April 18
As a target is not set up in order to be missed, so nothing bad arises by nature in the world.
Enchiridion, 27
Listening mode
As a target is not set up in order to be missed, so nothing bad arises by nature in the world.
When you think back on something you did that hurt another person, you may look for the moment when you wanted to be bad. Usually you don't find it. You find a different wish: to be left in peace, to be proved right, not to have to give in yet again. None of these was reprehensible in itself. The fault lay rather in how much weight it was given against everything else.
At first this seems a relief, but it is only half of one. If the bad in you had a place of its own, you could at least avoid it. As it is, the fault comes from the same wish as some of what you value in yourself. The need for quiet that once choked off a conversation lets you, on other days, stay calm where others have long since raised their voices.
With other people you find this distinction harder. Whoever hurt you seems to have meant it, because what you mostly know is the effect. Perhaps they just didn't want to lose. For you, that changes little about what happened.
What it changes, rather, is what you pay attention to the next time they say something.
