It’s Difficult to Be Good, But It Isn’t Easy Being Bad
Have you ever felt those times when it felt so difficult to be a good person? You want to scream back at the person who scolded you. You want to hurt the people who hurt you. You want to withhold your forgiveness and understanding. You felt like you just wanted to give up and not think about what’s right anymore. You were really tempted not to be good, but guess what? You didn’t cross over to the other side.
You held your tongue. You controlled your temper. And instead of cursing the one who hurt you, you gave your blessing and your forgiveness. Why did you do it? If it’s so hard to be good, why didn’t you decide to be bad?
Could it be that you were also able to see that being evil is also not as easy as it seems?
By being evil, you can finally unleash all your anger. You can hurt anybody you wish. You could even forget all about self-discipline and control and just surrender to every desire of your flesh. But what’s the catch? And at what cost?
Could it be that you realized even if you were able to do such things, you’d never really be happy? For where is happiness when your heart is filled with anger, or jealousy or greed? Where is happiness when you close your heart and not think about other people’s feelings when you hurt them?
Will you ever really feel good being bad?
The truth is, it’s never really that easy to be bad. It just looked easy because it’s so easy to give in and give up to negative energies and thoughts. But what happens after you give up? When you choose evil, it never really gets any better from there on.
Sometimes, it seems so difficult trying to be a good person. During such times, just remember that it really isn’t easy to be bad as well.
Check Jocelyn's books:
"Of Waves and Butterflies: Poems on Grief", "Mend My Broken Heart", "Questions to God", "To Love an Invisible God", "Defending My Catholic Faith", and more - click here.
(You may freely quote excerpts from this website as long as due credit is given to author Jocelyn Soriano and the website itakeoffthemask.com)
2 replies on “It’s Difficult to Be Good, But It Isn’t Easy Being Bad”
You pose good questions and I like the water it leads the horse to.
I got into a terrible conflict with a person at work. He claimed our project was going down the drain due to an ad hoc change I’d made, partially due to a misunderstanding between him and me. It was no problem whatsoever, merely a speed bump, but he kept claiming everything was going to hell, due to the minor change of plans. I had to fight off his negativity for months. I kept saying, ‘everything is fine’, he the opposite. The project did not fail! So he was proven wrong. Still he hated me. I could feel it in my guts. He wanted me dead and gone, even though everything was running beautifully. He still made negative remarks, probably because he was envious.
After the end of the ‘nuclear war’ I was fairly exhausted, and I felt polluted by his negativity. As of today I’m still working on regaining my stamina. He has lost face, and he knows it, and I’m a tad bitter that he made hell out of nothing for weeks and weeks.
There’s one thing I regret about that incident, I was maybe to focused on avoiding harsh words in the discussions we had. I treated him with way to much respect. Maybe I should have just told him to get a grip from the start. On one hand my positive focus helped save the project, but on the other hand my polite manners made him misinterpret me as… I don’t know, less strong than I really am. For me, the incident has raised many questions. There was war, and I kept acting civilized. Was I right to do that I wonder.