I remember my friend and I decided to reason with the guys who molested the girl. And when the police came to the noise, they found me in a torn wardrobe with clear evidence of a violation of law and order. One. I could hardly explain the nobility of our intentions already at the police station …
In other words, it happens that friends let us down, deceive us, or even betray us. In such situations, as most often it seems, three options are possible. First: put an end to this person. The action is logical. Another thing is that the number of close people is measured out to us for this life rather sparingly. With such maximalism, one can be left depressingly alone early. But this is one of those considerations that usually come with a delay.
The second option: to educate a person for some time with resentment and a demonstration of non-communication. That is, by their own efforts, to irrigate and grow in him a sense of guilt, pushing him to apologies. At the same time, we forget that the feeling of guilt lives in him and against our will, and apologies, on the contrary, may not be entirely sincere. But still, this method sometimes helps in that it calms our pride and makes it possible to continue the relationship.
A person has all the possibilities: he was stupid, he became smart … this is his greatness. and therefore cannot be judged
Finally, the third option is to forgive. This is the hardest thing to do. Here we act either super-generously, or rationally (believing that it would be more expensive to stay without this friend), or following the cynical opinion that man is not the best invention of nature at all, everyone is like that, and you yourself are no better, and why bother bottle…
I just remembered: when one of my acquaintances “reported” to Alexander Blok that his friend had acted badly in some case, the poet dryly replied: “This is just a fact.” Thus, he made it clear that a person is not reduced to an act and that he knows more about this friend than the rest, knows the best in him and believes in him. If in such cases you do not think first of all about yourself, this faith itself can be saving for a loved one.
Not so long ago, in the Diaries of Leo Tolstoy, I found another interpretation of this issue. (The current fashionable opinion that a book does not educate is actually quite stupid. Even as it sometimes educates.) Here is the judgment of the old count, which I personally thought about: “One of the most common delusions is to consider people good, evil, stupid , smart. A person flows, and there are all possibilities in him: he was stupid, he became smart, he was angry, he became kind and vice versa.
This is the greatness of man. And you can’t judge a person from that. What? You condemned, and he is already different. You can’t even say I don’t like it. You said it’s different.» By the way, we did not part with my friend then. Which of the motives was the main one in my behavior, now I don’t remember.