The Purpose of Hatred!
We speak so much about love at BoldGrace and that is good but the reality is that all that we feel and experience on this journey must have purpose. Love is indeed a strong, strong emotion but there is another strong emotion and that is HATRED. What is the purpose of hatred? I consider myself to be a man who has tried to both love and feel loved most of my life but I have also felt hatred at it’s highest degree. It’s not something I chose or ever wanted but that’s not how hatred usually comes to us. Love is something most normal people naturally gravitate to with great desire for its company, but hatred is something that is not normally sought or desired and very difficult to let go of once you have it.
So, what is its purpose? I can only answer for myself but whenever I consider such questions I always start with the assumption that whatever created me allowed this hatred to come my way, so it must have a purpose that at its conclusion will be for my good.
Now what possible good can come from hatred in my life? Oh, I know at this point many of you reading this would love for me to give you some profound answer that will immediately set your minds at ease that all is well and hatred is easily overcome, but that has not yet happened for me.
Hatred has caused me to look at myself in ways that I never thought possible. It’s caused me to examine who I really am at a level that love could never have accomplished. At this point the only real conclusion I have come to is that hatred has a purpose and only time will uncover what that purpose is.
Hatred has also humbled me. If someone had told me I could have this type of hatred in me a year ago I would have said they were wrong. I have never been one to judge others but this hatred has intensified that feeling of not being a judgmental person a hundred fold because I now know for sure that any one of us are capable of such hatred under the right set of circumstances.
How do I live with it? That seems like the next likely question. The answer to that goes back to my first point that if hatred is allowed (and it has been at least in my life) then my creator will eventually get around to showing me the good that will come from it. Until that time arrives I will continue seek the comfort that comes from loving others to the best of my ability and accepting love from my family and friends. Doing that does not take away the hatred but it certainly softens it grip on me and I have to believe in time that I will break free from it’s clutches.
You may also be asking yourselves why would I write such a personal post? I write because I know full well there are others out there that have felt the sting of hatred and you need to know you are not alone and that you are not a terrible person because you are experiencing this dreaded emotion. It may sound contradictory but I still consider myself to be a man of love because I believe that’s how we were ALL made to be. Someday this journey will end and the reality of who we are will be fully revealed but until that time arrives I will continue to do the only thing that seems to matter and that is to TRUST that my ultimate good has always been the PLAN.
WOW, story of my life! I totally see what you are saying here. I have recently have been through an obstacle in my life that made me feel so many emotions at once, and above all was hate.
My ex boyfriend left me when i was barely 2 months pregnant. I found out later that he left me for some girl he was cheating on me with from his work. Well, to make a long story short, he married the girl on my son’s due date in Vegas. These people made a scene at the hospital when my son was born. This girl would try to call me for my ex because he refused to pick up the phone himself, and I cussed her out. My ex wants nothing to do with my son and refuses to help me financially. In fact, he and his parents had wanted me to get an abortion. Going through all of this and being pregnant was so hard for me. I felt so much hatred toward these people who once embraced me, who bought me Christmas presents just a few weeks before I took the pregnancy test!
I know that if this all had not happened, I would not have my son. And I can’t imagine my life without him. That is the one thing that makes it so hard for me to hate my exboyfriend. So I have decided to let him go. Sure, I do not like him, but I have to do what is right for my son now. I love my son much much more than I hate my ex. This love will always overpower the hate.
Thanks for sharing that Michelle. I must believe we are all on this journey for a far greater purpose then we can even imagine and what you went through changed you to the core. I am also glad you got a beautiful son out of it all. And by the way…..it really is OK to not like your exboyfriend.
Michelle & Cliff
Not only is it okay to not like him, it is okay to HATE him!
And when you are done hating him that will be that. Only don’t let that hate consume your every thought or decision. When it comes either daily or for time to time embrace it and hold it till it is time to let it go again. Life is like an onion and it has many peels and layers until the day we all stand in the presence of the ONE who brought us here and ALL things from this life will make sense.
Peace
Geo
You guys are right. I was always taught that it is wrong to hate people. But funny how it came from a church who condemned everyone else to hell. I will always hate this guy, no doubt. This kind of behavior will never be acceptable to me. I like to think of myself as the kind of person who is accepting of others, though, which makes that a little tough for me.
I heard on tv one time, someone saying about a famous divorced couple, that you should never hate your ex more than you love your kids. I think I should never hate anything more than I love my son. And I realize it is ok to hate somebody if I have a right reason for it
Good advice Geo. I certainly do not advocate holding on to hatred, but at the same time pretending is also just as dangerous. As you said,
“Life is like an onion and it has many peels and layers until the day we all stand in the presence of the ONE who brought us here and ALL things from this life will make sense.”
I can’t speak for what is best for anyone else, but for me, it’s been best to be able to let go of the bitterness I once felt toward my ex-husband (who left me and our two sons for a younger woman). Took awhile, but I can now say honestly that I do not hate him. In fact, I feel sad for him that he was the kind of person that could do something like that. He must have been very empty inside. I pray that he will not do that to his present wife (who happens to be the woman he left me for) and their two kids. People grow and change, and I would like to think that he is different now. (Mind you, it’s been a number of years since all that happened to me and there has been a lot of water under the bridge since then.)
Hope I’m not monopolizing the conversation here, and if this is too much off-topic, let me know. I currently have a problem with hatred in the other direction, that is, someone hates (or at least seems to hate) me. I found it necessary to intervene in a situation on behalf of someone who is no longer able to draw healthy boundaries for herself due to declining mental abilities. The person who was taking advantage of her is, understandably, very angry with me, as I am blocking her from getting what she wants. Looking back, perhaps I should have handled things differently, but I did the best I could at the time. I am left feeling that I did what I needed to do to take care of this other person, but maybe should have done it in a different way, though I don’t know how else it could have been done.
I remember the post about seeing perfection in Hitler, and I get the premise that underneath the flawed humanity is a perfect being created by God. I really do get that, but still we have situations to deal with all the time involving people who aren’t acting on their perfection (including me, of course). So, when these kind of situations come up, what are some grace-filled ways to deal with them? (I’m pretty sure I flunked in the grace-filled category during this situation that I’m talking about.)
Connie, You did not flunk. There is no flunking in the perfect process of life that we all are journeying on. I agree that finding grace filled ways to deal with these types of things is our best choice, but regardless of our choices I beleive God will ultimately teach us what we need to learn for whatever is next. I guess my main point of all this is the absolute trust that we can have even in the chapters of our life that we don’t begin to understand. I write this to help those who have endured the kinds of pain that never completely goes away. For those people the best hope is in knowing that in every garden there are weeds that keep coming up and yet we must always focus on the abundance of beauty. And even the weeds have their purpose or they wouldn’t have been allowed.
Abraham hoped against all hope or in other words he chose to believe in God even in the midtz of all the evidence that God was not to be trusted.
So, when things come into my life that seem to contradict all that is good I will still trust in the Goodness of God.
Michelle
I can totally relate to you.
I just came out of a situation that left me wanting to hate and it was hard.
One moment I wanted to hate the next I didn’t I kept looking at myself saying I am no better but I know that through it all God loved me no matter what.
It’s a hard thing not to hate someone when they hurt us deeply and when you find out you are disposable to them.
But through it all there are lessons learnt and one that I learnt is to go throught the emotions and trust God’s love for me.
I know many times people make excuses we are only human and they seem to use this as an excuse for there choices.
But the only thing we can do is to go throught the pain and learn and allow God to do what needs to be worked in us.
People will always do what they want.
His Grace is Sufficuent
Thanks Jennifer. I think that it is his (the sperm donor’s) loss and i do not feel sorry for him making poor choices in his life. He knows he is doing hurtful things but he does not care. So that is his perogative. I am glad he is gone because life is much more peaceful for me and my son
Hi Michelle
Your right about what you say.
People are funny for many it’s all about them and their pleasures which is sad.
But they will reap the consquense of their actions sooner or later.
All we can do is change us for the better.
I am so glad things are better for you and your son
Take care
Jenn