The Luxury of Forgiveness
It’s flat out hard to forgive. It requires a short memory. Then, throw in a good dose of tolerance, grace, and humility – all traits difficult to find and arduous to master. Forgiveness goes against our instincts of survival and our primal emotions of hate, vengeance and retribution. It’s difficult to justify against those strong inner voices, the ones that want the end result to be fair, and where we obsess over a chance to get even. But in the end, what does ‘getting even’ get us? Where does it end? And, what does it cost?
If we lead ourselves down that rabbit hole, we’ll find there’s always a score to settle somewhere; a deception that cut deep, a cheat that resulted in loss, a betrayal we could not abide. We all draw lines along the way, lines that can be crossed without much harm and ones that cannot. From those that are forbidden we believe there is no coming back. Why is that? Some say there is no such thing as unconditional love because there are limits for what and to whom people can extend forgiveness. I don’t buy that. I think we place the limits on ourselves.
I think forgiveness is the masterwork of love. I think forgiveness strips away all pride, all hate, all ego, all self-righteousness, all educated learning. Forgiveness requires you to be emotionally naked, to be vulnerable. That’s why it’s so hard; we have to be brutally honest and completely defenseless. It is a spiritual journey, and it only begins by understanding that through acceptance one gains peace and happiness.
Forgiveness is an emotionally freeing, uplifting experience; it allows you to move forward in your life’s journey, to experience what lies ahead more fully because you are unencumbered. As long as you are judging, condemning or criticizing anyone you are standing in the way of freeing a powerful life force. It can unleash your imagination and allow you to realize your biggest dreams. Let go of those criticisms and you will free yourself of that all consuming negative energy, the one that keeps you focused on the past, agonizing over what cannot be changed, and anchored to a reef that has no treasure, no future.
Want to unleash your potential? Focus all your energy on the now, on being the best you can be today while focusing on the plan, the journey, the goals you have set for yourself. Find ways to excel today, to gain satisfaction from what you have done for others and, therefore, for yourself. If you are full of anger, remorse, betrayal, you will not be able to commit to your goal. If you hold on to negative emotions they will distract you and sway you from your potential, a potential you may never become.
Using negative emotions to motivate you can work, but for how long and at what cost? You will become single-minded, obsessively driven by avenging what or who wronged you. Obsessive people are unforgiving and no fun to be around. They lose friends, loved ones and alienate others. Ultimately, they end up alone and, most likely, unhappy. We are social animals; we need others to share experiences with, to recognize and appreciate who we are, and we need the endorphins that come from doing good deeds for others.
Okay, all that sounds great. But, come on, really? Am I really going to forgive my employee who stole $250,000 of aluminum injection molds and sold them for scrap? Or the police who said they couldn’t charge him? Am I going to forgive one of my former business partners who lied to me and ran my company out of business? Am I going to forgive him for losing millions of dollars of my hard-earned equity and screwing up my retirement? I could sue him. I could sue a few people and I thought about it. But you know what? I realized that would take years and it would mire me in focusing mercilessly on the past with no guarantee of a good outcome. Experience has taught me the only ones who really win in lawsuits are the lawyers. Trying to win back what was lost and trying to punish those who took it won’t allow me to move my life forward.
I don’t want that destructive negative energy. I want to move on, move forward. The only way to do that is to try and forget it, to let go of the anger, the betrayal. How do I forgive my crooked former partner? It seems too much. I finally realized I needed to at least forgive myself. Let me release the negativity by writing about it, getting it out, letting it go. I’m closing the door on that part of my life and moving ahead. Do new things, be open to new opportunities, be with those I love, be active and forget; have a short memory, be humble by recognizing and tolerating my imperfections, and allow myself the grace of calm, peace, and forgiveness.
Some will no doubt say I am simply limping off with my tail between my legs, too weak to see justice through to its rightful conclusion. If I’m honest, there is some truth to that, but only because I’m asking myself, Is it worth it? Is it worth all the negativity, the battling, the inevitable compromises that legal proceedings demand? Is it worth the years of my life it will take? The answer I came to was no, and I have told you why. It brought into sharp focus why I must strive to forgive. Now, once I forgive I almost instantly feel better. I now know I can only heal by forgiving.
It’s so much better waking up and knowing I have somewhere new, somewhere fun left to go. I have finally learned to give myself the luxury of forgiving others and forgiving myself. And I’ve come to understand sometimes it’s the same thing.
