You might never get your revenge

This post is for everyone who is pissed off because they got fucked over. Yeah, you. Still deep in the anger phase. Read carefully if you ever want to get out.

It doesn't matter who did you wrong, but seeing as this is TRP, it was most likely some girl who you're angry at for whatever reason. Maybe, like me, it was your wife who cheated on you, raped your bank account and deserted you. Maybe you were deployed, and when you returned stateside your woman wasn't there any more. Maybe you were trying to fuck some girl but a better man got to her first.

But it doesn't have to be about a girl. Maybe your parents, who are supposed to love you and care for you, weren't there for you. Hell, maybe some fuckface stole money from you and there's no way you can get it back.

There are a million different ways you can get fucked over, and not all of them are TRP related. But the key in relation to this post is this - someone did you wrong, and it seems like there's nothing you can do to get even. As a result, you probably feel a seething hatred for someone based on their mistreatment of you, and the fact that - short of breaking the law - there's nothing you can do.

The desire for revenge is powerful and innate. For men in particular, our sense of honor and justice can lead to an almost unstoppable explosion of moral outrage and righteous indignation. Problem is, in the vast majority of cases there's not really any satisfying or appropriate way to deal revenge to your enemies without making your own life worse in the process. At best, you'll just invoke more retaliation from either your target themselves, or the targets friends and family. At worst, you'll get yourself a criminal record or incarcerated.

If you go looking for advice as to how to deal with this sense of incredible anger mixed with total helplessness, common wisdom (read: bullshit) will placate you with sayings like "the best revenge is a life well lived" or "cheaters never prosper" or "what goes around comes around" or "you reap what you sow" or any of the hundreds of idiotic image macros that you can find anywhere like: This or this or this.

Even here at TRP, many of us like to rely on the concept of The Wall as a device to ensure that those dumb young sluts who treated us wrong or refused to be our perfect unicorn girlfriend will eventually get theirs. Eventually, she'll hit the wall, be too ugly to lock down a man, and die lonely and uphappy! Hah! Suck on that, bitch! Who's laughing now? HAHAHA!

The problem with this is that its total bullshit, because you know what? A lot of those people who fucked you over - in fact, maybe all of them - are going to go on living relatively happy lives. They'll never be punished by God for their sins against you. They won't suffer because of the injustices they committed against you. That money the dude stole off you? He spent it on a really cool watch that he likes. He loves that watch, and you'll never get your money back, and he'll never be punished. That girl who cheated on you? She cosied up to a tolerable beta male, got the ring, had 3 kids and lived a relatively happy life, dying of old age surrounded by her grandkids. On her deathbed, she thanked the Lord for her blessed life. She doesn't even remember you.

The point of the post is this: if you have this idea that the people who fucked you over owe you something, or that they will "get theirs", or that justice will be served - you are falling victim to what is known as the "Just-world fallacy".. From Wikipedia:

The just world fallacy is the assumption that all noble actions are eventually rewarded and all evil actions eventually punished, and that there is a universal force that restores moral balance.

Knock knock, Neo. Life is not fair and the just world fallacy is just that - a fallacy. Sure, you got scorned. Someone did you wrong. But if you're hell bent on being angry and seeking revenge, you're only hurting yourself. If the only way that you can sleep at night is to dream of the comeuppance that will oh-so-surely be justly delivered to the object of your anger, you are going to die disappointed because its very often the case that cheaters do prosper and what goes around does not, in fact, come around.

The key is to focus your energy on learning how to just walk it off. By all means, take whatever action you can to right the wrong. I'm not suggesting you just always "turn the other cheek" like you're some kind of modern day Jesus, in fact I think that's a good way to have people walk all over you and make you miserable. I'm saying that when all avenues are exhausted, and there's nothing else you can do to right the wrong, or when righting the wrong is going to cause you more harm than good, you need to learn how to just suck it up, shrug your shoulders and walk away.

Seething with anger and dreaming of righteous comeuppance is extremely unhealthy and totally pointless. If you find yourself doing this often, you need to let it go for your own sake because the odds are that nothing bad is going to happen to those who have wronged you, and you're only hurting yourself. Especially seeing as you're focussing all your energy on what the other person did wrong at the expense of trying to focus inward to explore how you can become a better version of yourself, which is the path that leads to true satisfaction.

Yes, you got fucked over, no, it wasn't fair, and yes, she's a fucking bitch. That's it - that's as much satisfaction as the world is ever going to give to you. So get over it.