Don't let the world change your smile.

Over time we let the world make us less compassionate, more bitter. Going into the medical field it feels like an inevitable destination, not always the one we hope to reach and never the one we want to remain in.

The bitterness that built up was an accumulation of several things, realisations that-

1. Life isn’t fair. Good people get bad deals and bad people get good ones.
2. Life, Love and Death don't discriminate between sinners and saints. They come for all of us. Everyone has some kind of suffering, some pain that no one else can do anything about.
3. People aren't always as nice as you believe they should be. Sometimes "friends" aren't very friendly.
4. Not everyone will like you. And the ones that do sometimes won’t as well.
5. If you love people too much they can hurt you too much and it’s not always clear whether it’s worth it, even when you’ve been told it is. 
6. You won’t always understand why.
7. People enjoy labelling you because it helps them think they can understand you.

Bitterness grew as a defence mechanism so that I wouldn't feel down and out about every little hurt and every little pain I saw around me. It was also a selfish weapon so that i wouldn’t get offended at every slight and every remark. I told myself that what other people said didn’t matter because I was better than that, I knew who I was. But I didn’t realise that instead of wearing confidence, I’d put on pride. Things would  just ricochet off the shell but little by little by little it started to crack. Instead of building up my bitterness I should’ve been taking off my pride. Hard things like shells and glass don’t bend, they break; well and truly shatter. It’s nearly impossible to put them back together and when you try it just looks ugly.

Humpty dumpty sat on a wall, humpty dumpty had a great fall. All the kings horses and all the kings men couldn’t put hunpty together again.

Its human nature to become bitter, after seeing the bad in the world you become “jaded.” But this nature encourages the negative aspects of humanity and it tells us we don’t have to always be nice. It feels justified because the world all around us is being cruel and telling us that’s what we need to survive, to not get stepped on. 

I’d become a bad egg with a proud shell. It did not go well when I fell.

The world is harsh enough. We don’t want to make it even worse for the people we love, or the people that have gone, or the ones that will come. Everyone deserves a pleasant world, as far as we can go to make that happen even if it’s just changing yourself, your thoughts, words and actions. We’re all worlds inside worlds, creating the world outside us today.

But bitterness is hard to shake off once it's taken root and even when it’s out there's still a lot of work to be done to repair the holes and uneven surfaces it leaves behind.

Here are some things that helped me:

1. Recognise it. Look at your actions, your words and your thoughts. See if they are being fuelled by love for others or bitterness against others and the world.
2. Decide whether this is something you want to overcome. Like most things wanting to is half the work.
3. Find the root cause(s). For me it was pride; a self-pitying, moping and pointlessly pouting pride. I was too proud to look soft so I thought i had to become hard. Uproot each cause one by one, challenging them head on and facing all the discomfort and confronting realisations it brings about yourself.
4. Find a good, solid foundation. Jesus was mine. He did not change and his words always remained. Bitterness will not grow in a place that is created to nourish goodness, compassion and love. Matthew 7:17-18 Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt :tree bringeth forth evil fruit.18 A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Plant some good seeds there. I found some good seeds in the Bible; love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
5. Water them every day. Remember, a seed will just always be a seed until it’s given the right conditions to grow. This means reading God’s word every day. You need this like you need water. Psalm 42:1 As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God.
6. Let yourself be broken. The seed needs to break so it can grow into what it was intended to be. Let it grow till it consumes you and you overflow to everyone around you. 
7. Be fruitful. Let your actions speak louder than your words. 1 John 3:18 Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. Pray to be able to do this. It takes effort to go against the nature that pulls you to reject love and choose your own well being above others and your pride. Fight this nature through prayer, through God’s grace and through his strength, because his love for you encourages you to want to love others too.

- evieroo

NB: Godly advice - pray for those you feel bitter towards because anything that advantages them will be an answer to your prayer and God will change your heart towards them through this.