Don't Be So Easily Offended!

My winter exercise routine - listening to Joyce Meyer while I pedal on my stationary bike - is developing more than my muscles! It is also challenging my mind. One idea I am trying to put into practice is her admonition to not be easily offended; in other words, not to take offense when someone makes a negative comment (or one that I perceive as negative). It's so easy to say things that others could take offense at, not even meaning to be rude.

One of Joyce's vivid illustrations has stuck with me: We see ourselves through rose-colored glasses, but we see others through magnifying glasses! (How true!) It reminds me of one of my mother's proverbs: Our own dirt is cleaner than someone else's dirt!

Over the years I have taken offense easily - too easily - and held grudges far too long - even against those who loved me. ("Well, if that's what you think about me..." I remember saying to myself when my grandmother once tried to reprimand me during my sensitive teenage years. My resentment smouldered for years...)

I'm trying to change... not to feel so threatened by negative comments. To forgive and forget... But it is hard!

Terry once approached a professor who had made a negative comment about him in class: It has been bothering me all week that you said... in the last class? Why did you say that? he asked him the next time he saw him.

(To me that takes courage! I would be afraid to know!)

Oh, that's not what I meant, his professor replied. I meant it like this... (And the way he meant it was a compliment!)

That experience changed Terry: he resolved never to sweep problems under the carpet, to let resentment build, but to deal with them openly, in case a misunderstanding had arisen and he had understood the wrong thing.

I still don't have that kind of courage! But I am trying to not take things personally... Maybe the person is having a bad day... Or maybe (a horrifying thought...) they are right!

I'm also trying to watch what I say. I mean, so many words come out of my mouth on any given day, it would be easy to offend someone, if they took it the wrong way.

(But this too is a discipline - it requires practice!)