Riding in the Way Back....

As a child we would take long car trips to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in our station wagon. This was back in the days of no seatbelts, so my older brother, my older sister and I would lay out blankets in the way back, and there we would ride. Inevitably in such a ride, when the out of state license plate game would get old, or we got tired of making faces at strangers out the back window, we would start to fight. It did not take long for it to escalate, and soon someone would be yelling from the way back: “Mom he hit me!” But not before they hit him back first. Even though we were tattling, we felt completely justified in hitting back just the once. After all we had been wounded. And it was our natural inclination, our right even, to strike back. Today we have seatbelts, and rarely do you see a kid in the way back making faces at strangers. But we still fight. And we still have that natural inclination to cry out from the way back: He hit me! Of course we usually don’t cry out until we hit back first. What is it about being hurt that makes us not just want to lash out and cause pain, but to feel completely justified in doing so? Recent months have provided many times for me to be proverbially punched, and unfortunately there have been many hits from people I love the most. It is still in there, that instinct to strike back. I read a study that said when people in a laboratory setting are asked to squeeze the person next to them with the same force they are squeezed, every single time the subjects would squeeze the person next to them with much greater force. It seems it is in our nature not to just strike back, but to add some pressure when we do. We hurt, and so we want others to feel that too. We somehow think it is our right to do so. If you hurt me, I need to hurt you too. I think the hardest hurt to sustain is the emotional kind, the kind where you feel judged, and rejected. We become self-righteous and are quick to lash out in return with something that will hurt them back, and maybe even more than they hurt us. It is what I call my “How Dare you!” instinct. It is there and it is strong. I fight myself on this all the time. What we fail to do is to view the other person as an actual living, breathing human being. Instead we only see an attacker. We do not take the time to put ourselves in their shoes. To ask ourselves why they are lashing out? Are they afraid by our behavior? Does something that we are doing challenge them in their own lives? Have they been “squeezed” recently, so they are simply squeezing the person next to them harder? If we take the time to not assign malignant intentions, but to try to understand, it takes a bit of the fight out of our game. Further, if we decide that it is better to just let one go, we free ourselves from the cycle. It is hard. I am not going to lie to you on that one. It is so hard to let a hurt go. I have had a lot of practice lately. I will promise you though, that there is such a freedom when we tamper that side of ourselves. When we give ourselves permission to sustain the hurt, and to turn the other cheek, we actually win. My counselor reminds me weekly to continue to behave with integrity and grace. Sometimes I don’t want to. Sometimes I want to kick and scream and fight back. Sometimes I want to feel justified and vindicated. However, what I have found is that when I do react with grace and integrity, when I do forgive and look the other way, things come around. Not always right away, sometimes it is days, weeks, or even months. But inevitably it happens that not striking back causes the other person to stop and think about their words or actions. Honestly with some people in our lives, it may never happen. But for me, it is far more important to be able to go to bed at night, lay my head on the pillow and to know that for this day I did not cause anyone any intentional pain. I think there will always be that part of us that wants to hit back. It is part of being human and vulnerable. Today, decide what you will do in the “way back” when you get hit. Will you tattle, only after you have retaliated, or maybe can you just forgive and move forward with your head held high?