"Come
to me all you who are tired and I will give you rest." What does this mean? Will
God give us rest by solving all our problems, by removing all those people who
hurt us or those who are thorns in our lives?
The answer is simple. No. But then he will help us carry our burden. He
will help us cope with the problems we face and deal with those people who are
difficult and irritating.
I chanced upon a sitcom rerun of "Hot in Cleveland" the other
night while trying to break my jetlag. Elka and her writing partner Mamie have
to come up with a radio play- “Gone with the Wind.” Elka suggests:”Let’s make Scarlet O Hara and
Rhet Butler vampires….” Mamie replies: ”But
there are no vampires in Georgia or Atlanta.They’re not real. “ Elka:”I know, but nowadays, everything goes
better with vampires.”
Real
vampires may not exist. But in our everyday life there exists bloodsuckers too -
really difficult people who are like vampires… creatures that the suck the joy
and life out of us. They affect our emotions negatively. When we are around them we feel ourselves
weakening…. Losing life… losing strength. And sometimes how we pray that these
persons were not in our lives. These are the persons a famous psychologist Albert
Bernstein talked about in his book Emotional Vampires. They’re not real
vampires, but they are RDP’s - really difficult people. But just be careful- vampires
are hard to tell, who knows we could be one too without knowing.
How
to spot vampires or the really difficult persons in our life?
1)
Vampires suck blood of their victims.
Really difficult people suck your joy, your energy, your peace, your time, and
attention.
2)
Vampires cannot see their own reflection
in the mirror. Really difficult
people don’t know they are that way. They think they’re right and everyone is
wrong. They think they’re an angel surrounded by us demons.. Why? Because they
cannot see their own weaknesses… they cannot see their blind spots. They think
it’s alright to irritate us because they have the right to do so.
3)
Vampires bite victims and turn them into
vampires. If you allow a really difficult
person to control you, you could become a difficult person yourself. Psychologically,
we know that an adult victim who was abused or victimised as a child will be
inclined to perpetuate the same abuse with their own children. This is because
of a principle known as "identification with the aggressor or
victim-victimizer" To protect himself, the abused individual unconsciously
identifies with his victimizer and so seeks to overcome the feeling of being
abused. So you must not get into the vampire cycle of the really difficult
person.
4)
Vampires are burned by sunlight. Really Difficult persons are burned by the
sunlight of truth.They cringe in the presence of accountability because they
know that if they allow truth to enter their lives, the vampire in them will
die.
Now
in the movies, you would want to destroy these vampires, but in real life,
there’s another way – we could transform these vampires or these really
difficult persons into beautiful godly creatures….
Here’s how. First step, the gospel of today.
“Take
my yoke upon you and learn from me. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is
light.”
Jesus
was referring to a double yoke. This
yoke is used to harness a pair of animals like an oxen so that they can drag a
load together as efficiently as possible. The secret is the weaker animal gains
the strength of the stronger one with which it is yoked with. Russell M. Nelson
says:
“You
come unto Christ to be yoked with Him and with His power, so that you’re not
pulling life’s load alone. You’re pulling life’s load yoked with the Savior and
Redeemer of the world, and suddenly your problems, no matter how serious they
are, become lighter.”
When
we take the yoke, we pair with Jesus. With him, the burden, the problems, the
vampires, the work of ploughing the field called life do not disappear… but
with him, the load, the problems, the vampires become easier to face.
Now
for the next and more important step. Let’s leave that for next week.
References:
Bernstein, Albert. Emotional Vampires: Dealing with People Who Drain You Dry, Revised and Expanded 2nd Edition, McGraw Hill, 2012.
Sanchez, Bo. How to deal with Difficult People, Quezon City, 2014.