What does it mean to truly forgive?
Different people have been coming to mind these past few weeks…people that I want to forgive and people whose forgiveness I’d like to receive.
A friend and I were discussing forgiveness the other day and my friend asked me, “Do you hold grudges?”
I thought about it for at least a minute, wanting to answer anything but the truth but finally I did reply honestly and said,“Yes.”
(It hurt to hear myself say that out loud.)
I’ve had the opportunity to get to know two incredible women here in Bali who embody how life-giving forgiveness can be.
I think about Felice who lost her two daughters in an airplane crash a few years ago and Diane whose fiance was killed in an auto accident. Both could easily be bitter and angry at the people and events that caused their losses. Yet both are soft-hearted, radiant, and love-filled women. When I asked both these women how they were able to move on they said they had to let it go (forgive) as holding on would eventually kill them emotionally or physically.
For the last few weeks I’ve been mulling over what forgiveness means to me and how I can truly forgive. After picking the angel card ‘forgiveness’ 3 times in 3 days (!) I realize it’s time for me to discover how I can truly forgive.
Here’s what arose from my heart to my pen:
Forgiveness is bending and twisting and being flexible in order to let the something that wants to stick on my heart slide gently off my back.
Forgiveness means having the capacity –the spaciousness in my heart- to soften and melt instead of harden and stiffen.
Forgiveness is flexibility not rigidity. It is strength not weakness.
Forgiveness is holding something to the Light and really asking myself: ‘Does this truly bother me or am I just want to carry a grudge because I think I should or because it’s comfy to nurse a resentment in my heart?’
Forgiveness is harmony. Inner harmony with self and outer harmony with others.
It’s allowing mistakes to happen and knowing that mistakes will sometimes hurt me while also realizing that mistakes by humans are a fact of life.
Reality check: sometimes people will hurt me.
Sometimes people will hurt me on purpose, other times by accident. Regardless of the motive, I truly am, at the deepest level, hurting myself when I nurse those grudges and resentments. So I then experience two pains: the initial hurt and the holding on.
Ouch times two.
And even if they did hurt me on purpose, forgiveness is getting, truly getting, that they did the best they could at the time.
Forgiveness is freedom.
To not forgive is to carry a backpack filled with stones around for miles and miles and miles…
Forgiveness means saying YES to myself, to people, to life. It is an open gate to inner and outer freedom. Forgiveness is letting go of control. It is trusting that I will be okay even (especially?) when I fully let go.
It is allowing and truly stepping in to an expansive life filled with connection and love.
Forgiveness means a new beginning. Letting go of the past. Not just talking about letting go of the past but truly letting it GO.
Forgiveness is open space, open mind, to see people and myself in a new way. To experience us all in a new way. It is kindness to myself and another. It is getting that we are all human and doing the best we can.
Forgiveness is dropping the sword and picking up a flute instead.
Forgiveness is fluid flexibility. Being able to see things and people from different angles. Looking at the incident from different perspectives the way one might look at a diamond. Looking straight on doesn’t reveal the light, the color. But from different vantage points the facets reveal something beautiful.
Forgiveness means dropping it, whatever the ‘it’ is.
Forgiveness is not about burying the hatchet for then it is always accessible with a shovel. It is about putting the resentment in the incinerator and disintegrating the ‘it’ once and for all, never to return again.
The incinerator is love. The love of the heart combined with awareness, flexibility and curiosity will cause the resentment to melt, never to return again.
Forgiveness is choosing life. It is saying no to being half-dead and YES to living full on, full out, no barriers to being happy, joyous and free.
Forgiveness is a choice. It is choosing to love. It is active, not passive. Passivity is holding on which is often easier than the action of letting go when one is nursing a resentment or a grudge.
Forgiveness is life-filled. It is taking the higher road. The one that requires more effort but ultimately leads to more freedom and joy.
Forgiveness is self-love. It is choosing love for myself over pain and darkness.
It is choosing to let go of those weights and stones so that I can dance through life easily and effortlessly.
Forgiveness is an open heart that is vast enough to hold life’s pain and life’s joy.
Forgiveness grows the heart. It is the key to expanding the capacity to love and to love deeply.
Forgiveness is getting, really getting that you are me and I am you. I’ve done what I perceive that you’ve done at some point in my life even if it didn’t take the exact form it took with you.
I’ve done what you’ve done in my thoughts or through actions or words.
Forgiveness is pure, undiluted love.
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Beautiful post, Kristin. And so perfectly synchronistic for me. I’m spending a lot of time with my mom, who suffers from Borderline Personality Disorder. Forgiveness can be challenging when she’s saying and doing heinous things. But I need to remember that I must forgive to set myself free. Thank you.
Excellent and thoughtful post! One thing that really bothers me is when people say, “I can forgive [insert person], but I won’t forget.” This isn’t forgiveness! I believe to truly forgive someone and “drop” the matter, one needs to forgive and forget. If you don’t forget about it you are still carrying it around inside of you. And remember, if you forgive someone, it should be forever, not just until the next argument arises.