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I.M. Provocative 16 Sep 2021

Provoking is to stimulate or give rise to a reaction or emotion in someone. By times I find myself doing that. Usually it is not very successful. It does produce a response, but mostly in the form of a withdrawal.

How

I do provoke in various ways:
First when I am defensive. And that is (too) often.
Second when I talk about issues which are important to me. I talk too long. It may be annoying for the listener.
Third, when I want to hurt someone. Perhaps because I am angry.
Sometimes when I play a game.
When I am jealous.

In short, there are plenty of opportunities. I hurt others and myself as well.

Change

For me the most important tool to improve is practicing. A role-play is a nice method. Then the quality of the response can be evaluated. It is useful to swap roles and to hear others dealing with the specific issues. The role-play should start with an invitation (or trigger) and one response (of several sentences) from the 'offended' party.
Be prepared, it really takes a serious (and perhaps long) practice to get good results. Improvement may come little by little.

Prayer

Jesus, I ask for kindness and patience in moments when I feel provoked.