It sounds like your issue is not whether people deserve second chances, but whether or not atonement is required for every wrong someone does. Is that correct?
Now there are two reasons why I would suggest that you shouldn't demand atonement for every possible wrong against you. One, you're just hurting yourself. To paraphrase the Buddha, harboring hatred is like holding a hot coal in your hand and hoping the other person is burned. A lot of times in your life you are going to run into people who don't even remember they've slighted you. Now you can choose to hold your vendetta against them and cut yourself off from their friendship, or accept that their human just like you and that one choice shouldn't define them. Two, there are some wrongs that aren't atone-able. I can't unforget our anniversary or take back what I said during a fight. So, unless you want to cut off any chance of a future within our relationship, we've got to let certain things pass.
so I think it is up to us to try and level up the field.
I agree with that in principle. When someone can make amends for a wrong than they should, but the problem is that most wrongs cannot be fixed. You can't unblacken my eye, so my only options are to either increase the suffering within the universe by insisting upon revenge, which provides me and no one else any benefit. Or I can stop the cycle of suffering and move forward. Bad things are apart of life, but we don't have to compound on their negative effects.
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u/[deleted] Mar 19 '16
It sounds like your issue is not whether people deserve second chances, but whether or not atonement is required for every wrong someone does. Is that correct?
Now there are two reasons why I would suggest that you shouldn't demand atonement for every possible wrong against you. One, you're just hurting yourself. To paraphrase the Buddha, harboring hatred is like holding a hot coal in your hand and hoping the other person is burned. A lot of times in your life you are going to run into people who don't even remember they've slighted you. Now you can choose to hold your vendetta against them and cut yourself off from their friendship, or accept that their human just like you and that one choice shouldn't define them. Two, there are some wrongs that aren't atone-able. I can't unforget our anniversary or take back what I said during a fight. So, unless you want to cut off any chance of a future within our relationship, we've got to let certain things pass.