Stop hating your ex || Acharya Prashant, at Delhi University (2023)
Questioner (Q): Hello Sir! My question is how to stop hating someone? I had a friend who deceived me in the past, but then after some time we made it up. But then the things keep on haunting me—like how he deceived me. So, can you please guide me on how to stop hating someone?
Acharya Prashant (AP): See, the wise once have told us that the mind is a very sacred place and deserves to be kept very clean. Do not put things in the mind that do not deserve to be there. So, they would say: man mandir —the mind should be treated like a temple. And you keep only sacred ones in the temple, right? And you want to keep the temple very, very clean, correct?
Now, tell me, what do you do when you hate someone? When you hate someone, do you forget them, or do you remember them all the more? When you hate someone, do you forget them, or do you get deeper into their memory? Deeper! So, the one that you are hating, in a very perverse way, very indirect way, but in a very real way, you have made them your God. Only God deserves to be in the temple, right? But see who you have put in the temple? Someone you hate, means someone who is pretty unworthy, correct? The best act of hatred, real hatred, pure hatred, would lie in forgiving and forgetting.
If you are still hating someone, it means you still have a very strong relationship. Such a strong relationship, you are preserving that person in your mind. Is that hate? No, that's worship. Why are you worshipping that person? I will tell you why we are worshipping that person—because we have nothing better to keep in the mind.
There was a level of mind that associated with that person, right? There was a level of mind that associated with that person. That person might have gone away, but my level of mind is still the same. I had this level of mind, right? Level of consciousness, and I got into a relationship, correct? Now there is a breakup, the person is gone; but my level of consciousness is still the same. So, what am I doing? I am still associating with that same person because my level is the same.
Why had the relationship developed in the first place? Because my level was this, and equal was the level of that person. Now that person is gone, but the level is the same. So, this (low level of consciousness) will still keep that relationship—not with that person, but with his memories. The only way to get rid of the relationship absolutely is by raising your game—raise the level of your consciousness. That person was at this level, his memories too are at this level; and if you stay at this level, then the relationship will stay the same.
Earlier you were able to touch, let's say, his shoulder; now you are able to touch his shoulder in imagination. Earlier you were touching him to embrace him; now you are touching him to hit him, in hatred. But still, you are touching him. What has changed? Probably the objective itself is to still keep in touch, but you cannot admit to embrace him, right? So, you touch him in the garb of hitting him. “Oh! No, no. Not that I want to touch you, it's just that I am slapping you.” It’s just that you are drawing some kind of hidden pleasure even in the slap. “You know, I slapped him, and I got to touch him.” You understand the word 'touch' here? I am using it as a metaphor. Do not take the word touch literally.
Only way to get rid of all these things is by raising your game. Do not remain the same person who got into the relationship. As long as you remain inwardly the same person who got into the relationship, it will never be possible for you to truly break up; that person will haunt you. Worse still, somebody just like that old person will freshly enter your life. You will think that the person is a new one. Yes, the name will be new, the face will be new; but the person will be old. You will think that the old relationship is gone and now you have a new person to be with. It will still be the old person—with a new face, and a new name, and a new body. What will be the ‘new result’ of this ‘new relationship’? The ‘old breakup’ and the ‘old suffering’. You want to get into that same suffering again? Do you?
Raise yourself, lift yourself up. Lift yourself up, do not remain the same person. You deserve to be better, and you deserve somebody better. We all deserve to be better, right? We all deserve to be better. The one you are with, even he deserves somebody better. So, be better.
