Pride is the strongest sin
The majority of my life I struggled with my anger. When I was a little boy, life was really enjoyable for me and I never had to deal with anger issues. When I got older I slowly began to feel more anger inside me. I was confronted with the reality of life. I hate injustice and this was a thing which I started to see more from day to day. In school, social media, the news were filled with injustice. The feelings that I felt towards injustice were rather furios, it was a subtle feeling of disgust. I was disgusted, if others were treated differently. In elementary school things were also great and I don’t recall to have felt this type of anger which I still sometimes struggle with.
The first time I felt this new type of anger was at 15 years old. I grew a lot in this time. I was probably 175cm at this time and weighted over 70kg. Through Swimming, I was well in shape in a time where most of the guys in my age including myself were playing video games all time. The difference was that I regularly trained hard. With this in my mind, I became confident but arrogant. The video games that I’ve played might have played a role in developing an aggressive attitude. Maybe it was just puberty and increased testosterone levels. In school I embraced these emotions. I was proud of myself because school was easy and I was in shape. But why is this a problem? Isn’t pride something good? The thing I lacked was true humility, therefore I got more and more proud of myself and became so arrogant that I felt superior towards other people. This would be a big lesson for myself later on. Life was alright. I was in puberty and fell in love with the new things my body had to offer. I suddenly got so much stronger and got way more muscles than ever before. Obviously I wasn’t a big bodybuilding guy back then but I had an athletic physique. It is nice to feel proud of your accomplishments and you should be but never forget to be humble about it. This was the beginning of my “newer” self. When corona arrived, I was happy like everyone else. I thought that 2 weeks no school would be legendary. I could train and play video games all day and this was exactly what I did. The only problem was, this shit lasted way longer than I thought. The first 4 months were nice. Training inside the house, playing video games all day and doing the easy school tasks early in the morning so I could be basically be doing nothing for the rest of the day without feeling bad because I had done my homework in the morning. This existence slowly began to change though. It was nice for 4 months, I have to admit this. How about 1 year, without having the possibility to meet with your friends? I tried to make the best out of it but I didn’t had the mindset back then. Now I think that I wasted my time and this is probably true. Nevertheless, I’m glad that I experienced this chapter of my life. Now I value my time a lot more and see the precious in all things(at least I try to do it). This lock down transformed myself to a different person. I’m an extrovert so this lock down drove me crazy. I felt imprisoned, like a bird in a cage. All I did was playing video games, watching porn and doing nothing. The training hadn’t stopped but I think I didn’t exercise regularly like before. I lost contact to my best friends, they had their own shit to deal with. I was isolated and this feeling pissed me off. I have the privilege to live in a nice house and even I became unhappy. My family probably had the same problems like me but I don’t recall being a nice person all the time. I could have talked with them more, instead of isolating myself.
This self isolating would be a thing later on. In these times I felt slightly depressed, lethargic. I felt despair. Those feelings turned into fury and hatred. I treated my brother not nicely. I lacked responsibility which I should never because I’m the oldest. Now I understand what I did wrong and things changed for the better. Back then I was careless. The worst thing that happens to everybody is when they become careless. Bad habits everyday over a year changed myself. I wasn’t the happy boy anymore. I was something else.
The anger which I felt for the first time felt good. It was a burning sensation in me. I never felt this strongly before and my dumb ass confused this slightly glowing anger with power. I became an asshole. Careless, arrogant, without responsibility and fury in my veins. I treated people not nicely. I forgot the basics of normal human communication and I was quickly pissed of when something out of my control happened. Today I view this as childish attitudes. Back then I felt good.
Anger is like fire. Think of a campfire. A controlled fire is nice and warming for you and those around you. An uncontrolled fire is dangerous, it is unpredictable and can burn down whole forests. The same goes for anger and aggression. Sometimes it’s helpful to be angry and aggressive because you get a bonus in strength, durability and endurance to say it in gaming terms. Which aggression did little Tim choose? Uncontrolled of course! I was in a weak state of mind and I confused this little burning sensation inside me to overcome struggles of everyday life. The problem with fire is that it needs something to burn. I fueled the fire within me with anger, fury and despair not with love, passion for the light and humility. This fire was blazing stronger each day. I paid with my soul in a way. The price was my happiness which led to myself feeling more and more in a pit of shame, guilt and hatred. I sometimes struggle with this alter ego of mine.
As a kid, I loved the cartoon “Avatar the last air bender”. Recently I stumbled across a video of this series. Despite being a cartoon for 10 year old kids , it deals with great topics and gives you ironically good lessons. The majority of them comes from one of the strongest fire benders in the series called Iroh. He was destined to be the leader of the fire nation but when his son died in an ambush of the capital on the earth kingdom called Ba sing se, he changed his whole personality. He used to be proud, glorious and was considered the shining light of the fire nation. After the death of his son, he refused the throne and all it’s glorious benefits and lived as a homeless man under the common folk. He traveled to all the kingdoms to learn from them. He became spiritual and changed fire bending. In the series, the majority of fire benders use their passion, hate, greed and other bad feelings for their bending. The longer you’ll use this type of bending, the more it devours the bender, eventually leading towards a never ending circle of lust for power and never ending pain. Iroh changed his fire bending to the old ways. The original fire bending was a virtues way of life. It wasn’t destroying everything on it’s way rather than inspiring hope and courage in those, who seemed without it and came from inner peace and humility.
“It is important to draw wisdom from many different places.“ - Iroh
Self improvement poisoned my mind
Self improvement is nice and helpful but one should be careful with it. Extremes are always bad no matter what. I fell so deep in the rabbit whole of self improvement, that I was watching videos of guys my age who were making millions. I felt like shit. Don’t get me wrong, self improvement taught me so much but I was watching so much content, that I behaved like a cult member. Whenever I saw things, which weren’t good for you or against self improvement, I felt anger. This makes no sense I know, but I was so passionate about helping others that I lost my ways on the journey. I was instantly pissed and defensive when something against this self improvement occurred. My father was the one to settle me down to earth like he always does. This is why father figures are so important for males and females. I was so focused on improvement that I lost joy. I was turning to my alter ego and I didn’t even recognize it. The motives changed, they were more nobel. The root wasn’t the same either, the problem was the same. Pride and Arrogance would be my downfall if I didn’t recognize this. I need to be more humble, I know this now.
“Pride is not the opposite of shame, but its source. True humility is the only antidote to shame.” - Iroh
The quote hit me like a truck. My whole life I confused this. I isolated myself and thought that I was different than the others. I probably was unkind to people, who I liked and I’m sorry for my mistakes. I’m also glad that I learned this the hard way. My father always taught me that Pain is the best teacher, but nobody wants to come to his lessons.
Whenever you feel hate, shame or any other negative feeling, think twice before you act and discover why you feel like this. When you locate the roots, you can deal with them. Don’t confuse hatred and fury with power. The strongest power comes from love, not hate. Hate devours yourself and leads to misery. Love is a blessing which helps you and those around you.
“Fear is the path to the dark side … fear leads to anger … anger leads to hate … hate leads to suffering.” - Yoda
I suffered because of myself. I suffered because I isolated myself. I suffered because of my hate. Now I know what I need to do. Humility is the way for me now. I’m glad that I learned this lessons early. I hope you aren’t wandering around on the wrong paths like I did.
Strength and Honor
