The Weight of Hate

I've been thinking a lot lately about hate.

You see, over the past couple of weeks, I've realized that hate isn't neccessary. I know it sounds cliche, but it's true. Being rude, being hateful, being disrespectful, is part of being negative, and negativity hurts not only the person it's directed towards, but the person that is being negative.

It almost makes sense, right?

It's like this - for some reason, you feel the need to put others down, talk about them badly, whatever the case may be. Maybe you don't know the reason for this negativity, maybe you do. Who knows. The fact is that the element of negativity is subconsciously you - feeling the need to be negative because somehow it makes you feel better than that individual.

When negativity gets more complicated, it becomes hate. Sometimes we may feel that people have wronged us, disrespected us, hurt us, and we get this idea in our head that we have a right to hate them for it. It's not the fact that we may or may not have that right, it's if we act out on that so called right. By hating someone, you're bringing yourself down to their standard, or your standard of them, however you want to look at it. Weird, eh?

It's the capability to forgive, to love, that will set you apart. By forgiving, you're placing yourself in a higher standard of living, and you're going to be happier as a result.

When you hold a grudge, the weight of that grudge is placed on you more than anyone or anything else. There's a very good chance that the individual you "hate" either doesn't know, or just doesn't care. So all of that nasty, discusting filth that you have against that person... it's not on their shoulders. They don't carry that burden... you do.

Sucks, doesn't it? But here's my point to all of this.

If you didn't feel the need to hold grudges, whether they be big or small, justified or unjustified, you wouldn't have to carry the weight of hate. You'd be free.

Freedom. That's another thing I've been astounded with lately, and how do you get to freedom?

Love. That four letter word that no one seems to know the meaning of anymore. I'm not saying you need to go become best friends with the whole entire world - that's impractical and highly unlikely. What I'm saying is that if you took that negative thought, that hate, that gossip, that rumour, whatever it may be that you're subjecting towards someone else, if you took that and turned it into something positive and gave it the element of love and forgiveness, or just ignored it all together, you wouldn't have to worry about anything! You're conscience would be completely hate free, because the only person that can place hate on your heart... is you.