There is a saying that goes “hurt people, hurt people”.
I’ve found that to be very true, both personally and as I’ve observed other relationships. When I’ve done things to hurt people, it’s typically because I’m operating out of a place of hurt myself (not justifying the action, explaining the behavior). When other people hurt me, when I step back and observe, or talk it out…it’s usually because they are dealing with some hurt themselves.
You can’t live on this earth and avoid community. And yet…can we all agree that it’s really hard? Anyone have a picture perfect drama free family? Anyone have a marriage where they are happy and joyful with their spouse 100% of the time? Any parents you know that are loving and patient all the time and never yelling or begging their kids to just not touch them for five minutes? Anyone been in a church (like really gone, and been involved) more than a year and not been hurt?
Yeah…community is hard, and yet we are called to it. Because God loves to refine us and deal with our junk in the midst of it. Some of our junk needs the context of community to be brought out. To force you to deal with those past hurt and walls.
While processing how we are supposed to interact in some of the more challenging times of community with one of my dear friends, she came up with what I thought was a pretty brilliant idea. It helps to get down to the bottom and root of the problem.
She was navigating some rough waters in a relationship. There had not been anything done outright, but she just got a general negative and challenging vibe from the person that seemed to be directed at her personally. Being the brilliant and educated person that she is, instead of taking it personally and responding in like form she decided to be more observant of the situation and think broader than actions directed at her. She observed that the person was hurting, and that there was probably a lot more going on in their life.
So instead of confronting the person with a list of things she did to hurt her, or telling the person they gave off a negative vibe, or even simply asking if she had done something wrong; my friend decided to go in with one question.
How are you hurting?
It’s so easy to get caught up in the wrong ways we’ve been treated. In how we’ve been taken advantage of, disrespected, have had our toes stepped on. When we are hurting we tend to get very ME focused, which is never very pleasant to be around. We go into a bit of survival mode, watching our backs and being on guard. No one gets in, no one gets to hurt us anymore. Sometimes I think we get so ME focused because it feels like no one else is. We’ve got to protect ourselves, because who else is going to? We build walls to protect ourselves, and keep others out.
Hurting people hurt people. Most often, I’ve found that they’re not meaning to. They are in self preservation mode. What if instead of putting them further on guard by starting off telling them how they’ve done wrong, or what they did to hurt you; you recognize their own hurt and probe further into it? What if instead of being focused on how we were done wrong, we recognize that the wrong doing probably came out of a place of hurt and get to the root of it?
How are you hurting?
I think this simple phrase can revolutionize how we do healthy community. I, for one want to implement it into my daily life. With my husband, my kids and friends…when I sense there’s something more going on, I want to be willing to hear the hurt others are dealing with…even if I may be the one that caused it.
Maybe you need to Do the Hard Thing this weekend and Ask How Others are Hurting. Where you might not typically pay attention, or dismiss…press further. I fear that often we pick up others funny glances, discouraged attitude, or offhanded comments and move right along to our next things without acknowledging them. We don’t see it as a cry for help. Sure, there are those people that seem to always be in a funk or hurting about something…and my bet is (and experience has been) that typically those people have had more pain in their life than the average person. There may be more layers of hurt than you could ever fathom. It might be hard to hear about, maybe even draining and exhausting…listen anyways.
As we Do the Hard Thing and Ask How Others are Hurting, we take the focus of ourselves and make it about others, and I think that’s always a good situation to find ourselves in.
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This post is part of the #write31days challenge hosted by The Nester.
Click here to read all the posts in the 31 days of Doing the Hard Thing series.
Yes and amen.
I so easily forget this and let my emotions get the best of me at certain times.