Recently, I went into the retreat mode, i.e. "keeping house". I had an aggrandised reason to do so - study. But covertly, I was hating one of my neighbours so intensely that I decided the mere sight of him is repulsive. This was of course one of those nosy neighbours that love to make their presence felt - incessant smoking, loud talking on the phone, parading the neighbourhood, finger-pointing etc.
It all started from petty neighbourhood disputes with a dose of harsh personality. What I saw to my horror was not how quickly he turned himself into an asshole, but how quickly I disintegrated from a person of reason to a person of inexplicable negativity. Just everything about this neighbour was disgusting, I thought. The whole neighbourhood is polluted by his existence...Maybe I should throw a stone at his window...
It's perhaps not so surprising that a few seconds of hatred would demolish a few year's building of rationality. It corresponds with the law of nature that it takes less to destruct than construct. This is probably what happened here. Hatred is tempting because it is easier for me to do right now. And it gives us a false sense of power over others, whereas we in fact have no meaningful power over anything, not even ourselves if our rational being is the one that's been conquered.
So as I write down these words in a calm drizzling morning like this, I feel sobre and strong again, as if I've just held up a mirror to my smeared face and wiped off the dirt. I may not be a friend to this neighbour for a long time to come, but at least I know that now I'm able to walk away from him without hatred.
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