Love and hate are actually quite similar, despite being emotions that appear to be polar opposites.

How are Love and hate so related?

The two are so similar because they are extreme emotions. It is also usually something or someone we once loved that we now have feelings of hatred for. It is a feeling of betrayal that prompts the hate. What was once so prized and cherished in our hearts is now gone and replaced with something to ease the pain and confusion.

Why do we choose hate?

Hate is the easy escape. When people do not understand something, we are threatened by it; we fear it. When this happens, we choose to hate. This is what stems racism. It is our body’s animalistic tendencies to fear the unknown. We produce anxiety for this exact reason: to stay alive.

Choosing hate over love because we are not familiar with something allows us to cope easier. We see unfamiliar and different people and customs as wrong because they are not the same and challenge our system of beliefs.

But we can’t go around hating everything and living in fear because our body tells us to.

Choosing love is the alternative.

By choosing to embrace all unknown challenges that lie ahead instead of seeing them as a threat to our well-being, we can better live in grace.

It is easy to hate when the individual is in pain and feels alone. When someone experiences a breakup in a relationship, most of the time it is not perfectly amicable. One person usually wants to leave and the other wants them to stay. The love they shared has ended, but that does not mean it has to result in hate. Hating the significant other for leaving is not a healthy coping mechanism. Love does not end just because you stop seeing the person. The love lives on through memories.

This is why we say ‘Good-bye’ to others. ‘Good’, in short, means ‘Of-God,’ and as we know, although God died and left us, He never truly left. The same applies to all people when saying Good-bye. We are leaving but we aren’t really. We shall stay present in the hearts of all.

There is never a real bye, only more of a see you later. We can still love each other without physically being with them. We never stop loving people immediately after they decide to leave. We only use hate to cover up the pain.

Hate is never worth it, though. It’s a bandage that hardly covers the wound. It never heals. The only way to do so is through Love: of oneself and of all.