Day 4 of the 30 Days of Truth: Something You Have to Forgive Someone For

The practice of forgiveness is our most important

contribution to the healing of the world.

~ Marianne Williamson ~

Gosh, it took me many, many  years, but I was finally able to forgive my parents....not that I forgot: it's something that you never forget.  You may grow to understand, if it that constitutes forgiveness, then I guess that I have forgiven.  I know that for many years I had no feelings, but now I know that I have always loved them.  Mom and dad lived in a different time, a time when you stayed together for the sake of the children.  I have to believe that things would have been different today.  I do know that  think I became a better parent to my own two sons because even before they were a thought, I'd promised myself that I would never hurt them the way I had been hurt.

I've yet to forgive my ex-husband.  I don't know if I ever will.  I want to for unforgiveness is like a wound festering within, yet, every time I think I have made some headway, something else rises to my conscious mind reminding me of  the evil I endured.  Evil seems such a strong word to call someone, but he really was.  He was so filled with jealousy, envy, narcissism, anger and rage.  His eyes used to dart around in a weird sort of way.  His sister swears that she saw the devil go into his room one day.  Well, I was so desperate for answers that that seemed as good as any and even went to a Catholic priest who thought I was totally off my rocker.  I must have been for I am not even a Catholic.  

But, I was desperate.  Perhaps if I understood, if I knew why he seem to hate me so, if I knew what I had done to deserve his wrath. That is how it is....when we have spent our lives being beaten down in one way or another, we always believe that things just HAVE to be our fault.  I know now that none of it was my fault; well, maybe it was my fault that I allowed it to go on for so many years.  But, that was a different time for me as well; that was a time when I just didn't think I could make it on my own.  

I know better than that now.  Although I have a loving hubby, I know that I am also strong enough to be independent if I had to be.  I don't need someone else to validate my existence.  When hubby and I first married, I couldn't even make the decision of what movie to see, what to eat...etc.  Always needed someone to do that for me.  But that was the ME that once was, the clinging me...and while, it was, in no way, my ex-hubby's fault that I was that way, but he did take advantage of it instead of trying to help me grow.  He utilized my pain and sadness to his advantage...to control...and that is what I am finding so hard to forgive.

It is getting better.  The rage I felt against is not so strong now, and sometimes it is not even there now.  I know he was placed in my life for a purpose. I like to help me to learn, but oh my gosh, did it have to be so painful?  Did it have to nearly destroy me to teach me how to live?  He's gone now.  He died of a rare form of groin cancer in 1996; it's eerie because the entire family was gone in a span of a few short months. Sometimes I wonder if, indeed, they ALL came into my life for a reason.  Sometimes I wonder if he sees me now, and if he does, what is he feeling?  Anger?  Remorse?  or a feeling of satisfaction that his work was done...that I had, in fact, become whole and strong

Forgiveness is not a moral issue.

It is an energy dynamic...

Forgiveness means that you do not carry the baggage of an experience.

When you choose not to forgive,

the experience that you do not forgive sticks with you.

When you choose not to forgive,

it is like agreeing to wear dark, gruesome sunglasses that distort everything,

and it is you who are forced every day

to look at life through those contaminated lenses

because you have chosen to keep them.

--Gary Zukav from The Seat Of The Soul --