The Worst Form of Murder

I believe that self-protection is the worst form of murder.

• Isolation
• Aggression
• Manipulation
• Unwillingness to be wrong
• Unwillingness to be right
• Silence
• Wearing a mask that says "everything is okay"
• Avoidance 
• Abuse
• Perpetual analysis
• Being extremely "clingy"
• Being passive
• Lack of repentance 
• A lack of boundaries
• Too many boundaries that amount to walls
• Giving in all the time
• Never giving in
• Comparing one to another
• Critical spirit
• A constant desire for control
• An unwillingness to hear the other person's heart
• An unwillingness to forgive
• Rarely listening (ignoring or thinking about what to say next instead of listening)
• Rarely speaking up
• Complaining all the time
• Being on guard all the time

There are so many others, but these are big ones.  In each of these forms of self-protection, we raise up an invisible wall that prevents intimacy.  A marriage, family, or friendship that exists under any or a number of these types of self-protection turns into an utter and unwarranted type of loneliness over time.

This type of loneliness is a kind of death.  I believe it is the worst form of murder because it is so deceptive.  The perpetrator hasn't physically killed another, but he or she has emotionally murdered the other.  It is so subtle, but it is so devastating.  Sometimes the perpetrator and/or victim aren't even aware of doing these things and sometimes they are.  Often the perpetrator and the victim are interchangeable and harm one another.  No matter the pattern, these forms of self-protection essentially turn perpetrators and victims into a walking dead persons.