Reading through quotes from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is both awe-inspiring and humbling. It is proof about the power of words. In looking through them, I found one that is especially relevant for me personally lately.

I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.

I have a lot to be angry about, but I am making the decision not be angry or hateful or spiteful. I want to let go of it. Shed it. Hate and bitterness weigh you down and ultimately hurt you more than the one who has committed crimes against you.

I was at war in 2011. I didn’t want to give up the fight out of principle. Not because I cared so much about the outcome. More that I didn’t want my opponents to win. Vitriol shouldn’t be allowed to win, I thought. But then, there was that word again. “Winning.” We all know how crazy that word sounds now. It’s a punchline. I had to ask myself what I was winning if I stayed in the fight. The answer is clear: nothing. Out of the list of things that matter to me, this doesn’t even register. Regardless of what I believe is “right” or fair, the result is ultimately the same.

I’m glad that the choice is so clear. Sometimes it is not. And we keep charging at windmills we’ve mistaken for dragons. Sometimes you can spare yourself many splinters if you just bow out of the fight.

(I apologize that this post may seem too vague. I feared that the story would distract from the message. The story itself is complicated and not really worth mentioning, as I have finally managed to come to terms with.)

| Category Life in General