Thanks.

Thinking back, I had one girlfriend who did a lot of really rotten things to me for a few years. I could stew about that all the time, feed those vengeful feelings, review it all in my mind and grind my teeth, throw more fuel on the fire....or...I could just choose to think instead about other people that I love and am very happy with. ;-) And when I've got my wits about me, I choose the latter...and that's most of the time.

gnu, it's mostly just a question of what you choose to focus most of your attention on. A bully is really only a problem when he is presently bullying you or is likely to do so in the near future. If he's back in your past somewhere, he's not a problem any longer (not for you, anyway)...unless you just can't stop thinking about him. If so, your habit of compulsively thinking about him is the problem.

We are as we think, correct? I mean, that's the emotional reality we keep experiencing moment to moment...every waking moment of our lives.

I have had the thought occur to me that the kids who bullied me in school may have done so because they were having a bad time at home with their dad and they felt powerless...or for any variety of reasons unbeknownst to me. That doesn't mean that they should be excused for bullying other people, but it gives me some degree of insight into the possible reasons that they became bullies. A bully is someone who's afraid. He's angry. He's afraid of not being taken seriously. He's afraid of not being respected. He's afraid of being seen as weak or powerless. Being not too wise yet, he seeks a dumb short cut to achieving respect and power...he picks on those who seem vulnerable. He is to be pitied for not having a better understanding of how to solve his self-confidence problem, because his particular way of coping with inner stress will only result in causing most people to detest him, and that will inevitably bring even more pain into his life at some point. Kind of a vicious circle, I'd call it.