My Thoughts on Getting Out Of The Hurt

This article is influenced by a talk I gave at a Singles and Courting Couples program in October 2016 hosted by The Daniel Generation Church, an RCCG Parish. Long, but hopefully worth your while.

  

What is Hurt?

Hurt means to cause pain to someone, to injure someone's feelings. 

Conflict in any relationship is inevitable. Not making conscious efforts to resolve and heal the hurt is what is not good. Can you imagine a world where physical injuries do not heal? That world would be full of pain, irritation and possibly stench from festering wounds.

Thankfully, many disagreements can be avoided if we stop depending on our partner to make us happy. Happiness is your own responsibility. Stop seeking from your partner what only God can give. Do you know that the origin and indeed the solution to most conflicts lie in the fact that the two parties probably have different views of life, relationships and indeed marriage? It is called your Paradigm.

Our knowledge base, the skills acquired and our desires influence the way we see the world. This postulation is referred to as the Basic Change Model, which simply states that, “the way we see the world triggers an attitude in us, which in turn influences our behavior which becomes a Habit”.

The simplest conflicts to resolve are the ones where one of you is just plain wrong either because one of you just got the facts wrong, forgot, or just did not care. However the more difficult conflicts to resolve are those where both of you are right. Yes, you heard me correctly, the most difficult conflicts to resolve do arise when both of you are right, because neither wants to back down and perhaps neither should.

A perfect example is that between my wife and I over raising our two lovely children when they were much younger. Olabisi placed so much more emphasis on the children’s security while I valued their autonomy. Can you see that there is nothing wrong with either of our expectations, valuing the children’s security and raising them to be able to survive childhood on their own and to take calculated risks so that they are better able to make decisions on their own when the time comes.

The challenge is that both of us approached the problem from our right perspective and wondered why the other could just not see it when it was so obvious isn’t it? My wife saw the children as needing shelter, protection, guidance and warmth which is excellent but I saw them as free, risk takers who should think for themselves, take responsibility for their own lives, and bounce back from adversity learning from the consequences which I dare say is also a good desire. The problem here is that we were both right but thinking it through we found out that were both really on the same side, wanting the best for our children. We only took different routes to achieving our common goal, bringing up mature and thriving children. Realising that, we both increasingly sought to help fulfill each other’s expectations by working together as partners instead of constantly fighting as foes. That revelation if applied to your other recurring conflicts would help you appreciate the values that are not in conflict with principles, which are universal and should be sustained as a couple.

So here are my suggested steps to getting out of the hurt

1. Values Vs Principles Appreciate the values in each other that are note in conflict with Godly principles.

2. Choice You have a choice of how to respond when things go wrong. One choice in response to mistakes and personal failures is arrogant defensiveness, which is the choice to justify, rationalise and stand your ground. It is however the choice on a path to repeated failures and stunted growth. On the contrary, those who are both humble and willing really do not claim to have all the answers, but they are just willing to do whatever it takes to find the answers.This part of humility allows them to seek help from others and shift their reliance from themselves to God.

3. Grieve Allow yourself to grieve. The restoration begins the healing process that will include several difficult processes, such as grieving past hurts so you can move forward. Rather than numb your feelings or deny they are there, you will need to acknowledge them and feel the depths of your emotions.

4. Forgive It may involve forgiving your partner who has hurt you, and giving up old resentments and grudges. Hurting people hurt other people, which is why satan wants the one who was hurt to spend the remainder of their life hating the one who caused the hurt but God’s plan is just the opposite. Then as the reality of your situation becomes clearer, it is required that you embrace your life, the good and the bad of it all, and allow God to do with it what only God can do.

5. Perseverance Be prepared to Persevere. The final element to getting through the hurt is perseverance as you have to be in it for the long haul, remembering that though life is not always fair, God is.

Be intentional in investing in each other. Some of you must be familiar with the principle called The Emotional Bank Account (EBA). EBA is a metaphor for the amount of trust that exists in a relationship, and just like a bank account, you can only draw from the relationship if you made deposits in the past. Your deposits are deeds valued “by the recipient”, which build up a reserve of trust that can be called upon later.

In conclusion, let me emphasize that True Love is Agape, which is unconditional and sacrificial!

Now, as you seek that right person, a lot of responsibility falls on you too from the excerpts eloquently espoused by Michelle Barack Obama reproduced here verbatim

"Even if you meet the perfect person, the relationship will still require real effort. Everyone wants to be in love until it requires a real sacrifice. If you are not willing to compromise, love is not for you. If you are not willing to make sacrifices now for the greater good later, love is not for you. If you only want to be with someone on your own terms, love is not for you. If you can't put someone else's needs before your own every once in a while, love is not for you. If you are not emotionally healed from previous or current relationships, love is not for you."

Feel free to share with those that you believe need to hear this, and I hope this contribution would help someone get out of the hurt.