all damage is permanent
I remember reading a story somewhere about a dad who had his son hammer a nail into the fence every time he directed his anger unkindly.
Eventually, the son learned to manage his anger, and the first time he was motivated to reserve himself and apologize, the dad took him to the fence to remove a nail.
With the nail removed, a hole remained. Thus, the son learned...
All damage is permanent.
I have this gripe with repair culture—those who seem to see themselves as well-versed in repair also seem more willing to behave reactively toward others, allowing their fears and projections to become material to their relationships.
Those who learned to behave reactively are motivated to seek repair practices and get good at them, and it's beautiful and important as a step on the road to responsiveness.
It's also somewhere communities can stay and hang out indefinitely, it enables reactivity and sometimes outright enmity to be a sustainable practice within the system.
If repair is a common practice, reactivity can keep being a part of a system. We start to see the reasons for reactivity as excuses for reactivity, and we prevail upon repair and forgiveness again and again.
No matter the culture, however, the damage IS permanent. This is the way these cultures destabilize—they espouse values of repair and reconciliation, and then when permanent damage becomes overwhelming, they must refuse to engage, and in so doing, seem out of integrity with their own commitment to repair.
Repair is not a practice of our community. We are in constant adjustment to accountability and integrity within ourselves. We do not inflict damage, nor do we take on damage from others. Repair does not make sense without damage.
We are responsible for our own projections and judgments, and we remain arm-in-arm, collaborating on what is here now. We remain curious about the experience the other is having, reverent toward each other's sovereignty, selective of our own experience.
We have all been down the road of claiming responsiveness from reactivity, we know the process of repair. That is why we don't do it with each other. We do it within ourselves, and show up to the other ready to love, every here and now.