Great post Lisa. It's all about family here. I am continually humbled by the people who have chosen to be a part of this site and who have adopted themselves into this rag-tag group of wonderful people.
I know I can be a royal pain in the you-know-what a lot of the time, but I'm really not a bad guy. I can get very loud sometimes with my opinions, but I don't really ever mean any harm. I also am over-sensitive at times too, and that is something I pray about all the time, that the Lord would lift from me the burden of this sin. I am what I am, a 48 year old nerd.....of that I cannot hide or make an apology for
Brother, I have 'known' you for a long time and you know that I respect you. My comment was to highlight how open you are with your extended family and to show how accepting and open your ThePhins.com family is to your problems.
I know it can be a lot harder than it sounds but I think the best way to deal with it is to say **** em and just move on. I can't remember the last time I was really insulted. I get sarcastic remarks made towards me by family and friends. And I shoot right back at them with even more sarcasm. If someone did insult me I'd probably literally tell them to **** off and just walk away. Being about 6'4 helps I guess. Maybe that's why I haven't been insulted much.
Hell yeah. Don't apologize for who you are. If someone can't accept that then its their problem, not yours.
Oh I know that bro, and I appreciate that. Its one of the reasons I totally abandoned "that other site". I was just emphasizing that so folks can see I am not playing a part on the internet like some folks do. I have seen that way too often and been suckered in and then find out later they are all hot air. I am 48, I never played sports except at PE and one year in 3rd grade pee-wee football (at the Coral Gables youth center). I was a band nerd (played the trumpet). I was the ugly skinny kid with glasses, who most people picked on, and abused, and called f*ggot, and who carried the secret that I knew I actually was gay. But tried to hide it, and became lonely, and not really any friends. (It wasn't only Dad and my brother that picked on me, and it didn't help that my brother was Mr Jock - football, baseball and wrestling) My football knowledge is vastly limited, but I am a damn big fan, and I love my Dolphins and Hurricanes. I am just pointing out my flaws and putting them out there. One of them is that I am oversensitive, and maybe I was last night with one of the boards posters. I am guessing he didn't mean any disrespect, its just he's done it before, and last night it seemed like it was on purpose. But we talked and hopefully its resolved.
I don't usually come into this forum, it is a scary place, but since I was a participant (though not the insultor or the insultee, I believe) in the discussion that led to this thread I thought I ought to pitch in. I commend you Kevin for being direct, though I would have handled it first with a pm to the other party. We all have our demons and they influence us in many and varied ways. Sometimes a single incident becomes a tipping point and the response is out of proportion to the "offense". When that happens we need to take ownership for not having brought up the earlier "insults" directly so festering will not happen. I wonder if that is the case here???? In a general answer to your original question, which is a wonderful lounge topic, I try to remember that people are rarely intentionally cruel but are often cruelly insensitive. The former requires direct, confrontational action, the latter requires gentle teaching. The trick is picking which it is. Given my perception of the percentages and based on prior history, I usually try the latter action, gentle teaching, first before becoming harsher in my criticism. For what its worth. and oh by the way, I enjoy your posts in many of the forums, Kev, and hope to see them continue.
I don't have to worry about it too much, because I figure anyone who would insult someone who is disabled must be a ******. Mmmm ... soak in the irony.
To be honest Ohio, I did it very spur of the moment, and probably over-reacted but it just struck me as very hurtful thing to do for someone that claims to be a strong Christian. I would never do that to him, or anyone else. I had just poured out my heart in another post, to help and console someone else that was hurting with the very same problem that I have. To not acknowledge me at all, and to specifically point out the other person was just downright hurtful. Yes I could have and maybe should have kept it to myself. But its happened before and I don't understand it.
I have been a jerk and I apologise to TheRev. After reading Mary's thread, I have nothing to be upset about. Damn I hate myself sometimes.
I firmly believe, forgiveness is overrated. If someone purposely tries to hurt me, then they do not deserve an ounce of my respect or forgiveness. I never go out of my way to hurt anyone, I expect the same in return.
In this case, I believe the final take home message is that no ill was intended. This doesn't relate for this incident but as for forgiving people, I am all for it. I think most people are capable of feeling remorse for a careless or thoughtless act and, as such, deserve to know that their apology is accepted as genuine. If you carry around that burden of unforgiven acts, you're head will explode. Trust me, it's a scientific fact.
If I am insulted...I will either a) play along with it by agreeing giving the insult less power or b) throw an insult back with a nod and a smile. c) "F*** you very much" works well, too.
I think the general thrust of this topic is a good one. How do we handle things. It is an informative thread. You reacted out of who you are and out of your perceptions. Should it have started in a pm? Maybe. Will you deal with it differntly next time you feel this? Also maybe. I think "jerk" is also an overreaction. I picked up on your comments in the other thread and acknowledged you so it isn't like you were invisible, but perhaps having been put upon all your life has conditioned you to react even in places where no hurt is intended. That doesn't make you a jerk, only abudantly human! Don't hate yourself, if you are like me that will just make you gain weight! Just learn and move forward! God's best to you now and always!
I'm sure it was harmless in this case. I was speaking in more broad and general terms. (Which yes, I get I'm OT, which I'm sure was part of your point.) I just think that anger and hate don't get the credit they deserve. I think those things are only destructive, when handled incorrectly. Point being, forgiving all transgressions, IMO, is wrong.
No bro, I didn't consider your post off topic at all. I was responding to the point that you make again, that hate serves some higher purpose. I just disagree with that and don't believe that lasting feelings of hate can do any good. I agree that if a person harms you or your family and remains unrepentant, forgiving that person might not be high on my list either but how I feel about that person is not anything that I would choose to dwell on. I don't believe that is a good path to sanity.,
I don't see how hate is dwelling. My ex-roommate, screwed me over hardcore. It was unfounded. Then preceded to threaten me to others a full year after. I hate him. I don't dwell on it though. It doesn't consume me or occupy a lot of my time. I probably wouldn't piss on him if he were on fire though. The point is, I try really hard to be a good and honest person. I consider other people's feelings. But some people deserve to be hated because they don't even try to do those things. More importantly, hate is as much part of the human experience as love. As such, there is as many quantifiers for hate as their is love. So maybe that's the problem for me here. I love the Dolphins and hate the Jets. Not as much as I love my wife or hate my ex-stepfather, though. So, I guess there's degrees.
While anger is a basic emotion, hate takes a greater investment. I work with a lot of folks who carry a lot of unresolved anger and/or hate around for years. It does no harm to the person to which it is directed. Indeed many times the person being hated is unaware or only vaguely aware of the feelings. But it does have the capacity to do great harm to the "hate-er". Those feelings can poison a person from the inside out. Now if your anger or hatred is fairly remote from you, perhaps it will do you no harm but I would be careful. I mean why give a person who has harmed you in the past an ongoing club to beat you with?
Damned kids I'm not good at the insult thing, I've been known to be sudden in my early days. I tried to be mellow, but bullies with a mouth could be in peril quick. I try hard not to let my mouth, age and ego overload my *** nowadays. Skills mean less and less as the years pass unpracticed and age advances ever on... damn it. Speaking of perils.. one of the more subtle ones is making a list of people for any reason.. name one, you must name them all.. miss one and someone will feel slighted, I think it is natural. Most want to be recognized and even accidental ommisions can be hurtful even tho that was the furthest thing from the authors mind. I feel a twinge sometimes when I see a list I think I belong on, I bet most of us do. I give myself the who do you think you are buster lecture, then I get a little flush of deserved embarrassment. We're human, and some responses are so automatic they are hard to fix. IMO.
Is that the one with the rich girls who just whine and complain about how the other rich girls gossip too much? o wait..
Yeah it was Debby. I guess if y'all allow me to stay, y'all will have to understand my little quirks.....that's one of them, I hate to be left out. Maybe it goes back to when I was a kid, and the way Dad and brother treated me many times. It was Dad who always took my older brother to fix the car, or to the store, or to the movies, or here or there, because my brother was "his boy" (My Dad and brother were real jock types in school). It always hurt by that, and I tried hard, but usually failed, especially at sports. Instead of encouragement, my Dad and brother would insult me, make fun of me, and generally drive me to tears half the time. It got to the point where I just stopped trying after a while. And the one time I did try to do pee-wee football, Dad couldn't be bothered to come to not even one of my games (Saturday mornings).....if he did, it meant he would miss my brothers game, and of course since my brother was the star of his team, he would go see him. I guess it just sounds like I am bitter, and I guess I am. This is one of the toughest things I have had to resolve in my life. It sounds stupid, but its these feelings of inadequacy that I get now, are all back on how I was treated as a kid. Anyone else still holding things from their childhood or teenage years ?
No offense man, but I think you'd prob be better off letting that stuff go. You don't have a time machine so you can't change it. And I doubt it's doing you much good these days. IMO, better to learn from it and move on.
We all bear the scars of our childhood. You just gotta get through it somehow, for each of us it's different method. Some turn to drugs, some to God, some confront their past, others bury it, there's no simple answer. Good luck bro.
I've been trying to do that for years. I just have to let it go eventually but its harder than just saying, "I let it go".
I know that it can be hard to let things go brother but as soon as soon as you disempower the demons, the sooner you will be free. I came across this Zen story today: Author unknown
celt i know youre being serious but i cant help but feel that you sound just like kevin nealon's character on grandmas boy last night i had a dream i was a dove and i flew high, high into the sky and i looked down, into my soul and then i knew all was going to be ok
