I remember lying on the bed in the unforgiving heat of the Philippine summer and found myself in the depths of rage. I was shaking uncontrollably. My body felt tense and on the edge. A bowl of Mama’s chicken macaroni salad would’ve fixed everything or the best of Frédéric Chopin playing on the background would’ve sufficed but I cannot, for the life of me, visualize myself calm. My heart was racing as though there was a great pounding in my chest and I can’t seem to catch my breath. A confrontation that I had hoped to be proactive had gone awry and I was met with considerable disrespect. I knew I was upset but I didn’t realize I was THAT upset.
I inhaled. Then, exhaled. I tried to flex every muscle in my body as hard as I can.
“Jesus,” I uttered under my breath. Getting the jitters out, I finally allowed myself a good cry.
Life has been major this year. Three months in to it and 2019 has already seen me ugly cried once or twice. Nothing like stress and disappointments to shake my self-confidence and focus but sometimes, life happens, you know? I’ve resigned myself to the harsh realities of life that someone can (and will) discredit your character and speak unfairly of you at any given daylight. But once the people you treated like family… loved like family… capitalizes the first opportunity to bring you down the minute they already get what they've wanted from you, it rips apart your heart like nothing else, leaving you incandescent with rage – a hard place to be in and an even harder furrow to climb out of.
As someone who strongly values friendship, trust and reciprocal altruism, it makes me wonder why certain people that we care about treat us badly. For months, I’ve begun to view others through a guarded, constricted-heart lens… constantly questioning everyone’s motives. I was moving through life somehow on the defense, as if poised for the next attack. Crazy, I know. Providence came in the form of Mama who communicated some choice wisdom to me: The action of one, she said, does not entirely speaks for the action of the rest and believe me, that's all I needed to hear in order to turn around and step back to take a longitudinal view of life.
Forgiveness is not exactly my strongest suit and I’d be lying if I said that it didn’t take everything in me to choose maturity rather than the antithesis of it. It's still a struggle. Sadly, however much we dress it up, some people (who are, for lack of a better word - jerks) will never value the friendship we so sincerely offer, in the same sense that we do. As good as we try to be or purport that we are and no matter how much we intend to live a life of kindness, empathy and love, at some point we will encounter a 'Judas' of our own and everything in between can still happen. When someone gives us a kiss of betrayal, it's difficult to employ the scriptural truths about forgiveness but turning the other cheek and offering them civility will help you move on - a process I'm still learning day after day.
We lose quite a few friends in our journey to life knowing full well that we can also make new ones. It’s swings and round abouts but the most important thing is we should not let the moment of unpleasantness take over our lives because it's true, we win some, we lose some. Such is the way of life. Perhaps friends lost are not really a loss at all. It might just be a blessing in disguise you have yet to realize.
