A monk once said:
“Imagine being bitten by a snake, and instead of focusing on healing from the poison, you chase the snake to understand why it bit you and to prove that you didn’t deserve it.”
It sounds absurd when you picture it. Someone bleeding, venom spreading through their veins — yet sprinting after the snake demanding answers.
But emotionally?
We do this all the time.
The Instinct to Chase
When someone hurts us, our first instinct isn’t healing — it’s understanding.
Why did they do that?
What did I do wrong?
Don’t they see I didn’t deserve it?
We replay conversations. We craft imaginary arguments in the shower. We rehearse explanations we’ll never deliver. We scroll back through old messages looking for clues like detectives trying to solve a crime.
The ego hates injustice. It wants clarity. It wants validation. It wants to be declared innocent.
But in the pursuit of being right, we stay wounded.
The Real Poison
The bite hurts. That part is real.
But the poison? That’s the rumination.
That’s the resentment.
That’s the constant mental replay.
Pain is an event.
Suffering is repetition.
Every time you relive what happened, your body reacts as if it’s happening again. The venom circulates. Your nervous system stays on alert. Your mind becomes a courtroom with no verdict.
You can’t heal while you’re still chasing the snake.
People at War With Themselves
Here’s the part that changes everything:
People wound you because they are at war with themselves and call you the enemy.
Sometimes the bite wasn’t about you at all.
It was their insecurity.
Their unresolved trauma.
Their fear of abandonment.
Their need for control.
When someone is fighting internal battles they refuse to face, it’s easier to project than to self-reflect. You become the target not because you deserved it — but because you were available.
Understanding this doesn’t excuse behavior.
But it frees you from internalizing it.
Their chaos is not your identity.
Healing Is an Internal Decision
At some point, the question must shift from:
“Why did they?”
to
“How do I recover?”
Healing begins when your focus returns to your body, your peace, your breath. It looks like boundaries. It looks like silence. It looks like choosing not to explain yourself for the tenth time.
Closure doesn’t always come from conversation.
Sometimes it comes from acceptance.
You may never get the apology.
You may never get the explanation.
You may never get the justice your ego craves.
But you can get your energy back.
The Quiet Power of Letting Go
Letting go isn’t weakness.
It’s strategy.
It’s recognizing that chasing the snake keeps you in survival mode. It’s choosing to remove the venom instead of escalating the hunt.
Forgiveness doesn’t mean access.
Understanding doesn’t mean reconnection.
Compassion doesn’t mean tolerance.
You can wish someone well — from a distance.
You don’t heal by proving you didn’t deserve the bite.
You heal by tending to the wound.
And sometimes the most powerful thing you can do…
is stop running.
TheSpiritualExplorer 