People often justify gossip and slander, saying they need to get their feelings out rather than “stuff them.” So they dump on different people in their lives concerning their hurts. I tell people that I don’t share any negative information about people who may have hurt me, with anybody, not even my wife. The response that I often get is that it isn’t healthy to keep things bottled up inside of me. I hear of people counseling their friends and encouraging them to gossip and slander others in the name of catharsis. I don’t dump on people about others, I dump on God. I use the “Imprecatory Psalms” and there are many of them, to vent my anger and hurt against people.

Psalms 69:7-24
Those who hate me without a cause are more than the hairs of my head. . .Those who would destroy me are powerful, being wrongfully my enemies. . .Dishonor has covered my face. . .May I be delivered from my foes and from the deep waters. . .For I am in distress; answer me quickly. Oh draw near to my soul and redeem it; Ransom me because of my enemies! You know my reproach and my shame and my dishonor;
All my adversaries are before You. Reproach has broken my heart and I am so sick. . .May their table before them become a snare; And when they are in peace, may it become a trap. May their eyes grow dim so that they cannot see, And make their loins shake continually. Pour out Your indignation on them, And may Your burning anger overtake them.

Included in my daily Bible reading is five chapters of Psalms. There are 150 chapters in Psalms so I read through it each month. When I read the five chapters for the day I pray them back to God, personalizing the words so they become my prayer. It is amazing how many times the words in a Psalms for a particular day perfectly fit what I have experienced and what I am feeling.

After I have prayed curses upon those who I am angry at, I then change course and pray that God would open their eyes and convict them helping them to see their own sin, and bring them to repentance, and deliver them from the control of the evil one. I then really change course and pray that God will bless them, and that I might be able to help them.

It doesn’t happen very often, probably only once or twice a year, but I like to eliminate all negative feelings toward anybody. Life is so much more comfortable then.