When I Hate the Haters, Am I Becoming What I Hate? Possibly

When I look into the mirror, the last thing I want to see is the troll I could become...

Jul 10, 2024

Did you know that becoming what we hate is actually a thing? Here is a smart person with Better Future talking about it:

We now understand why we hate, but how does hating result in the inevitable transfiguration of the self into that of which we despise? It is simple; The trajectory of our lives is guided by where our focus is. If we become focused on a certain goal, we start to move towards that goal. We do not even need to be aware that this is happening, it simply does; It’s almost like that of which we are fixated on has a gravitational pull that one cannot hope to escape unless he becomes aware of his predicament.
The more our minds are focused on hating something or someone else, the more we become said thing, in an ironic twist of events. In my own experience, I began exhibiting the traits of those I swore to never be, only because I continued to think about how badly I wanted to get away from that. If I had not been so fixated on not being, however, and if I had been more concentrated on where I’d wanted to be, I’d be seeing significantly more progress in my life (positive progress, that is).

Well, that’s an ice-cold splash of water to the face. I learned, through very hard lessons, that I can out-troll the trolls if I don’t keep that part of my energy in check. I learned to focus on the good, to focus on what my goals are to become/continue the good in life and relationships.

That said… :)… Here’s a good example of a hard lesson I learned.

Do you know what drives me absolutely snot-bonkers? People who seem precisely like the horrible person they accuse others of being. One example is when the most hateful, cold, hard-hearted religious legalist quotes the following scripture while condemning others for simply (but firmly) disagreeing with them:

2 Timothy 3:1-5–New International Version
3 But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. 2 People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, 4 treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— 5 having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.

Not only do they disagree with said legalist, but they are also an apostate heretic banished out of his life.

I want to aggressively point out where they, the hater, provide plenty of personal examples of the failures and character weaknesses described in that passage. The temptation is real… so real.

Oh, the many, MANY MAny maNY, many words I have written and never published verbally eviscerating who I believe to be the highest evolved form of hypocrite on the planet. But that is a waste of time and energy. And truthfully, that’s not who I am anymore or who I want to be.

This futile exercise of writing entire blog posts never to publish or deleting them almost immediately after publishing doesn’t happen nearly as often as it did back when we closed Exodus or when I came out. The reason? I can recognize my inner troll, my hypocrisy of judging others exactly as they judge me. When I respond with negative energy to negative energy, I have become what I hate: in this case a know-it-all condemning someone else.

Yes, my views are pro-LGBTQ+ (among many other things). Still, when I act like my enemies by matching their unhealthy energy in the ex-gay conversion therapy war on LGBTQ+ people, it only worsens the consequences for us all. It sets back any progress we hope to achieve in getting conversion therapy banned everywhere and changing hearts and minds to help make that happen.

I am confident that verbal evisceration and na-nanny-boo-boo-and-I-can-craft-a-more-clever-insult-than-you tactics are not on team #LoveWins; those kind of responses only entertain the already outraged.

While confronting clear injustices and hoping to free LGBTQ+ people being held hostage in the ex-gay conversion world, it must be careful and considered; not reactive or lazy (I consider trolling lazy, it’s to easy to troll and requires no thought).

So when it comes to the trolls, including the one I just buried (my own), to paraphrase Arianna Grande, the voice of a generation herself,

”Thank you, not really, next…”