I had a bad enough time in school that, at twenty, there was a terrific amount of residual anger. I definitely could have gone there... and in fact at that age was easily sucked in by political/social hot-button issues. Read a ton of stuff on the treatment of women in the Muslim world (it was the hot topic of the day), some disability issues, etc.
It was easier to be angry about someone else's problems than to deal with my own feelings of humiliation and rejection.
But I realized, at some point, what was going on with that. I saw it in other people, and it held up an ugly mirror to my own self. It's not that those "issues" weren't real, or worth addressing... it's that I had unconsciously picked issues where I had no chance of making any difference with concrete action, because they were so far outside my sphere of influence. Something bad happening far far away, in another country where I'll never go, is a *safe* thing to be angry about.
So I dealt with the real problems in my real actual life: went painstakingly back over the roster of former friends, former classmates, former enemies, former persecutors, asking myself:
Did I do anything to contribute to the bad situation with this person? (often, yes)
Do I want to remain connected to this person, and the bad feelings between us, forever?
I first realized that nearly all of us, including myself, are crap people during adolescence. Hormones, bad parenting, awful environment... it's a wonder anybody grows up sane, really. For most, character development happens later. I forgave myself for being a self-absorbed nitwit. It happened. I was a lousy friend. And then I went down the list, everybody, by name, that I'd had negative thoughts about, or experiences with, and I forgave them. Then I made myself wish them well in their adult lives, prayed for them, and let them go. I was a stupid bastard at 16, they were stupid bastards at 16, and with luck and God's grace, I hope we all grew into better people. Staying attached to whatever we were as teenagers was definitely holding me back, stunting something inside. Maybe holding onto it was also holding them back. Let go and let them be the best version of whatever they're destined to be. Like, clearly my impotent rage is not going to hamper anybody with a modicum of spiritual protection... but what if they don't have that? Would I be cursing them by holding onto my grudges? I don't wanna do that.
I feel like... the toxic hormonal soup of a school environment that we came through has only gotten worse since we graduated. At least we did it without social media and smartphones. Whatever I had to overcome to become a functional adult... the current crop of young folks have got it worse. Are they getting any help to do what they need to do to leave it behind? No, I think some vested interests have been busy taking all that completely inevitable anger and actively *preventing* them from processing it. They're weaponizing it. Grade school is a cannon factory. College tells you where to point it. There is no disarmament program.
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It was easier to be angry about someone else's problems than to deal with my own feelings of humiliation and rejection.
But I realized, at some point, what was going on with that. I saw it in other people, and it held up an ugly mirror to my own self. It's not that those "issues" weren't real, or worth addressing... it's that I had unconsciously picked issues where I had no chance of making any difference with concrete action, because they were so far outside my sphere of influence. Something bad happening far far away, in another country where I'll never go, is a *safe* thing to be angry about.
So I dealt with the real problems in my real actual life: went painstakingly back over the roster of former friends, former classmates, former enemies, former persecutors, asking myself:
Did I do anything to contribute to the bad situation with this person? (often, yes)
Do I want to remain connected to this person, and the bad feelings between us, forever?
I first realized that nearly all of us, including myself, are crap people during adolescence. Hormones, bad parenting, awful environment... it's a wonder anybody grows up sane, really. For most, character development happens later. I forgave myself for being a self-absorbed nitwit. It happened. I was a lousy friend. And then I went down the list, everybody, by name, that I'd had negative thoughts about, or experiences with, and I forgave them. Then I made myself wish them well in their adult lives, prayed for them, and let them go. I was a stupid bastard at 16, they were stupid bastards at 16, and with luck and God's grace, I hope we all grew into better people. Staying attached to whatever we were as teenagers was definitely holding me back, stunting something inside. Maybe holding onto it was also holding them back. Let go and let them be the best version of whatever they're destined to be. Like, clearly my impotent rage is not going to hamper anybody with a modicum of spiritual protection... but what if they don't have that? Would I be cursing them by holding onto my grudges? I don't wanna do that.
I feel like... the toxic hormonal soup of a school environment that we came through has only gotten worse since we graduated. At least we did it without social media and smartphones. Whatever I had to overcome to become a functional adult... the current crop of young folks have got it worse. Are they getting any help to do what they need to do to leave it behind? No, I think some vested interests have been busy taking all that completely inevitable anger and actively *preventing* them from processing it. They're weaponizing it. Grade school is a cannon factory. College tells you where to point it. There is no disarmament program.