Why do people take revenge
Many books have been written about revenge, but how do the lives of characters who give themselves into the hands of the thirst for revenge ultimately end? As practice or the storyline of books and films shows, nothing good. But for some reason humanity does not notice this, viewing the film not as a lesson that it is better not to descend into revenge, but as a reason to take action.
Many psychologists believe that the desire for revenge arises after severe pain. Revenge is a way to make up for all the pain that was caused. Revenge is the ability to make another person feel the same thing only twice as much.
At the same time, psychologists say that when the desire for revenge arises, there is nothing bad or terrible about it. Often everything happens at the subconscious level, because any offended person wants to protect himself and show his “I”, proving, first of all, to himself that injustice is happening in his life. Difficulties begin when a person moves from thoughts to actions. This suggests that his psyche is out of balance and that he urgently needs to recover.
A dish served cold: a dangerous feeling of revenge
According to the avenger, the feeling of revenge and its implementation should lead to:
The triumph of justice.
That is, set a goal, achieve its implementation, prove to yourself and others that justice has been restored. But there is one “but” here: the desire for revenge will not go away, it will not disappear. That is, another event will occur, perhaps equally brightly negatively colored, but it will be exactly DIFFERENT.
Feeling of power.
An idea appears that everything can be changed, that you can influence another person or situation. But again, this is not an opportunity to change the past, but a modeling of a new situation.
Getting rid of heaviness.
But this, most likely, will not happen. Or it will be for a short period of time, a moment, a moment, a period. And difficult memories of the past will remain for a long time, perhaps forever.
And the most important thing is not even in the illusory feeling of solving the problem. And the fact is that when realizing the desire for revenge, a person spends his life, the time allotted to him, not on himself, not on becoming happier and living every moment with quality. And on others, on thoughts and thoughts about them.
Moreover, anger does not allow you to feel other, brighter, positive, constructive emotions. It destroys, violates mental and, ultimately, physical harmony. Leads to anxiety and fear. After all, a feeling of revenge, once it arises, can destroy everything positive for the rest of your life, turning into a constant search for means and tools of revenge. Ultimately - to the destruction of your own life.
Read more about How to control anger
It is still possible to cope with the desire for revenge
Build your own house or continue to destroy someone else's? It would seem that the answer is obvious. A heavy desire for revenge that interferes with positive thinking, feeling and living is unconstructive. But what to do with it, what to do and how to act?
It is necessary to impartially deal with your own messages and desires, to find out the true nature of revenge:
Do I want to prove that I'm right?
But to whom and why? Why prove something to someone who doesn’t need it and doesn’t take into account our feelings and desires from the very beginning. The best way out is to ignore such people, draw conclusions from their actions and have nothing in common with them in the present and future.
What will I experience?
Analyze what I will experience if I realize the feeling of revenge: gloating, satisfaction, joy? That is, the desire to cause another person suffering can bring pleasure? If you stop and understand this, you can gain much more morally, feeling less vulnerable and weak than someone who could not stop. And this is already a victory, a real one, and above all, over oneself, one’s weaknesses and fears. A strong person is invulnerable and protected by his confidence.
Revenge is insidious in its successful implementation.
What if you want to repeat it again and again? Then this instant strong (and negatively colored emotion) will cyclically, over and over again, destroy the personality, psyche, and, ultimately, life.
The psychology of revenge is very insidious. She masterfully disguises herself as such noble impulses as the desire for justice and restoration of a sense of dignity. In fact, according to the boomerang law, everything comes back. The message of anger will return with anger. Emptiness - emptiness. By stopping the vicious circle, moving away, ignoring and becoming higher, you can break this path to nowhere. And wake up happy, letting go of the problem, taking care of your own life, aiming for happiness. This is what is important and unconditional.
Reasons for revenge
- A sense of ownership. Many men and women forget that their significant other is not property. And if a partner begins to behave differently than expected, the desire for revenge takes over, because if you don’t like something about yourself, you want to eradicate it.
- The desire to restore justice is another clear reason for revenge, which actually makes no sense. After all, if this very injustice was noticed much earlier. Why wasn't it stopped then?
- Caring for others. Some vigilantes believe that this is their way of caring for the person who hurt them. By exposing the whole truth about him or his weaknesses, they try to do better for him and at the same time reassure themselves.
Vengefulness Vengeful Revenge
Vindictiveness as a personality quality is a tendency to deliberate, planned actions to respond with evil for evil, for grievances, troubles, death and illness, regardless of whether there is expediency in this.
In one village there was a herald, an angry, vindictive, irritable man who was at enmity with everyone. He oppressed the village and completely ruined it: he invented some kind of guilt, informed the Tatars, and they exacted a lot of silver from the inhabitants. But now his death hour has come. He called the whole village to him and said this: “In many ways I am guilty before you, and since you could not take revenge on me during my life, I conjure you with God: when I die, throw a rope around my neck, drag me out of the house and hang me on the wall.” tree. The residents succumbed to his trick and, when he died, did with him as he bequeathed. Some Tatar, seeing a herald hanging on a tree, went and said to the qadi: “They hanged our herald.” The Tatars sent their people to the village and exacted a huge tribute from the inhabitants. Everyone began to scold the herald: “He robbed us during life and after death he took revenge - he completely ruined us.”
Vengefulness is a chronic desire to return to the offender the pain and suffering experienced. Debt is repayable, and vindictiveness, coupled with unforgiveness, rancor, intransigence and a sense of retribution, prepares its own cold dish. A person who has been severely harmed is able to return to a normal state of mind either from unconditional forgiveness or from merciless retribution. Alien to spiritual education, vindictiveness without hesitation chooses the second. This is her nature, instinct and emotion. Being gloomy, angry and suspicious, she is ready to take revenge for any insult, real or imaginary. Vindictiveness justifies itself: “When you are deprived of everything you love, there is only one thing left to do - revenge.”
Vengefulness first manifests itself in the head, in imaginary scenes of revenge, and only then, having exhausted the whole soul and nerves, does it show its face in real life. She is insistent on resentment, anger and hatred. Vengefulness loses the power of its inertia where a person is able to understand and forgive, think about the future, begin to care, respect and love others. The great composer Schubert said: “If you want to enjoy a moment, take revenge; if you want to enjoy your whole life, forgive.”
Vindictiveness is not a one-time act of revenge; vindictiveness is a repeat offender of revenge. Taking revenge is harmful to health. A vengeful person devours himself, stops seeing the sun in the sky, becomes an embittered negativist, and loses the opportunity for personal growth.
The bee stung the bear on the forehead.
She wanted to take revenge on the offender for the honeycomb;
But what? She died herself, having lost her sting.
What is the destiny of one who seeks revenge? - Coffin.
When a person shows vindictiveness, curious metamorphoses occur in his body. First, an attack of indignation begins, similar to an internal nuclear explosion caused by resentment, envy or jealousy. Pride hurt. The false ego sends painful signals to the mind, feelings and intelligence. A devilish fire flares up inside a person. Thoughts of revenge appear. Man is no longer his own master, being completely dependent on his own vindictiveness.
Vengeance is weak. It’s not for nothing that people say: “The strong forgive, the weak take revenge.” Only a spiritually exhausted person can constantly be in revenge mode. Strength lies in indifference; it will either forgive or simply ignore the offender.
One of Napoleon's soldiers committed a crime and was sentenced to death. On the eve of the execution, the soldier’s mother came to Napoleon to pray that he would forgive her son. “Madam,” said Napoleon, “your son’s act is not subject to pardon.” “I know,” answered the mother. “If such an act could be pardoned, I would not ask for forgiveness.” To forgive means to be able to go beyond revenge and justice. After listening to her, Napoleon canceled the death sentence and replaced it with exile.
Vengeance is the reaction of a painful and overly inflated ego, unable to forgive and intolerant of other people’s behavior, to sometimes far-fetched irritants. Being a clear form of pride, vindictiveness does not recognize the right of others to be different. Having endowed another person with far-fetched virtues, she is offended when he does not behave the way she would like. The exit of another from the zone of her control becomes a reason first for resentment, and then for hatred, anger and revenge. Vindictiveness is inherent in insecure and dissatisfied people. Through vindictiveness, they try to prove to themselves and the world their own importance and significance. Often the cause of vindictiveness is banal envy or jealousy. This is a particularly difficult case, because the objects of envy and jealousy are constantly changing, but the vindictive person remains in a static position.
Vindictiveness does not bother itself with analyzing whether the insult, insult or trouble caused is really so large-scale that it is necessary to make the thought of revenge dominant. She does not even look into the future, what the result of her revenge will be, whether she will receive satisfaction from revenge or will suffer more than before, whether the offender will repent of his indecency or will become even more embittered.
Vindictiveness has no statute of limitations and does not accept outside services. One day Khoja Nasreddin had a strong quarrel with his neighbor and cried out: “I curse you!” May you fall in 40 days and may you break your leg! The neighbor was heading home and suddenly fell so badly that he broke his leg. They carried him home and put him to bed. Writhing in pain, he asked his family to go to Nasreddin and beg him to come to him. Nasreddin has arrived. “Forgive me,” said the neighbor. “I didn’t know your curse was so powerful.” “My curse has nothing to do with this,” Nasreddin answered with dignity. “You broke your leg yourself, on the same day, without any curse.” Remember when I said, “In 40 days”? So, in 40 days, my curse will take effect, and you will break your other leg. With these words Nasreddin left.
Vengefulness is often called a disease, because a person who has fallen under its influence, like an obsessed person, thinks only about revenge. It is also very similar to falling in love with a minus sign. The same dependence, one dominant thought about the object of one’s passion, obsession.
Vengeance is unusually inventive in unexpected cunning tricks and dirty tricks. Take, for example, this case. After the divorce, the husband gave his now ex-wife one day to leave the house given to him by his parents. Having packed her belongings, she gave herself a farewell dinner with shrimp, black caviar, and a bottle of champagne. After lunch, I took a few shrimp tails, dipped them in caviar, and stuck them in the curtain rods. The husband and his new girlfriend were just happy for the first few days, but soon the whole house began to stink. They tried everything they could, spent a lot of money to get rid of the smell, but nothing helped. Then they decided to sell this smelly house and move to another. A month passed, but there were no people willing to fork out money for the stinking house. I had to take a tidy sum from the bank to buy a new house without selling the old one. My ex-wife called about a month later to find out how things were going. He told her about the problems with selling the house, without going into too much detail. She said she missed her old house terribly and would like to buy it. The man quickly agreed to the price, which was a tenth of the cost of the house. A week later, a happy man stood and grinned as the movers packed his things to move them to his new home... Everything, including curtain rods...
Often vindictiveness itself falls into its own networks. — Nina Pavlovna, remember, last year you gave me a C in strength of strength? I have been hatching my revenge for a long time and now I can tell you that yesterday I seduced your husband! - My girl. Sweetie. You won’t believe it, but 25 years ago I also gave a C to one student. And also according to strength of materials. And she, too, carried out her revenge for a long time. It was your mother.
Petr Kovalev Other articles by the author: https://www.podskazki.info/karta-statej/
Who does revenge harm?
But it turns out that there is nothing good in revenge, and not at all because everything can come back like a boomerang. Psychologists believe that karma is of no use here, and revenge is not worth taking for completely different reasons.
A person who desires revenge completely fills himself with this feeling. At some point, he simply begins to live in the past, not noticing either the present or the future. Of course, such a process only begins to aggravate his psychological state and often against this background he goes crazy or develops physiological diseases.
In addition, after revenge it does not become easier and the desired feeling of satisfaction does not occur. Often the offender experiences even greater pain and even a feeling of guilt for ruining a person’s life because of his negative emotions, even if he was a traitor.
In fact, the ability to overcome the pain that was caused lies in the ability to forgive someone who could stoop to such a level. Just forgive and let him go, never letting him into your life again. And who knows, perhaps at this very moment the boomerang will fly towards the offender.
Bye everyone. Best regards, Vyacheslav.
Code of Revenge
Blood feud is most common in the North Caucasus, Albania and the island of Sicily. It is believed that a vendetta declared on members of one family (teip or clan) is a “sword of Damocles” that will hang over the killer’s family until justice is done. There are known cases when bloodlines took revenge on offenders after decades. “This incident occurred in 1982 in Urus-Martan. In a state farm field, 16-year-old Ali shot an elderly man who was weeding corn, Musa Khadisov, a former prosecutor of the Urus-Martan district of Chechnya, told NI. “When he was arrested, Ali said that fifty years ago his grandfather was killed in a quarrel. Then Ali's family declared blood feud on the killer's family. From birth, the boy knew that he had bloodlines. And so Ali grew up, graduated from school, tracked down the son of his grandfather’s killer and shot him.” Musa Khadisov says that in his prosecutorial practice he often encountered blood feuds. “Only sons on the paternal side are bloodlines. If there are several brothers in the affected family, then, as a rule, the execution of the vendetta is entrusted to the younger brother. There was a case when the elder brother accidentally met a bloodline and killed him. The younger brother took the blame for this crime,” Khadisov recalls. Machine instead of murder
However, if a blood feud is declared, this does not mean at all that it will definitely come true.
In most cases, reconciliation is possible. In Soviet times, there were special commissions in the district executive committees that tried to reconcile warring families and prevent blood feuds from occurring. These commissions included authoritative people: elders, a prosecutor, a police chief, and a mullah. “I was a member of one of these commissions,” recalls Musa Khadisov. “We called the bloodlines and talked with them. It happened that they refused blood feud. They were encouraged for this: they were given cars out of turn, allocated land plots, and could be promoted.” As a rule, blood feud is not declared for accidental, unintentional killings. The person at fault in a traffic accident that results in the death of a person usually does not become a blood relative of the injured party. “A month ago, my nephew became the culprit of a serious accident,” Umar Dzhavtaev, head of the Khasavyurt (Dagestan) organization “Alternative to Violence,” told NI. - Two brothers were injured. One died and the other survived. My nephew behaved with dignity - he did not hide, he took the victims to the hospital. Our relatives came to ask for forgiveness from the family of the victims, and they forgave us.” The reconciliation procedure takes place in several stages. First, negotiators come to the injured party’s house. If they agree to forgive the killer, one of his family members is allowed to attend the funeral and wake. And only then, after some time, reconciliation itself occurs. It happened that the “blood member” who committed the murder was brought by relatives on a funeral stretcher, wrapped in a shroud. During the “forgiveness of blood,” one of the close relatives of the murdered person performed the ritual of shaving the head and beard of the bloodline. This was a sign of great trust. “I will never forget how a man came to our house to ask for forgiveness, who accidentally hit my five-year-old brother with a car, who rode out onto the roadway on a bicycle,” Magomed Alkhazurov, a resident of Chechnya, told NI. - He was unshaven. In a long robe, with a hood on his head. The face is covered. We three brothers stood in front of him and looked into his eyes. When the head of the republican reconciliation commission, Batu-Khadzhi from Gekhi, a well-known person in Chechnya, said that we must forgive the murderer of our brother and his entire family, we forgave him.” Umar Dzhavtaev tells another case: “In one Chechen village, a man was killed with a knife in the back. He had six brothers left, and they did not want to forgive the killer. Then we invited the elders from this family to a mawlid (religious ceremony) in another village. The killer's relatives also arrived there. There they discussed the reconciliation procedure. However, the blood feud was abolished only two years later.” Be your own judge
Experts say that crimes are usually committed out of revenge in those states where the population does not trust the law enforcement and judicial system.
“There is a known case when one family of Kosovo Albanians took revenge on another for 400 years,” Sergei Enikolopov, head of the Mental Health Center of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences, explained to NI. – People do not believe that their offenders will be punished. When law enforcement agencies play by their own rules, which, according to citizens, are far from the law, then archaic traditions take over in society. However, the avengers will be very offended if you tell them that they are committing lynching. They are confident that when they kill the offender, they are acting justly.” In 2000, in one of the districts of Moscow, a young woman killed her stepfather out of revenge: he put her fiancé in prison. Investigator Andrei Kotov says: “Natalya Prokhorova lived with her mother and stepfather in a communal apartment. I met a guy who already had a criminal record. My stepfather didn’t like his future son-in-law for some reason. He wrote a statement to the police and accused him of hooliganism. The guy was jailed. Natalya harbored a grudge against her stepfather. She decided to take revenge on him and stabbed him with a knife. During interrogation, she admitted that she committed this murder out of revenge. She was given a suspended sentence, admitting that she acted in a state of passion. When sentencing, the court also took into account the fact that she had a small child.” In several articles of the Russian Criminal Code, revenge appears as a crime. Article 105 (“murder”) mentions blood feud. Article 63 recognizes “revenge” as an aggravating circumstance. Criminologist Yakov Gilinsky tells NI that in some cases the court may consider the motive of revenge a mitigating circumstance: “This applies to crimes committed in a state of passion caused by violence or bullying on the part of the victim.” “I investigated several murders when the motive was revenge,” recalls former investigator and now lawyer Vladimir Volkov. – It was in Perm. The middle-aged actress took revenge on her husband because he cheated on her and then talked about his mistresses. She doused him with gasoline and set him on fire. There was also a case of revenge murder in a maximum security colony in Solikamsk. One of the convicts killed another, who had only a month left to serve. As it turned out at the trial, the killer wanted to punish his cellmate for informing the colony administration.” “Many people settle scores with each other in the career game; sometimes behind revenge there are childhood grievances. Maniacs, raping women, as a rule, take revenge on the mother, the first girl, explains psychologist Sergei Enikolopov. “In any case, revenge is always a decisive action caused by resentment.” Don't call it ugly
The theme of retribution, as a motive for crimes, has always attracted writers. The most famous “avenger” in classical literature is rightfully considered the hero of Alexandre Dumas, the Count of Monte Cristo. While in prison, for years he hatched revenge on his former friends who put him behind bars. Having escaped from the impregnable castle of Yves, the hero Dumas carried out his plan. The author of detective novels, Alexandra Marinina, believes that in modern Russia it is rare to find the “Counts of Monte Cristo”, capable of developing scenarios of retribution for years. “Revenge is really interesting to write about. But what counts as revenge? - asks the writer. - Can an insult for which you are ready to immediately take revenge be considered revenge? As for “forsaken revenge,” the one that is “served cold,” such cases are extremely rare. People who are capable of such crimes have an intelligence in which they cope with their feelings in other ways.” The story that shocked the city of Shakhty in the Rostov region a month and a half ago proves the opposite: “cold avengers” still exist in Russia. A 68-year-old pensioner killed her school friend. She beat it with a hammer, then dismembered the corpse and took it out of the house in parts. Having come to the conclusion that it was Anna Ivanovna (name changed - “NI”) who was guilty of the murder, the detectives came to her home. The pensioner admitted that she killed her peer because she called her ugly many years ago. For premeditated murder, Anna Ivanovna faces from 6 to 15 years in prison.
HIT ON THE RIGHT CHEEK, SUPPLY YOUR LEFT
As you know, there are few saints on our mortal earth, a few people for two and a half centuries. But every person has an unconscious, and even if it seems to him that he has long forgiven the offender, the unconscious is looking for an option for revenge. And then - bam! - you’re all so good, you’ve forgiven everyone everything and don’t get offended, but out of the blue you express yourself in an offensive manner or, as if by accident, do a little nasty thing, and then you’re surprised at how justice cleverly triumphed! This is not justice, which, as you know, is always subjective; it is you who took revenge with your own (or someone else’s) hands and did not even notice it. And those who say: “I have forgiven and forgotten!” - they blatantly lie to themselves and others, because if resentment could arise, then it is hidden and cannot be covered with forgiveness, like a pile of manure with roses.
Forgiveness, or more precisely, forgiveness, arises when, looking into a person’s eyes, you understand that, in fact, you have nothing to say, not because there are no words, but because you don’t want to say anything! As in the film “Moscow Doesn’t Believe in Tears,” Katerina says to Rodion: “I’ve been rehearsing our meeting with you for so many years, I imagined everything and imagined that I would tell you what it would look like, but now there’s nothing even to say!”
From a psychological point of view, this phenomenon is explained by the fact that our conflict, as a rule, occurs not with the person himself, but with his projection, that is, with our idea of him. And when we see living eyes, we open our mouths to say something - then all the insidious plans either disappear, or we are released because we simply got the opportunity to speak out.
In films, the main characters always speak out before taking revenge and let the other person speak out. And they do what they planned after communication only because, according to the law of the genre, a peaceful separation of the parties would look somehow strange.
There are, of course, very principled people for whom doing what is planned, even if it is not relevant, is also a guarantee of internal integrity, but this is rare. These people, as a rule, are very unhappy in life, because they forget its main law - it is not a person who exists for the principle, but the principle for him, so it can always be changed.
ECO-FRIENDLY REVENGE
It happens when we do not have the opportunity to talk to a living offender. For creative individuals, this method is suitable: write a story in which the main character takes revenge in all colors on his offender. Gestalt therapists suggest putting a chair in front of you, imagining the offender on it, telling him everything and kicking him in the face. You can do with this chair or with any object what you would like to do to restore justice. You can simply describe the situation as it was, but at the end remember the cherished “if only...” and write the ending the way you would like. Sublimated resentment can lead you to the creation of Facebook, like Mark Zuckerberg, or to a complete collapse in life, it depends on your talents and luck.
The most unecological revenge is to seek allies against your offender. At the same time, your inner anger will increase, and you will feel even more like a victim in this unfair life. And such a position has a negative impact on self-esteem and subsequent life choices; the victim will always find an executioner.
