Getting offended, having feelings hurt, taking things personally/to heart, and constantly crying foul are all symptomatic of an overblown oversensitive ego that needs to be curbed. Ego by nature is very fragile which unfortunately has led to innumerable unnecessary conflicts and clashes in history.
Being over sensitive and constantly being offended are the product of an ego that feels it is too good to be criticized or attacked. Not even playfully or when there isn’t any intent is to hurt that person.
This is unfortunately the case across the entire political spectrum, as much as one political group wants to claim the other side is full of over sensitive snowflakes, they are just as guilty of the same level of over sensitivity. The important thing to realize is that the knee jerk reaction to cry afoul and throw a baby-like tantrum at being offended, are all bolstered by people’s egos, and the desire to never ever be offended or disrespected. The feeling of being disrespected is your number one sign that your ego is in charge and needs to be silenced.
The feeling of disrespect or the desire to say ‘how dare you’ are both incredibly important indicators and red flags that you need to quiet down your ego. Learn to laugh at yourself, and forgive forgive forgive as Jesus would say because ultimately they are not hurting anything real. It demonstrates an attachment to your ego as well when you are that incredibly over protective over it.
The sign of a true strong person is someone who can take a joke or feel disrespected, and learn to laugh at themself. Train yourself to be self deprecating, it doesn’t change the level of self esteem or confidence you have, but it will help you learn to poke fun at yourself.
Here are a couple of red flags that tell you when your ego should be curbed
- Feelings of being disrespected
- If you feel you’re about to say “how dare you!” Or “the nerve of that person!” etc.
- Feeling the urge and temptation to snap back at someone and hurt them in some way because they hurt your feelings
- When you start feeling your self defensive mechanisms kicking in. If someone is saying something, and then you start formulating what to say to be offensive as a result, that’s your cue to take a deep breath and not engage.
If you’ve trained yourself well in these skills, no verbal attacks, aggressive or passive aggressive will scathe you. Your natural response will be laughter and rolling your eyes. Bless them and wish them the best. Ask the Holy Spirit to help heal you and relieve you of your ego’s self defense mechanisms. Declare that you let them go completely as they are no longer needed.
Cancel Culture
Unfortunately, the culture of over-sensitive people has also led to people weaponizing feeling offended to destroy other people which is inherently combative, hostile and unpeaceful. As a person who chooses the path of peace, using ‘cancel culture’ tactics to ruin and destroy people is not choosing the path of peace. In fact, it is deliberately seeking to destroy someone over hurt feelings. At very best the targeted person should be educated to be more sensitive and thoughtful towards other people in order to inspire and increase people’s empathy. But destroying people via cancel culture is inherently destructive and lacks any peace or educating/enlightening of others. In the same way that that public disagreements don’t need to turn into violent arguments shouting matches.. pointing out that someone may need a revised or educated point of view on a particular topic is always preferable to destroying that person which only serves to damage the cause the person believes they are defending by seeking to destroy someone else’s life. The cancel culture is not limited to the left either. We see it in many ways, and it is unfortunately extremely damaging to progressive and compassionate causes which are hurt because the destructive nature of cancel culture then taints whatever cause they are pushing for. Supporters are inevitably lost because the destruction of cancel culture supersedes whatever benevolent cause they were initially pushing for. You can teach people valuable lessons without destroying them, that is pure aggressive and destructive ego at work/play.
On the left, cancel culture often focuses on holding people and organizations accountable for anything perceived as harmful, discriminatory, or offensive. The calls for boycotts, public shaming, or for firing people are all counterproductive and destructive by nature.
On the right, cancel culture is usually directed at people or institutions that are seen as undermining traditional values or challenging conservative viewpoints.
At the end of the day, people from across the political spectrum engage in incredibly destructive actions with the intent to destroy others over hurt feelings or challenged opinions. No single specific sect has been innocent from engaging in behavior that is purely motivated by ego and desire to cause harm to others. This on the other hand, is absolutely choosing the path of conflict and aggression rather than peace. If you are a follower of Jesus, it is a betrayal of his values and tenets of forgiveness that he taught everyone. Cast aside your desire to be vindictive and harmful towards others, which is always sourced from a place of hatred in your heart where there should be love. If you claim to be a Christian, as Jesus stated, always choose the path of peace and always forgive. Cancel culture is antithetical to a life being lived with forgiveness being used as a guiding light.
For spiritual folks, earnestly declare to our Father and Holy Spirit:
“Please heal me and dissolve me of argumentative combative and abrasive habits and tendencies and ramping arguments up to 11 from disagreements. In peace i let go of all attachments to arguments or desiring to be right. I ask the holy spirit to help me remain in and choose the path of peace always especially during arguments or disagreements. Forgive me for being combative or hostile to friends and loved ones. Lead me away from temptation into being defensive, offensive, argumentative, debating and clashing with others.
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