Thought 25: Hatred only harms the person who entertains it in his mind

You hate a person when he makes you unhappy for some reason. If you are deceived, naturally, you feel outraged. When you feel cheated, you will naturally hate the person who cheated you.

All negative attitudes are manufactured by the mind internally. Hatred is one such negative attitude, which is potentially very corrosive. It really serves no purpose to you. On the other hand, it causes unhappiness to you - and not to the person whom you hate. You do not have to hate a person just because you do not like him or just because he caused you some harm.

You are responsible for the way you think about any person. You feel what you think. When you control your thoughts, you control your feelings too automatically. If you think differently, you also feel differently. You have the choice to hate a person or to love a person. You are the sum total of your choices.

You may not be able to change a person, even though you feel that the change may do him good. It is very difficult for people to change. You do not have much control over the inner changes of any person. Even if the person wants to change and the fact that he does not, shows that it is very difficult for him to change. It is impractical to want the whole world to conform to your wishes, even though they may appear valid to you.

You are no doubt responsible for your actions and emotions - but how can you assume responsibility for the actions of others? If you have done something wittingly or unwittingly, you can own up and make amends for your own omissions and commissions. But how can you assume responsibility for those of others? Yet some one else's omissions and commissions seem to affect you to a very large extent, emotionally. The reason for this is that you internalize them - you allow them to penetrate inside. (Swami Dayanaanda)

Hatred is a mere thought in your mind – and when you ignore this thought, it goes away quietly. If you associate yourself with that thought, however, it causes damage – to you. Thus, it is your mind which manufactures anger and hatred. It is your mind again, which, manufactures understanding and forgiveness. Here is a choice for you. Why don’t you choose to understand and forgive. The remedy lies, says Dr Wayne Dyer, not in twisting the knife in the hurt, but in cutting and throwing the hurt out. This is what forgiveness is all about; throw the memory of the hurt out.

The truth is that no one can make you unhappy - unless you permit them. People have no power over you, unless you empower them. People have your tacit approval when they annoy you. The wise person knows this - and he wears a bullet-proof vest. Nothing penetrates and goes inside to trouble him.

The next thought is about “Making mistakes”