People hurt us. One thing I have learned is that nobody has lived a life without pain. In one way or another, we have all been damaged at sometime. So we all know what pain feels like. No two people have experienced the same thing, but we have all had to suffer.
So what do we do when someone hurts us? What do we do when, intentionally or not, someone does something that deeply upsets us? It might an insult spoken rashly, or a lie behind your back. Whatever it is, how do we respond?
That natural human response is to fight fire with even more fight: "they hurt me so I am going to hurt them back." What happens than is more anger, more fighting and more pain.
When someone hurts us, it only makes sense to be upset at them for it, and to show them how it feels. But what does that solve? More often than not, it leaves us in a worse position than we started in, and it validates whatever thoughts the other person had of you in the first place.
So what is the correct, Christian response?
Break the cycle!
When we don't respond the way we want to, when we avoid animosity and instead treat the other person the we feel they should have treated us in the beginning, something very strange happens.
The other person usually begins to act as you do.
This is called "non-complementary behavior," when we break the cycle of anger and bitterness and instead act with kindness. Doing this shows others that we are not simply trying to win a fight, but that we are trying to solve an issue. It shows that we care about the other person is important to us and that we care about them.
When others cause us pain, it makes sense to want to do the same thing back. But if we can somehow break the cycle, we can experience the most amazing changes possible
