Forgiveness

I’ve been taking a close look recently at the practice of forgiveness. I’m a bit hesitant to write about it because it can be such a triggery topic for people – but I also feel it’s a very important topic to discuss. When the topic of forgiving someone comes up many people get very angry and defensive at the idea of someone suggesting they forgive the person they are angry or resentful with. People will often insist that they have the right to be angry at the person who was driving drunk and hit their child or at the person who abused them or whatever else. These people will often say that so and so doesn’t deserve forgiveness.

Here is my 2-part response to that – You are absolutely right. We all have a right to feel whatever we feel. No exceptions.And, it’s not about the other person – forgiveness is always about us.

Right to be Angry

If you’ve read my previous articles – I talk a lot about how no emotion is bad, or good, it is simply an emotion . Everyone has the right to feel whatever it is they feel – angry, sad, joyful, excited, etc. The problem with holding onto emotions like anger or resentment, whether they are directed at other people or ourselves, is that the result is more pain for us. Holding onto anger against another person for something that they did or didn’t do does absolutely nothing to that person – it only harms us. Here is a quote I love from a book called “The Four Spiritual Laws of Prosperity” by Edwene Gaines:

“An unwillingness to forgive is like stabbing ourselves with a knife and expecting the person who did us wrong to feel the pain. Forgiveness is not something we do for the sake of another person. Forgiveness is something we do for ourselves.”

I think that sometimes it’s easier to be angry and resentful because it helps us to avoid our grief . As long as we can focus on the anger and resentment, there’s no room in our attention for the intense pain of grief. The thing is, however, that just because we don’t let that pain into our awareness doesn’t mean it goes away. It just hangs around waiting for that day when we finally shift our focus off of anger. It has also been my experience that when I release the anger and resentment, it seems to carry some of the pain away with it.

“They don’t deserve forgiveness”

Perhaps you are right – maybe they don’t. Consider this though – do you want to feel miserable and upset and trapped or would you rather feel free and calm and loving? Anger and resentment keep us miserable and, when directed at another person, they keep us bound to that person. When we forgive, we free ourselves.

It’s not a question of what another person deserves or doesn’t deserve – it’s a question of what YOU deserve.

People often say they don’t know how to forgive – that they don’t know what to do to forgive someone (or themselves). I don’t think it’s a matter of doing. I think it’s a matter of allowing. The place to start is to be willing to forgive. To allow forgiveness to be a possibility. I believe the act of forgiveness – and the peace that comes with it – will follow that willingness organically and naturally.

I’d like to leave you with a beautiful poem on forgiveness shared with me by a beautiful person – someone who has agreed to let me share it with you but who wishes to remain anonymous.

Forgiveness

Some days I want to scream
And scream and scream
‘Til all the rage inside of me
Is set loose onto the wind.
Scream until the ball of rage
Lodged so firmly in my heart
Dissolves away to loving tears.

Sometimes the urge to lash at you
Seems to take me over
And I shake and cry and
Beat the air with fisted hands.
At times I fear the icy rage
Will consume my very soul -
I want to hurt you for the pain in me.

For years I woke from nights
Of haunting dreams and memories
And the icy ball of rage
Burned with red hot tears.
Sticky strings of blackened guilt
Tied the icy sphere to me
Throbbing with my heart beat.

I have often felt consumed
With tears that never seem to end
‘Til my soul is hollowed out
And my eyes burn as red hot coals.
Pain slashes through my heart
As hot knives slide through butter
An oily coat of red tinged tears.

I wish I knew how to hate you
To forget how much I love you
And all the love you gave to me
In all those years you were my brother.
I wish I could hate you now
For the choice you made that day -
Hating you might take my pain away.

Some days, and every day,
I can’t help but love you still.
And I cry and rage at life
Because I haven’t yet forgiven you.
It’s as if I want to punish you
Cling to icy rage and sticky guilt
To somehow tie you to this life.

In my dreams you say “I’m sorry”
You say you just didn’t see
And you ask me to forgive you.
The rage, the guilt that lives in me
Spreads through me like poison.
And, yet, as I look upon your face
A wave of love floods over me.

I remember how you made me laugh
And let me tag along to play and
Even how you called me little sister.
I can’t help but recall how you played
All those endless games of Monopoly
By my hospital bed as I recovered.
I remember how you loved me so.

In my dreams I see your face
And all my icy rage dissolves away,
Washed clear by your loving tears.
You take my sticky guilt into your hands
And make a pretty flower you hand to me.
Cleansing tears spill from me as you
Whisper, “All is well, little sister.”

And then suddenly, I knew.
The way you left no longer mattered.
For all those years of love
And all those memories of laughter
Simply overwhelmed the rage,
The guilt, the pain in me.
I responded, “I forgive you, weekend brother.”