It’s human nature to want to strike back and hurt someone who has hurt you. Most often, you feel as if they deserve to be paid back with the same treatment they showed you. Whether they betrayed your trust or broke your heart, or even seriously harmed you, physically or emotionally, you want them to be held accountable for what they did. But revenge is never worth it in the end. Why? Because it never makes you feel as good as you think it will. If anything, it only makes you feel worse and prevents you from healing. As the saying goes, before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.
Doing unto others as they have done unto you means that you are now lowering yourself to their level, and being as heartless, cruel, and cold as they were to you, which only damages your self-worth. Even if, on some level you believe that they deserve to be hurt in return, you still won’t feel good about yourself for doing it. Most likely, you would experience feelings of guilt, shame, and disappointment about your vindictive actions.
Even worse, by seeking revenge, you are essentially highlighting a belief that you cannot heal or overcome the pain they caused until you have hurt them in return – which is simply not true. In fact, the desire to strike back and hurt them is fueled by anger, and it’s the very thing that will hold back your ability to heal and overcome the pain. The truth is, the more you cling to your anger, the longer you will take to heal.
Instead, if you will start working on embracing and validating your feelings of anger and allow them a healthy outlet, you will find over time that the anger lessens, and your desire for revenge fades away. You can do this by journaling your feelings of anger or role playing with a therapist. Sometimes just giving a voice to your anger and expressing it helps alleviate the intensity of your feelings.
With every passing day, your heart will heal a little bit more and your inner peace will return. You will come to the realization that hurting others can never make you feel better because it cannot undo anything that was done to you in the past. You will recognize that hatred is harmful and destructive, whether you are giving it or receiving it, and it never contributes anything meaningful to any situation.
Finally, you’ll come to know that love is the most powerful healing force that you have available to you, no matter who or what caused your hurt. As you release your desire for revenge and focus only on healing your inner wounds, you allow the transformational power of love to flow through your body, mind, and spirit. You will quickly reclaim your inner strength and resilience and release any sense of powerlessness or victimization that you were holding.
You will remember that no one else has the power to take away your inner peace or lower your self-worth. Best of all, you will have a deep knowing within that only you have the power to love yourself back to wholeness, completion, and wellness. And that is something that revenge could never have done for you.
