-Hu, California Health Care Facility in Stockton, CA
It has been said that two wrongs will not make it right. As long as a victim has been left with the ugly poison of resentment caused by a tragic act of evil, they may struggle to change their attitude of anger. They may carry this burden into their relationships with others, limiting their humanness. They may become so bitter that they act out in aggression or with the intentions of inflicting injury upon others vindictively.
Evil cannot effectively be changed by evil. Evil must be weakened by the power of love. If it is not, the tragic vibration of anger and pain will continue to be repeatedly unleashed upon others, knowingly and unknowingly, without compassion or forgiveness, but rather with only the need for angry retaliation.
For those of us who have been victims, how can we heal if we continue to hate? Why should we hate when we are the ones that suffer when holding the hate within, when we can let go and heal, closing a stormy chapter in our lives so that the future has the potential to be brighter.
The cycle of victimization can be catastrophic when we leave a painful experience unresolved. When one person is hurt and does not receive any help, the pain intensifies, getting worse. Pain quickly becomes anger and can settle into a concrete resentment. When anyone holds onto resentment the poison infects the human conscience.
The person can slowly drift into a vindictive attitude that darkens the human capacity to have compassion. Without compassion how can we step out of ourselves to feel the feelings of other people? We lash out, wanting to inflict the pain we feel upon others. The old saying “misery loves company” is acted upon.
There are so many situations when a child is victimized by growing up in a hostile environment helplessly watching a parent get beaten. The child can grow up in fear and hatred. They learn by the examples of others, their adult role models, that violence is the appropriate way to resolve disputes and get your needs met. This also generates the expectation of violence generating fear giving control to the most aggressive.
There are many instances when a child grows up being abused mentally, emotionally, physically or sexually. They grow up hating others, hating themselves, and disconnected from God for allowing them to be hurt. The child usually becomes a bitter, emotionally bankrupt person before their teen years.
Ultimately, they end up acting out the same way it was done to them, or worse. When one person wrongs another, and in turn the injured person seeks only retribution, the cycle of victimization continues. One family hurts on one side, another family indirectly gets hurt on the other side. The cycle keeps escalating and the domino effect of victims continues and gets worse over time.
Hurting people will hurt other people.