Thinking about hate today...

The above-referenced quote was taken from Star Trek: Voyager, and it came on the heels of Commander Chakotay being brain-washed into hating a group that had never done him any harm. Because of how he was trained, he had a hard time overcoming the hate even once he realized they weren't his enemy.

When you're trained to hate, it's difficult to retrain your brain. It takes effort, but you have to want to make that effort. It's an investment of time and learning, of realizing that hating someone because they're different only makes you an angry and bitter person. 

There are many people in this world whose ideologies I don't agree with, but I don't hate those people There are many people who seem to be angry all the time and hurl insults at random on social media, but I don't hate those people. Because I'm not going to hate anyone. As Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear." 

I don't want to walk around with hate in my heart. Why should I? It weighs much too heavily on my soul. I know because I've done it in the past. Now, I refuse to hate. I may not agree with someone. I may not like what they're saying. I may disagree with their politics, their religion, and their beliefs, but I don't have to hate them for it. 

Maybe I'm wearing rose-colored glasses, but I like to believe that over time, more people will realize that the vitriol they're spouting, the names they're calling people whose opinions differ from their own, and the attacks they are making are senseless. No one's life has ever been improved by hate, but it has been improved by love.