Do you want to live a freer, happier, more restful life? So do I. And one way I’m working toward that goal is by choosing to be unoffendable.
Unoffendable means just what it sounds like—an inability to be offended. And while I admit it’s humanly impossible to never be offended, it is possible for me to choose not to remain offended, or to hold those offenses over others.
Why is this a good idea? The benefits of choosing to be unoffendable include:
- Freeing my heart and soul from the weight of unforgiveness and bitterness
- Resigning my self-imposed duty to fix others
- Releasing the need to sit in judgement of everyone else’s rudeness, incorrect procedures, inefficiencies, misconceptions, mistakes, etc.
- Gaining the ability to stop taking other’s offensive behavior personally
- Promoting unity and peace instead of division, conflict, and criticism.
Where did this crazy idea of being unoffendable come from?
From the book Unoffendable: How Just One Change Can Make All of Life Better by Brant Hansen. The basic premise: Jesus calls us to choose forgiveness and mercy instead of judgement and retaliation, to choose love and unity instead of division and self-righteousness.
Here are some excerpts to further explain the concept.
We think we want a right to “righteous anger.” It takes a tremendous amount of humility, and extraordinary “dying to self” to hand over this desire, this job, this obsession, to God. But He made us, and He knows how we operate best. He says to hand it over. … He’s promising a release from the constant evaluation, never-ending striving, and relentless assessment of where we, and everyone else, stand.
Brant Hansen
Giving up our right to anger, will open us up to new dimensions of rest, grace, and simplicity. In denying ourselves, choosing humility over our right to be offended, we discover that—as Jesus promised—we gain life.
Brant Hansen
Jesus is giving us a completely different way to live, and it’s one that sets us free from anger, free from ever-present guilt, free to really love people, free from constant anxiety, and free to get a good night’s sleep.
Brant Hansen
I like that list of benefits, don’t you?
Three stress-reducing strategies from the book Unoffendable
Instead of looking for things to be offended at, look for things to be grateful for.
Instead of being shocked and offended by the commonplace realities of a fallen world, (injustice, unkindness, pain) why not choose to be delighted and surprised by scenes of beauty, kindness, and goodness?
War is not exceptional; peace is. Worry is not exceptional; trust is. Decay is not exceptional; restoration is. Anger is not exceptional; gratitude is. Selfishness is not exceptional; sacrifice is. Defensiveness is not exceptional; love is. And judgementalism is not exceptional; but grace is.
Brant Hansen
We see what we look for. Therefore, when we adjust our focus to look for the good stuff—such as peace, trust, restoration, gratitude, sacrifice, love, and grace—we will notice them more often. Which will enable us to be spend more time feeling grateful and blessed and less time feeling angry and offended.
Decide ahead of time to forgive offenses.
If you forgive others for the wrongs they do to you, your Father in heaven will forgive you. But if you don’t forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.
Matthew 6:14,15 CEV
We live in a fallen world. People will do and say things that offend us. We will get angry, hurt, of annoyed by their behavior. But what happens next is up to us.
A proven strategy for making good decisions in stressful situations is to decide ahead of time how you will act. Therefore, whenever we head into a stressful situation with difficult, offensive people, we can decide in advance that we will forgive them, no matter how obnoxious they are to us.
Quit being shocked when people don’t share your morality. Quit serving as judge and jury, in your own mind, of that person who just cut you off in traffic. … It’s all so exhausting.
Brant Hansen
When we choose in advance to forgive, it also reduces the power other’s offenses hold over us. If we don’t waste time ruminating over what they did to us then we aren’t stirring up our emotions as much. Thus, it’s easier to let go instead of taking it personally.
Opt for kindness over being right
We all have opinions about what is right vs. wrong, but we rarely agree on what “right” looks like. When my view differs from yours, we have potential conflict. Therefore, much conflict can be avoided by choosing to be kind instead of proving we are right.
Consider these facts:
- The Bible commands us to love others and warns us not to judge others.
- We are imperfect humans, not the omniscient God. We may be mistaken about who is right or wrong.
- Different cultures have different values which lead to different ideas about what is right or wrong. It’s arrogant to think our culture is better than another.
A better mindset:
We can stop focusing on who is right and look instead for how we can show love, foster unity, and build relationships. Even if we know we are right, we should ask ourselves “Does proving I am right help or hinder this relationship from growing?”
I don’t have to “win” because I know God is in control, and he loves those people.
Brant Hansen
Are you ready to release your “right” to be offended?
Just think how much better our highly divided society would be if more people chose to be unoffendable. Do you see how it promotes unity instead of division? Do you see how it makes your life freer, happier, and more peaceful?
Gratitude, forgiveness, and humility. These three heart attitudes are potent antidotes for allowing offenses to build up and weigh us down. I hope you resolve to adopt these three attitudes and begin your journey to becoming unoffendable.
