By Dina Aldabbagh

I’ve heard it said of forgiveness that, “you’re not letting them off the hook, you’re letting yourself off the hook.” Does it kinda seem like you’re letting them off the hook though? That they have no consequences to their actions? So you need to stay upset at them until some force in this world is sufficiently disappointed at them? It feels wrong that they experience zero consequences to irritating your peace, so you must make things right and take matters into your own hands. You must become the executioner if there is no other force sentencing them. But can I tell you…the exacting of punishment is not your burden. 

You think you’re punishing this other person, but the only person you’re punishing is yourself. When you’re in your room thinking about how upset you are with that person…well, you’re in an empty room with no one but yourself. Maybe you’re thinking of them, but they’re not the one feeling that negativity — you are. All that hate stays inside of you. 

When you hate on somebody — criticizing and condemning…do you think that energy is really sent to them? You can try to send it out, but it doesn’t have the effect you’re seeking. The place that energy of hate will be most potent inside of is its source: you. By the time your hate of someone gets to that other person — if it ever does — it’s so diluted. They may not even feel it. They definitely don’t have to absorb it. And most of the time, that hate never even does get sent out. Do we ever call up someone and berate them, telling them all the things we hate about them? Hopefully…not. So then what’s the point of your hate? You’re the only one ever experiencing it. 

You’re the one sitting in that room, stewing in hate, stewing in anger, stewing in negativity. That person who angered you is somewhere out in the world, unaware of all the negativity boiling in you. Think of yourself like a pot of water with a top on, but the top isn’t clear. Someone can look at you and see your pot while you’re thinking all these negative things about them, and have no idea. Their experience is totally unaffected by it. Meanwhile, all the heat is inside of you. You’re boiling under the lid, but they don’t know that. They only see you when you boil over. But they didn’t see the water boiling. They didn’t even know they were the flame. Then they think you’re crazy, because all they’re seeing is the effect of you boiling over and acting out. 

Their reaction to you blowing your lid is momentary for them, but you still had to experience the whole process of the rising pressure inside of you. That was your experience. Maybe to you, it feels so integrally connected to them — but to them the experience is just an external observation. You had to deal with the internal turmoil, not the intended recipient of your anger. Therefore, you are the recipient of your anger.

Any negativity from someone else is theirs to hold onto. They can try to dump it off on you, but it’s only theirs to hold. They actually need to bum it off on you, because they don’t want to hold it — but someone has to, until they’re the one who chooses to let it go. Because they are the source of that energy, so they have the responsibility to do something with it. Hopefully, they can pass it off to you, so that maybe you can hold the burden of the anger. But just like you can choose to throw your hands up, and say, “I’m not holding anything that’s not mine,” so can everyone else in the world.

Therefore, we need to be very thoughtful of what mines we’re digging inside of ourselves. You’re holding a bomb, and no one else has to take it from you — even if they’re the one who set it off. The truth is, even if you can pass it off to someone, it doesn’t satisfy the sense of release you’re looking for. That cord is always going to be connected to you until you decide to cut it. You are its lifesource. 

Most of the time, the offenses that set off our inner bombs are so inconsequential and meaningless. If I go into a coffee shop and the barista is rude to me, I can choose to be upset about that. “Why would you work in customer service if you hate people so much? If you’re so miserable, you shouldn’t be dealing with other people. Why don’t you think I deserve your kindness?” I can be hurt by this barista, holding that hurt for the rest of the day. I can be mad at her, and call her names in my head. With every insult I shoot off in my head, it can bounce off the walls of my spirit until it finally dissolves with time — since it has nowhere to land. 

But realistically…I may never see her again. Truthfully, I won’t even remember her face in a couple days. But I can remember that anger I felt. I can help my body remember the pain it felt from someone else’s harshness. Two months later, I can think of this barista. I can remember the pain she caused me…but I won’t even remember her face. 

The lady who didn’t move over to make space for me on the sidewalk, I can get mad at her, but I’ll NEVER remember her face. I’ll never see her again. I can make a little annoyance in my life last 5 seconds — or I can turn to her, show my disapproval, maybe fight with her, and also think about it later over and over again. How annoying and not-right she is. And then I can make it last much longer — much longer than it ever had to.

Do you see? You are not devaluing that rude barista with the insults you’re saying inside your head. You’re not teaching that inconsiderate lady with your nasty looks. You’re hurting yourself. You’re destroying your peace. You’re harvesting anger and negativity in your garden. Their gardens have a fence and a lock around it; you’re not getting in. 

We are fed this narrative to fight for ourselves. To not let others take advantage of us. To make sure we get treated like we matter, because we do. In a way, it’s not totally off. And maybe in some periods of our lives, these things are necessary. Maybe some situations will call on you to rise up and fight. But understand that 99.99999999% of situations do not call you to do this. It is almost always in our best interest to let things go. This narrative, while can be looked at in a good way, is often twisted to mean that we cannot let others offend us. That it is our responsibility to control the actions of others so that they don’t hurt us. 

In reality, it’s not our burden, our responsibility, or in our power. I’m not saying, “Stick with mistreatment,” I’m saying, “Don’t stick around. Don’t entertain offense.” Not in your spirit, either. Let go of the idea that it is your job to correct people. To control people. The best thing you can do for yourself is let go. Look in the face of offense, emotionally unmoved, and say, “I’m not receiving this.” They may send it out, but you don’t have to receive it. 

It can be so difficult to experience “offenses” and not feel offended. It feels personal, because it’s directed at you, right? So how could it not be personal? Simply because that anger they want to offload is not yours to carry, it’s theirs. It’s coming from inside of them; it’s not something you put onto them. Their boat is sinking so they’re trying to unload just to stay afloat. But you receiving their weight won’t fix the source of their sinking — there’s a hole in their boat. So not only is receiving that burden detrimental to you, it doesn’t even create resolve for them. 

Instead, let me offer you a solution: give them grace. Maybe they don’t deserve it, but you’re not really giving that grace to them, you’re giving it to yourself. By releasing the need to make a judgement, you stay neutral — unmoved, unaffected. Suddenly, life starts feeling a lot safer. If your emotional state is not dependent on the actions of others, there’s not so much pressure to make sure other people act right. When you refrain from saying, “They did X, so they are rude…ignorant…bad,” you become an indifferent, observing force, not an emotionally charged, judging force — a witness rather than a judge. You don’t take on the responsibility to give others their judgement. You stay neutral. Emotionally detached. Hence, safe. You choosing to not give others a definitive judgement protects your emotional safety, it doesn’t excuse them. 

In reframing situations to not negatively judge things or people, but to be understanding of why that might’ve happened, you release yourself. In choosing to give someone else grace, you take your pot off the fire. There was this girl at the gym who had her locker under mine and I was just leaving, in the middle of putting the lock on my locker. She waited a second and then angrily bent down under my arm and put her stuff directly in front of me. She did so with a kind of harshness and got right into my space. Immediately I thought, “Wow, she couldn’t wait,” and then I continued, “But honestly, maybe she just had a really frustrating day with the people here. You know how overwhelming the amount of people in the city is, and how frustrating that could be. And you have also had your moments of frustration as well. Maybe she just had a lot of that building up and had a bad day.” 

Saying that freed me. I realized, “Hey, this isn’t really about me. I was just putting a lock on my locker. I was taking the normal amount of time and it wasn’t a lot. Her reaction speaks to her emotional state. And this interaction I had with her, it’s more indicative of how she’s going through life, not my failure to deserve kindness and patience.” In the release of judgement, there is a release of energy. Like a sigh of relief. “Ahh I don’t have to hold onto this offense. I don’t have to make it personal or be on guard. I don’t have to be in a state of fight or flight. I don’t have to feel anything about this.” It’s so freeing, and a really positive shift.

When you give someone else grace, you’re grounding yourself and saying, “I’m still safe even though you’re acting like this.” This doesn’t mean you approve of or appreciate what they did, it just means you are not moved by it. You accept it. You see someone else’s actions as something outside of you — something you can’t control, and therefore something you don’t have to hold. And ultimately, when you realize it’s not yours to hold, you see it’s something that you don’t have to do anything about. People’s emotions can just exist in space. They can be suspended in the air, and you can squeeze past them on the way to your next thing, maintaining a respectable distance. 

Don’t let the world convince you that you need to feel anything about anything. You can choose to go through life with understanding, extending grace out like a smile. It is of no cost to you, it makes you feel good, and it’ll make your whole experience go along easier. By choosing to release the need for a definitive judgment, you soften the importance of things outside of you. That thing isn’t asking to be judged by you. You can just observe it. Practice discernment and evaluation without judgment.