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Daily Question, August 2

What shifts when I see myself in those who have wronged me or hurt others?

  • Mercedes
    Qué cambia cuando me veo en aquellos que me han perjudicado o lastimado a otros… cuando logro verlo, ya que me cuesta más reconocerme en el otro de forma negativa… indudablemente no me gusta… creo que lo primero es una sensación de pena… de angustia.. de, al final, yo soy igual… Quizá después, pueda tener una sensación de empatía, o entendimiento… pero aún con un dejo amargo.. porque el verme en el otro en una acción que no me gusta, que desapruebo porque lastima a otro ser,...

    Qué cambia cuando me veo en aquellos que me han perjudicado o lastimado a otros… cuando logro verlo, ya que me cuesta más reconocerme en el otro de forma negativa… indudablemente no me gusta… creo que lo primero es una sensación de pena… de angustia.. de, al final, yo soy igual… Quizá después, pueda tener una sensación de empatía, o entendimiento… pero aún con un dejo amargo.. porque el verme en el otro en una acción que no me gusta, que desapruebo porque lastima a otro ser, me duele aún más…. no deja de serlo porque yo lo haga… no es mejor… ni la justifico… es terrible. Quizá soy más exigente conmigo misma que con los demás. Siempre me enseñaron, “no hagas a los demás lo que no quieres que te hagan”… por lo que me manejo de esa forma y trato de poner mucho cuidado, pero indudablemente, no soy infalible y si me enojo, puedo lastimar de la misma forma sin querer hacerlo… como cualquier ser herido…por lo que tengo que reconocer que me falta mucho por hacer en mí misma. Trataré de seguir aprendiendo, poner más cuidado, más calma.. y sobre todo, más consciencia y empatía.

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    • Judith

      Gracias, Mercedes. Todos seguimos aprendiendo. We must all keep learning!

  • why would I see myself in them? although we are all connected their wrongs are not my wrongs and my wrongs are not theirs. to practice compassion and loving kindness towards all, right doers and wrong doers is my path. to learn to be unbiased and be able to equally give myself is what I aspire,

    • Cathy

      Well put, Verena. I had to pass the question because it left me unsure and unsettled. Your words straightened my feelings. ?

  • Malag

    I can intellectualise this, but feeling it is more of a challenge ie to really sense at a deep level {1) that we all carry the darkness within and some counterbalance with the light better than others and (2) born with the same body, mind and talents and brought up in the same experiences I would likely be the same.

  • Sajana
    I find this a very difficult question indeed to engage in. I have recently been beyond hurt -- the wind has been knocked out of my lungs. I have always been loving and giving toward my adult step kids and have been living with one of my step kids for over 7 years. I have always tried to take the high road, she is often irritable and short and grumpy and overly private. I have tried my best to only manifest love and kindness toward her and she has recently done the unthinkable. So i have spent ma...

    I find this a very difficult question indeed to engage in. I have recently been beyond hurt — the wind has been knocked out of my lungs. I have always been loving and giving toward my adult step kids and have been living with one of my step kids for over 7 years. I have always tried to take the high road, she is often irritable and short and grumpy and overly private. I have tried my best to only manifest love and kindness toward her and she has recently done the unthinkable. So i have spent many a nights and days wondering what i did or what she could have felt to have hurt me so this way. I don’t have the answer. She is a non communicator. I am no psychic. So all I can say this question is hard — i feel a lot of hurt pain anger sadness. I am trying to send love to her so that her heart may open again. I am trying to heal my heart too.

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    • you might find some relief in your hurt when you let go of black- and white thinking, allowing some subtleties in the way you look at this story

  • Pollyanna Gladwell
    I have not been writing here for several days although I do read the wonderful reflections every day to buoy me up in the face of what I have been dealing with. Todays question is perfectly placed to allow me to reflect on what has been going on in my life this week A criminal lawyer – and I mean a lawyer who is a criminal as has been proved in court this week with my evidence – tried to steal very valuable property belonging to a close friend of mine. My friend was the lawyer’s c...

    I have not been writing here for several days although I do read the wonderful reflections every day to buoy me up in the face of what I have been dealing with.

    Todays question is perfectly placed to allow me to reflect on what has been going on in my life this week

    A criminal lawyer – and I mean a lawyer who is a criminal as has been proved in court this week with my evidence – tried to steal very valuable property belonging to a close friend of mine. My friend was the lawyer’s client and, at one time, the lawyer was a friend to both of us… or so we thought!

    Evidence produced by the lawyer to the court revealed that he had also been defaming me to a third party. So now he has wronged me as well as my friend and, it transpires, many others in town. He got away with it for years.

    I have great compassion for the lawyer (and his family) because I believe he may be mentally unbalanced in some way, but I also found myself incensed by his behaviour.

    So I rode a white horse into battle to rectify injustices – à la Joan of Arc. There is no doubt that the lawyer will be struck off and I am delighted that he will not hurt vulnerable people ever again.

    I do not want revenge – I want justice. And justice will be served by the courts. They will ruin him as he tried to ruin my friend. But at the end of the day he will be ruined by his own hubris. And that is sad.

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  • Don Jones

    The story evaporates as soon as i remember that I cannot divide the existence into right and wrong, good and bad. Why would I want to anyway? The madness quickly becomes apparent. Where is the inclusion? Where is Yoga?

  • Dusty Su

    I can do this quickly, initially, but it is only a starter version. A choice to want to see the other in me and me in the other. Later the real work of digging deeper and seeing layer by layer must occur for it to be real. This takes work but ends up working into my being a sense of freedom from anger, anguish, hurt, pain, and all the weights those states bring. It also gives me a sense of connection, compassion, humility, and a greater ability to be kind to myself.

  • Melissa

    After the first wash of anger, shock, hurt and frustration. I take a deep breath and get quiet. I ask and pray for a soft heart for myself and the other that I feel wronged by. I ask for an open heart. Usually after a few days or even months there comes an opening to work it out to forgiveness and the hurt stops.

  • Hot Sauce
    First, it humbles me by reminding me that I (along with everyone) am capable of doing the same wrongs that are done to me and others. I realize that I am a sinner who needs forgiveness and who needs not think that I am better than other people. At the same time, it also allows me to see that, often times, those who wrong me or hurt others, are doing it from a place of pain, ignorance, or fear. While that does not excuse the behavior, it does allow us to humanize the people who have hurt other pe...

    First, it humbles me by reminding me that I (along with everyone) am capable of doing the same wrongs that are done to me and others. I realize that I am a sinner who needs forgiveness and who needs not think that I am better than other people. At the same time, it also allows me to see that, often times, those who wrong me or hurt others, are doing it from a place of pain, ignorance, or fear. While that does not excuse the behavior, it does allow us to humanize the people who have hurt other people. With practice, I hope I can become as forgiving as Thich Nhat Hanh, the Dalai Llama, or the people in El Salvador who forgave the people who treated them horribly when their government went to war against their people.

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  • Carol

    Humility rises big time

  • Mica

    My next door neighbor has views quite different from mine. Gradually I was coming to like and enjoy her, but the big shift came recently when we discovered we were both people who believe that ‘one person’s trash is another person’s treasure’ – and we’re both the ‘treasure’ people. It’s fun to view her as a soul mate, in this way, after 8 yrs of living next door to her.

  • Zenith
    I am again not sure what this is asking. I find I generally don't see myself in those who I have conflicts with. Sometimes I am able to see similarities in our strengths. There is no 'shift' when I do that. In one case it a lack of maturity on their part, the assumption that it is merely a difference in perception between us. I think most times that is the case. But sometimes it is a clash between leadership styles which I must brush off as lack of experience on their part. I rarely see myself i...

    I am again not sure what this is asking. I find I generally don’t see myself in those who I have conflicts with. Sometimes I am able to see similarities in our strengths. There is no ‘shift’ when I do that. In one case it a lack of maturity on their part, the assumption that it is merely a difference in perception between us. I think most times that is the case. But sometimes it is a clash between leadership styles which I must brush off as lack of experience on their part. I rarely see myself in others.

    Read More
  • Michele

    I feel sorry for people who have wronged me or hurt others. Beyond the hurt sure there is anger, betrayal, shock, but I feel sorry they are lacking maturity, knowledge, wisdom, and most importantly LOVE. We have to focus on ourselves first. Self love.

  • Javier Visionquest
    How uncommon it is to recognize ourselves in those who hurt us or others. That level of conscious awareness is in rare supply where we seek our own culpability in every situation. For us to look for the opportunity to identify the shadow that our petty tormentors and the interpersonal collisions we share with them are attempting to reveal to us, so that we might finally bring them to the light of conscious awareness to be healed. Certainly such healing is predicated on cultivating empathy and a...

    How uncommon it is to recognize ourselves in those who hurt us or others. That level of conscious awareness is in rare supply where we seek our own culpability in every situation. For us to look for the opportunity to identify the shadow that our petty tormentors and the interpersonal collisions we share with them are attempting to reveal to us, so that we might finally bring them to the light of conscious awareness to be healed.

    Certainly such healing is predicated on cultivating empathy and an aptitude to forgive, which invites us to bring forth more unconscious pain for healing. It’s a daunting and confusing process but with practice we gain momentum to overcome and dissolve the emotionally backed demands and ego-based fear that keep us mired in the inertia of self-interest and isolated in the illusion of separation which seems to be the prevailing focus of human consciousness during this window of time.

    Read More
  • Trish

    Everything softens when I make the connection. It reminds me that we all have wounds that impact our behavior & relationships. It allows me to love the person more deeply & to appreciate their complexities. When I love them more deeply I’m in a position to heal myself & my relationships.

  • Judith

    I am reminded of something I heard or read: hurt people hurt people. Realizing and accepting this is not always easy, but if I can forgive others, I can forgive myself. A burden is lifted.

    • Mica

      I love it, Judith – “hurt people hurt people” – I saved it to my doc of gratefulness quotes
      (❤´艸｀❤)

      • Cathy

        (I saved it, too. Those 2/2 words really spoke to me.)

  • Antoinette

    I’m stating to see that there is suffering in everyone in some way or form and this helps me have compassion.
    Compassion shifts me and aides in understanding.

  • Howie Geib
    I heard it first from my Therapist years ago that what I find annoying most in others is likely something of myself I see in them. At the time I was incredulous. However this, over time, has born out and so as a means of feedback I can use it to gain some empathy for others. And for the acts of violence and cruelty, I may not commit such acts, but do know I am capable of them. We are much more alike than we are different, us humans. The insight can temper my reaction, allow humanity to those wh...

    I heard it first from my Therapist years ago that what I find annoying most in others is likely something of myself I see in them. At the time I was incredulous. However this, over time, has born out and so as a means of feedback I can use it to gain some empathy for others. And for the acts of violence and cruelty, I may not commit such acts, but do know I am capable of them. We are much more alike than we are different, us humans. The insight can temper my reaction, allow humanity to those who otherwise seemed undeserving and marvel at our brokenness. All frontrunners of forgiveness.

    Read More
    • Linda

      Right. “You spot it, you got it.”

    • Mica

      Indeed, Howie, I’m trying to be more aware of that myself. The attitudes that annoy me are attitudes that I tend to have, myself. ◑﹏◐

  • devy

    A work in progress. I try to embrace the pain they have brought. Then, forgive them And – recognize what they did to me and others and the pain it brought. I will try to understand the reason why they hurt others and look deeply into their actions. I attempt to put them in my heart, and show them grace and love through acts of kindness.

  • Katrina

    It’s an interesting question to ponder. And I ponder each time the shift happens, hopefully in a way that is fruitful.

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