Sylvanna Devlin

I experienced treatment from a woman so vile, so deeply evil, so relentless, so wrong and twisted, that it was a near spiritual instinct to hate her as I would, say, a demon. A real blazing pool of dark chaos climbing out of hell to piss on all that was sacred.

She seemed to want me dead for no decent reason beyond obsession with a man and jealousy of my history. She was young but the level of petty she reached was obscene. No detail too small to peck and pick on or use as a source of gaslighting. Nothing.

I could pray and she would bend the experience into three hours of torture. What was I supposed to do but hate her?

Once an enemy (for what better word is there?) gains a foothold in your soul it’s natural to feel further resentment. Influencing our shadow self means they have some control. But while modern hocus pocus philosophy is to say you are giving it? That’s victim blaming bullshit half the time, and you are not responsible for the actions of boundary bashing bitches of any gender.

So how do we respond to this presence within us? Hooks that cause pain then anger on a level that fosters hatred?

Let’s be clear, as there are some emotions or conditions I can address. There are some forms of prejudice and related hatred I can not aide the understanding of. They are not within all of us and while I am not without benefit from systems of prejudice, I am without malice. And I am not alone.

Hatred as I describe it is a natural response to prolonged deliberate injury.

While some are abusive out of weakness or madness, they tend not to be as extreme as the type of enemy I’m describing.

Unfortunately for us both one day I saw her humanity and I couldn’t hate her any longer. I couldn’t even get mad when she needled and wheedled. She didn’t really want to be hurting me.

What can you do when that consistently angry? It helps to know why. Being pushed into it or she got the same does actually seem reasonable. Behind her was a bastard more worthy of the emotion. A hostage taker and abuser. But I didn’t know who and had no where else to lay my emotion.

A lack of understanding seems to fill the gaps when it comes to the motivations for emotional responses and that kind of hatred is indeed a temporary emotion no matter how badly it seems lasting.

What do I mean fill the gaps? We may know the trigger and the cause but not the purpose, background, context of the cause. So understanding is like water trickling to the back before you find out if ever.

Though once you have that it’s a lot easier to release that feeling into the ether. That and time with distance from the one making you so angry on a regular basis hatred has formed.

This is how couples who once love each other dearly came to hate each other upon divorce. The level of divide is too strong. Maybe with time they can remember the good. But the bad bogs them down. It does take two to tango when it comes to divorce but not necessarily the instigator of it.

Toad (My ex spouse) wanted mediation. I only wanted that in the form of divorce papers. He clung on to power and clutched a ribbon I was letting go of. I don’t hate him. But by god there was a night I did. I should have. He made me a nervous wreck. Gave me PTSD. Worsened my bipolar. And in screwing up that badly released me to live a better life than one I could have with him.

No hatred is the wrong term. Lack of concern is more accurate. Which from some all loving being as myself probably seems the same. But while he gets coldness and any other lover gets the heat of the sun, what Toad receives (or doesn’t) is not as active as hatred.

You have to still care to hate someone in that way.

Malice? I don’t know. I don’t want to know. I’ll skip out on learning that part of humanity. It’s a motivation I don’t understand. Even prejudice is othering combined with fear and hatred. That hatred is learned.  Fear is usually resource anxiety and also learnt. But it is not the same as Malice.

Does Malice actually exist? Hurting another for the sake of hurting them? Of course. Lashing out is malicious and prolonged disregard for another is malicious too. Or at least can be. I don’t know.

What I do know is as I write this I’m resisted by a malicious force hiding behind envy. There are plenty of religions who dig into that but I’ll discuss Jealousy tomorrow.

Stay safe, there are assholes out there.