Sofia Klem

Why do people scream when green lights turn red, when the sun drips its glow across the sky to welcome the moon; or when the girl’s hair that sits in front of them falls over their computer screen. These things are not meant to be sad or aggravating. Oftentimes, they’re seen as beautiful; yet the ones who can’t see past the damage and drown themselves in their own despair can’t feel the warm hug of the sun as it sets, can’t stop and breathe when the light turns red, and can’t move past what hurt them. Instead, they hurt others.

According to “The Personal Growth Story” on medium.com we can always offer love to those people who are hurting  either from close proximity or from further away. We should be careful as we teach people how to treat us — no matter how much a person is hurting, they deserve to be loved in a way that makes them feel better. Hurt people hurt other people, and they are hurt within themselves even more.

Being able to understand takes hearing. Listening to these people, not falling with the punches they throw but learning to roll with them. Stepping back and not taking the ones that are hurting, seemingly cruel statements to the heart, even if that’s the only thing that seems reasonable.

People can often be compared to a poster—slapping other’s personalities, problems and perspectives onto their surface as stickers and claiming them as their own because they don’t have depth of their own to publicize for the world to see. They front things they don’t necessarily like and say things that they could never wrap their head around, but only because they’re hurting internally over things the outsider, the one being victimized, could never understand. Or maybe they can, which is where empathy plays a role. Junior Lily Highley shared her experience with having empathy for others and how it has followed her throughout her life.

“Growing up when other girls were mean to me, my mom always said that people who are hurting tend to hurt others,” Highley said

Among these hurting people, they usually don’t love themselves enough, to the point where they seek love and approval from others to hopefully fill the empty void, which isn’t always achievable. Unless their behavior is being bought into, they won’t be successful at their own game: manipulation.

Make them feel important. It might not end up well, but a single effort is better than none at all. Junior McKenna Kalisz has experienced many complications with herself and her relationships when it comes to feeling hurt by the ones she loves.

“I think that people tend to act out when hurting due to the fact that when we are alone to our own thoughts we begin to believe that there is no possible way anyone else is going through exactly what we are,” Kalisz said. “Because of this idea of feeling alone, some let it consume them to the point of acting out.”

Even the saying “the phone works both ways,” is an example of validation from peers. Certain friends never reach out first—whether it be with initiating plans, figuring out the time of pre established plans or them being too timid to ask for homework help, everyone has that one friend that only comes in contact when the other end rings first. It comes from the feeling of being loved and appreciated when someone else contacts them first, and they feel validated that way. In some occasions, if they don’t come right out and say this, or they aren’t asked about it, their habits will never break, and their end of the line will continue to grow dust and remain silenced.

According to medium.com, reactions stem from past experiences that lead people to certain beliefs that, in their eyes, is accepted as truth. They are actually just preconceived ideas projected onto others to protect their ego.

Instead of making their words malicious, they must be pondered on. Being empathetic, climbing in their skin and feeling around for awhile to get a real glimpse of a different reality.

Other times, there is a primal instinct implanted in our DNA. Regardless of who they are, people feel violence. People will lash out for no reason and hurt others in the process.

“I could recognize they were hurting due to the fact that when they are voicing why they are upset they will often get more caught up on the smaller things,” Kalisz said. “It was little stuff that they shouldn’t be getting upset over.”

The offer should always be open to love them, either close to them or from far away. Although people don’t deserve to feel this type of hurt, the ones they affect shouldn’t be hurting as well. Rising above the hurt and hopefully bringing them along.