Brooding

I’m not sure what’s wrong with me these days, as I seem to be getting into confrontations with friends. Confrontations I don’t like, but with friends it seems especially magnified and lingering. It’s generally about very trivial things, which get to me, and which is revealing themselves more and more as I’m traveling with friends.

They say I am moody, grumpy and acting strange, but sometimes I don’t even understand what it is I do or say that seems to make people feel this way… and often I just give in and don’t even bother to explain myself, because why waste all that time and bad vibes when we’re supposed to be enjoying travels and one another’s company.

But more and more I am bothered by the snide remarks and sometimes downright malicious attempts to pull a joke at my expense. Perhaps my friends mean well and just want to "lighten" the mood with a few words and acts of careless nonsense. And perhaps I am to blame for being the fool to take their fabricated stories and tall tales seriously. But they do not understand that such careless attempts really hurts me

They do not understand why I react strongly, why I pout and become silent and do not want to say much for a while… because they do not and cannot possibly know that malicious jokes and attempts to trample all over my person is exactly how my brother tormented me with growing up. The similarities are all too frightening, and hurts me to the core. They do not know that, so I just swallow and watch the anger, the hurt, the sense of betrayal rise and boil inside before they eventually subside.

As a Buddhist I know that what people say and whatever happens around me should not bother me; should not even affect me at the least. I can grow angry, I can grow with rage deep down inside. I can let the mean-ness get ahold of my soul and let the anger linger for a long time, if not for ever… but it is ‘I’ who is hurting. To the others, after the attempt at a joke is over and done with, after they’ve had their laugh at my expense, they forget about it all, and are baffled at why I am still brooding. So really, there is no need to brood, no need to ruin rare moments together with friends with anger and lashing out or waste time explaining things. Watch the anger, watch the pain, and it will all pass…

As the saying goes, if one only takes a step back, the sky is broader and the sea looks wider.