Hey guys, this is my first post in this website. I’m just a stranger here ranting about his own personal issues that have been affecting not only himself, but also others as well. When I was very young, I developed anger issues due to my parents scolding me for doing something foolish or careless, and I got caned for it, only a few times. Another contributing factor was me getting bullied by my classmates back in primary school. Even though my family members no longer cane me, no one is bullying/harassing me, these past events have negatively distorted my perspective about my family and friends.
1 example I could think of is when my family shouted and punished me, it is because they were angry and upset about me. As I grew older, and when there are people that made me angry, I needed to do the same to them, such as screaming at them or threatening to flog them just to show that I’m angry and very upset about their actions that affected me. Unfortunately, this is 1 of the plentiful examples of me getting angry for the most trivial of things, which has resulted in me being called a “man child” from my friends. They see it, but I don’t, because I have this mindset that by using my anger, my most extreme emotion, things will work out for me eventually. But until now, it has NEVER work out, or rather, work in the opposite direction.
Isn’t anger a human emotion? People did it to me, so why can’t I do it back to them? They hurt me before, so I must hurt them back… It’s not revenge, it’s fairness.
I sometimes asked myself these questions, which have fuelled up my pride into believing that using anger and “action payback” are quick and easy tools to solve all my problems. However, that has led me to disrespecting the people around me as I have been creating this horrible idea in my head that people should respect me first before I can respect them. Nowadays, when I try to “prove people wrong”, I’m ironically proving them right that I don’t try and make the effort to change myself. I realized that I am bringing a net negative impact to the world, largely due to my selfishness in only caring about my own feelings instead of other’s, my stupidity in not thinking twice/thrice before committing an action, and my ego in feeling this sort of elite self-importance that I must be treated right from others.
It’s extremely hard to rework my hard-shelled mindset and change myself and my behaviour towards other people, especially my friends. They’ve grown tired and eventually gave up on me since I treated them horribly all because I’m upset about something, not listening and taking in their advices and change my whole personality only because I felt offended by their blunt words.
To anyone of you reading this particular post and somehow made your way down to this last paragraph, let this be a cautionary tale and don’t turn yourself into something you hate. Do not let your troubled past define you and your actions, because those who let their past define them, will not allow themselves to make the effort and define their present and future with a new, better meaning.
The fact that you’re connecting those dots now is great.
