We have often heard the words “Forgive and Forget”. What part do they play in your daily life?
We face disappointments and daily events that, in order to move forward in life, need to be forgiven. Our partners, our friends, and even the world at large, may hurt us through their words or actions. While it isn’t always intentional, it hurts just the same. When such deep emotional pain is placed in your life, how do you forgive and forget? For some, the burden of this event can be with you 24 hours a day, hanging onto your every breath, filling your every waking moment. How could you possibly forget what happened when your life is so changed…and you didn’t even have a say in it? For some, hurt is etched indelibly on your mind, in your memory. How can you possibly forgive them? The pain becomes a part of you, a compass for each day. This pain can also invade and take over your every waking moment, if you allow it.
If you allow it. You see, you do have a choice in the matter.
How does one forgive something when often the unkind act is purposeful and maliciously intended? How do we go through life and say “Yes, I forgive you” for altering the course of my life, for shattering the trust I had in you, in my world, in mankind, for taking someone who I hold dear to my heart, for acts that are so unkind.
Forgiveness does not mean that you accept inappropriate behavior towards yourself. It means that you are no longer prepared to carry the pain of reaction within you, and that is when you can begin the healing process. Take away the power of the act and regain, reclaim your own personal power. Holding on to the pain can set you up for stabs of bitterness. Let go of the substance of the pain that stops you from living a life of unlimited joy and love.
The mere act of releasing the negative feelings of the past is empowering. This release makes room within your heart to truly love and fully live once again. Release this pain and you will break the chains that bind you to the past, to the act. Release the pain by asking for it to be healed without any negative repercussions in all directions, past, present or future.
This act of forgiveness does not only pertain to large events in your world. A friend says a careless word, a partner does something that hurts you, your child hurts you. We easily brush off the little things in life, but it seems that the bigger the hurt, the deeper the emotional tie to the event or person, the harder it is to forgive. Let it go. When you hold on to forgiveness, you are only hurting yourself. Often, the one who hurt you, the person who you “cannot possibly forgive”, goes on with their life as if nothing happened. You keep yourself chained to a wall in a cage with the invisible chain of unforgiveness. You have the power to break that self-imposed chain. Open the door of the cage you put yourself in. The door, the cage, the chain were never really there. They existed only in your mind and as such, you can move them out of your way at any time.
You see, you do have a choice in the matter.
Forget? What does it mean to you? Forget can mean that you stop thinking about something, that you put it out of your mind, or that you put it behind you. As humans, we hopefully learn from our mistakes, from events in our lives, from the mistakes of others. The event may forever be a part of your memory, but it doesn’t have to rule your life. You deserve to feel happy and have love and joy. Learn from the mistake, and move forward. Letting it weigh you down keeps you from fully experiencing and living the life you were meant to live.
How effectively and safely would you drive your car if you only looked in the rearview mirror and never looked out the windshield? Sure, we must use that rearview mirror from time to time, as well as the side mirrors, which give us a different perspective of the past. We learn about our future by looking at the past, but we can’t get stuck in the past. Life can only be explained by looking backwards, but it must be lived forward.
When you think about it, we have four different kinds of sight that can help us see life through different perspectives. We have eyesight. Another word for this would be our vision. It allows us to safely and effectively navigate our way within the physical world. We have hindsight…that’s always 20/20, of course. Hindsight gives us retrospection, a perception or observation of the past. We have foresight, a forethought that hopefully helps us to not do the same thing, make the same mistake, in the future. Perhaps the most important sight we have, though, is insight. Insight is that ability to really see and intuitively understand the problem at hand. It is that little light that goes on in our minds, that “aha” moment we’ve all experienced. Insight is what helps us find solutions and move beyond. Insight is what helps us move forward in life.
Forgive and forget? You see, you really do have a choice in the matter.
