“Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?”
~ Abraham Lincoln
I have never understood this quotation or any rendition of it there of, because how could your enemy ever truly be your friend? And at what levels of life would this actually work? Maybe on the innocent days of the playground, or the exploratory moments of your school-aged angst, but as an adult, we have stuff to lose, and I am not just referring to materialistic things. Also, we have such little time as an adult...why would you want to spend any of it with an enemy? I barely want to associate with family at this point in my life and they are by far not my enemies.
The sentiment of this quotation is valid—confusing your enemies, disabling their attack modes, “killing them with kindness” as some would say, would definitely throw a perverbial wrench in their diabolical gear shifts, but once again, could you really allow yourself to believe they were your friends? To act as if they were your friends? I would be worried, and wholeheartedly believe, they were participating in the “long game” and just waiting for the right moment to pull my rug of comfort from under my feet. Cyncial? Maybe. But as I stated earlier, as adults, we just have too much to lose in life and risking it on someone who is not worth our time just does not make sense. Now if the quotation was modified to “Do I not disarm my enemies when I make them my acquaintances?” it would be more believable and doable, because let us be honest, most people in our lives are just acquaintances, right?
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