the light inside you. People will not fight with an infuriated person, if they made a mistake they will apologize, but if you make a small mistake a war, don’t plan on them armoring up to fight. It’s tiring and unnecessary. People will not beg for your presence and your love if you hold grudges and keep score. Nobody will fight a battle they can’t win.
When you’re angry you become closed off and reserved. You become a mosquito, a pest. You sting those around you, and while their wounds fester and grow painful you find excitement and amusement in stinging them once more. Anger is immersive. See now the fact that they hurt you has now disappeared, the enemy they once were is irrelevant because you let their one act of defiance manifest an elongated life of torment and vengeance within you.
Anger doesn’t change what they did, but it does change you. Anger doesn’t heal, instead, it sends you plummeting down a dark hole of negative thoughts. Its time to talk about the culture of blocking and casting out people you once called friends, maybe the person you once loved endlessly.
It took time to learn that forgiveness heals, to understand that anger does more damage than good. I’m not saying to let those that hurt you back in with open arms, to give them a free pass to wrong you once more, or to neglect the respect and trust that all relationships should obtain. Forgiveness is not about condoning someone’s actions; forgiveness is about seeing past someone’s wrong and accepting them for what they do right. Forgiveness is the only way love endures. It allows you to talk through your problems but choosing love as the final resolution. Forgiveness doesn’t have a past, it doesn’t hold grudges. If you truly forgive them then you will hold no memory of your last confrontation, and you will not tally the times they occur. If you really love a person you will fight for them till the end, you will fight with them, but when the day is done, you will choose to love them.
Some of you don’t want to forgive and want to hold onto hate. I also understand that some of you have been wronged so deeply you do not see a purpose in maintaining a relationship, and that’s okay because forgiveness is more than being merciful to someone else. Forgive for yourself; forgive so you no longer have to live with a blackened heart and see the world through broken glass. Forgive so that maybe one day you will be forgiven. Forgiveness doesn’t mean you cannot distance yourself, distance can be healthy if done correctly. If you choose to distance then do so with love in your heart, show them respect and kindness before you choose to leave.
But I believe love is always worth the fight in the end.
If you choose forgiveness, you choose love.
I urge you to forgive, I ask you to love endlessly.
