Hatred in your heart hurts you

Hatred is a strong word and emotion. It’s a feeling that brings along with it other negative emotions like anger, disdain, the urge to hurt and harm, and perhaps vengeance, leaving no room for the positive ones like compassion and empathy.

During a literary criticism class in college, our lecturer emphatically stated that love and hatred are two sides of the same coin, meted out where care and concern are involved. If you care about a person, it matters whether they love or hate you, and it should not matter at all if they don’t.
A lot worse than hatred is indifference, which hurts more and implies a total lack of care.

Do you hate someone or something? Does it bring out the worst in you? Do you often indulge in being cynical and hurting or putting down someone with harsh words or inexcusable actions? Then, it is time to reflect and get to the root cause of this attitude. Is it your own insecurities, much like the bully who feigns importance and feels good only by belittling someone who is weaker, vulnerable, and an easy target? Or is it bias or prejudice that is usually baseless and irrational?

History reminds us of the extremities of hatred practised by Hitler with his atrocities, and so it needs to be nipped in the bud before it consumes all reason, compassion, and kindness.

Sometimes worldly, philosophical wisdom comes from the most unlikely and unexpected quarters; like a main character in a popular sitcom rightly pointed out, “The least lovable are perhaps the least loved, for one can give only what one has or has received.” Your object of hatred will probably be worthy of affection only when and if you can send a lot of love their way. Think about it!

The Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 4, Text 13, has this to say: When people reject, cheat, or humiliate us, we may feel justified in hating them. No matter how justified our feelings are, it doesn’t change the reality that hatred hurts us far more than it can ever hurt those we hate, because holding hatred in our hearts is like holding burning coal in our hands constantly, waiting for the right time to hurl it at an offender. When our hatred is a driving emotion, we’re far from spiritual reality; our love for Krishna should be so great as to leave no room in the heart for hatred.