Have you ever had someone be cruel to you and then had you start feeling that their cruelty was your fault? As if it was totally up to you to make the situation better?
Sometimes we make poor judgments, cause turmoil in relationships and are the one who needs to change to improve relations. But there are times when other people cause the turmoil, refuse to take responsibility for their evil, and want to blame us for the trouble they caused. It’s important to know the difference so we don’t take on guilt and blame that doesn’t belong to us.
There was a time when I took an honest action that severely upset a distant acquaintance of mine. My action interfered with plans he was making, and he wanted me to change my plans to accommodate his. I couldn’t agree with his notions for some very strong moral reasons, and suddenly he viewed me as his arch nemesis of the universe. The diatribe, slander, accusations, and hatred that followed were the darkest of dark.
At first, I agonized, “What had I done wrong to bring this horrible malice upon myself?” But when I thought it through, I hadn’t done anything wrong. Yes, if I wouldn’t have taken the action I took, he wouldn’t have got upset. But it was not an unreasonable action to take. Any morally balanced person would have easily adjusted to it and figured out a workable Plan B. His dim outlook was not my creation, I realized. This was his narrow view yearning to expand. I was not to blame for the malice. I did not cause it and shouldn’t take responsibility for it. But I did have a responsibility to love him back.
And that became my prayer—to pour love all over this individual so he would hopefully mellow out, relax about the situation and see it from a healthier point of view.
We have crossed paths since, and I always say Hi and stand ready to strike up a positive conversation with him. But he has not been ready to talk to me–yet. But that’s okay. That’s not my job to worry about. This is a healing he is working out with God. My job is to love him and let him know I harbor no ill-will.
In the meantime, I’m not going to carry around externally imposed guilt that doesn’t belong to me. I have a life of happiness, joy and love to live! You do too.
Thank you for this wonderful blog. Relationships with others such as neighbors, coworkers, family members, acquaintances etc., are great (sometimes REALLY great) opportunities to apply what I’m learning in Christian Science. I very much appreciate what you’ve shared with us and I love The Message quote. Thank you once again.
Thank you so very much for this Truth, Evan, for standing rooted and grounded in Love, letting your Light shine ! A big relief that we do not have to take on the sins of the world !
Is it any wonder that our daily prayer to enrich the affections and our Lords prayer to feed the famished affections are so right on?
That was a wonderful story to share and I thank you for it. I guess it isn’t necessary but I would love to know that your friend had evolved . He must not want to change.
Well done. When we start with love as our premise, I find that the road becomes easy to navigate.
How good God is. This was precisely the situation I was struggling with but with such a timely message I am resolved to move forward, feeling great love for this individual and have always and will continue to experience great joy in my life independent of what they do. Great gratitude today for this clarity. Blessings on you!
Thank you for sharing your experience, Evan. It’s a helpful reminder to know that our role is to love, love, love. 🙂
Thank you so much. This is extremely helpful with situations I’ve been recently working with.
Currently reading the expanded We Knew Mary Baker Eddy book, and this testimony of yours, Evan, parallels Mrs Eddy’s approach to difficult relationships and situations. To “pour love all over this individual”. And to be wide awake to how we might be “foolish and deluded” as Pooh might put it! Thanks!
I remember having this conversation with my children over and over again when they were young. I have to tell myself it again and again every week!.
I used to tell them you can’t control how the other guy is going to react. You must stand tall and speak from your position. Never tell anyone what to do, tell them what you are going to do. then we devised an imaginary raincoat to protect them from the possible storm coming their way. It was hard to explain loving this person. I could only say to them that they didn’t know any better and you don’t have to join them.
Thank you Evan for sharing this. I have been struggling for many long months with a similar situation and at times have been tempted to just give up. This person, someone very close– isn’t openly aggressive, she has just frozen me out, and I have no real idea why. As I read your post I am reminded of the phrase “the floodgates of love”. You have encouraged me to be persistant like the dove in Noah’s ark. And the verse from The Message is one of my favorites. Again, many thanks.
If it wasn’t for C/S, I would proberly feel guilty as hell. God bless this system for teaching me what to say, how to say and when to say.
Unfortunately my husband was one who believed every problem was someone else’s fault, and towards the end, usually mine. I wish I’d stayed with Christian Science at the time, but I did not. Fortunately I finally learned this lesson through other means enough to move on (mainly counseling to raise my self-esteem). I am now working, using CS, to focus on the good of the relationship, forgive him (and myself for getting in and staying in that situation), and moving on. I’m very grateful I once again have CS to help!
Hi Ellen,
I’m glad you found it again too!
This is not an easy situation to address. I don’t have any idea what the issues between you and your friend are. That’s not the point, But, it seems today there is a great deal of division with neither side willing to compromise. Not only is our country politically divided but the lack of compromise is far reaching. Even some of our churches have divided because members have taken positions where there is not give and take. I know of a situation where after months and months of trying to work through some challenging issues regarding who should and who should not be allowed to be members. The Branch Church split. So, in one town we have two branch churches one is referred to as the Orthodox Branch. The other as Reformed. One church says “all are welcome – except for . . . . ” The other “all are welcome”. When members pass by each by they are polite but, each is steadfast. No compromise. In one of the MBE biographies she was asked about a city having a second church. Her response was something like if it is because the number of attendees necessitates a send church then yes. She agreed. But if the question was asked to have a second church and the reason was because there was an internal conflict her answer was an emphatic no.
Much of life is about compromise isn’t it?
The little ego needs to yield to the divine Ego!
thank you.
Isn’t this a case of letting the tares and the wheat “both grow together until the harvest”? In other words, sometimes we may not be able to discern the truth from the error try as we might. We may have to attain greater spiritual growth before we are able to know whether we need to change or the position we are holding is the correct one. So perhaps the churches that you mention did compromise by agreeing to continue separately until they are able to make whatever demonstration is needed to come to a decision they can all agree upon. I just know in my own experience there have been times when I thought I was right and “compromising” wasn’t something I was willing to do even though it would have made others happy (i.e. as when in college I was pressured over and over to drink alcohol at social functions).
But with that said, I agree with your point that there seems to be a lot of division in the world today and we all need to try and compromise more…when doing so won’t compromise our core values.