The unnecessary burdens we carry

The other day when we were in class, we discussed about The Shadows. There was one part about possession and projection. It is sort of like, if you hate somebody and you can’t pin point the reason why, it could be your dark side projecting on that person. Sort of a mirror image of a side that we hate about ourselves and yet, not something that openly display them.

So, I brought up a subject to dissect in class. Our course is almost finish and I sometimes treat the lecturer who is a Catholic priest expert in psychology like my private shrink. Only thing is I pay only RM80 for 2 months.

I told him there is one woman that I loathe. Every time I see her, I will evade and avoid meeting face to face because I hate pretending to be all nice and friendly. You have to strangle me half dead in order to give a smile, wish someone good morning and say God bless. If I am not happy, it shows on my face. So, it is sort of an annoyance to me because I could not forget all about what she did to me.

Talking about forget, Fr. Huan also revealed to me a misconception that I had. Christians are asked to forgive and forget. But Fr Huan (and another Catholic priest had assured me the same thing when I went for confession) that it is silly to think that we can forget. He said, even Jesus cannot forget His crucifixion. He remembered the scars of His crucifixion and yet, He forgave those who crucified Him.

So, how can we forget? To forgive, it is possible because we can ask for God’s grace to release us from the burdens of hatred and ask for forgiveness. But we cannot expect to forget if someone has done us wrong.

So, back to class. I asked Fr. Huan. Let’s say I dislike this person and hate seeing her around, does it mean :

1) She has the bitchiness that I do not have and probably, I long to have that kind of character she possesses like being bossy, persistent (pesk), thick skin and etc? And because I cannot be a strong (aka bitchy) woman like her, I hate her?

or

2) She probably have all the bad points about me and I dislike the person because she reminds me of my own bad points?

So, Father Huan asked me in return. Have you ask the others around you what they think of her? If the others have the same opinion of her like you did, then, it is her problem and not yours. (mine) But if I am the only one having problems with her, then, I could be the problematic one.

Then, I realised (though I didn’t share it in class), Oh oh….actually, I dare not express to the others about how mad I was with her or how I absolutely dislike being in anything together with her. The reason is I am afraid that it may make me look like I am being petty and over sensitive. So, I thought I could just brush it off and take it upon myself to just bear with it. However, I am not the only person who is annoyed by her as there are others too.

That brought me to the realisation that we women especially, sometimes carry unnecessary burdens. We blame ourselves and bear grudges eventhough we may not be at fault. For example, that woman backstabbed me and though I feel pissed, I had not openly showed her how pissed I was. From now on, I am going to start to make the meek me a little bit more assertive in real person. It is true. I am too nice, too meek, too accommodating, too cincai in real person. This is especially so when I am doing something for the church. I took on things which are not my duty simply because I thought it is the right thing to serve, even when some of them are just blardy bossy. For e.g. the other day one of them have the nerve to ask me to remind him about his duty one day before he is supposed to do it. I was like wtf, you think I am your alarm clock? He is much senior, much more experience, much more responsible. But I dare not tell him off and of course, I didn’t remind him either.

So, all these little little things gnawed into me. The only good thing is I have someone whom I can rant to and get some wicked retort that makes me feel good. Otherwise, one can get really bruised and fall into self-doubt and self destruct sooner or later.

New year resolution – To be a bitch.

2 thoughts on “The unnecessary burdens we carry

  1. How true… The concept of forgive and forget. Often, people say that they forgive you but they don’t forget the wrong that you did.

    LOL… I think its hard being a bitch-le. I’m also a very accommodating person but now, because of the situation at work, my old, sarcastic self is making a come back… 👿

    Angie Tan´s last blog post..Nightmare Colleagues?

  2. This reminded me of the de facto leader of a political party who stated that he could forgive but he cannot forget.

    Great men think alike?

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