One of the hardest things that I had to face as an adult is forgiveness. When I think about how hard it is, I ask myself why it is worth it? The things that we face in life at the hands of others can be painful; however, to gain healing requires us to forgive. As I am writing this post, I am reminded of how long it took and will take me to forgive people for failed investments in relationships, betrayal, dishonesty, just to name a few. For me, it was a battlefield between keeping this fiery anger or gaining healing. Yes, it is easy to say go for the healing, but there was something about holding on to the anger that I felt was necessary. Anger taught me a lot about myself. It showed me how invested I am in relationships, that I have resilience as long as the Amazon river, and that I genuinely care about people. When I thought about those great qualities, I could not afford for them to go to waste. There was no way I could allow the ill reflections of others to tear down the genuineness of my being.
Deciding to forgive forced me to love on myself more. In a blink of an eye, it became easy to leave that up to others. In my case, the pain showed me what was really good, haha. Of course, I wanted revenge and could not stand to see them go on like nothing happened. But I had to be reminded that you get what you put out and that one thing is for certain, the tables will turn. I decided to forgive because it was the catalyst to propel me into healing. There was no other way, trust me I thought about it! It sucked, it sucked so bad because it made me feel like I had to accept and just deal with it. If you know me, you know that there was no way I could do that – but it was necessary for my healing. If I did not make the moves I needed, I would be trapped mentally asking “what is wrong with me, why did they do this or that, what could I have said or done differently?”
Today, I can look back on some things and just smile. Ultimately, I am thankful for the experiences. It shed light on some dark places where the wrong people were hiding in my life. I have grown and gained more layers of tough skin. In some cases, I was filling up pillowcases of tears and in others, I added more miles on my runs. There is no way to perfect this area because disappointment is inevitable. I will say that knowing this moving forward, I take charge of my time and what I bring to the table in any relationship – whether it is a friendship or romantic. There will be times when we slip and fall, just do not stand down; yet revisit how you slipped in the first place. Trust me, it will make a difference in the choices you make concerning this area.
Enough about my experiences, what about yours? What is your story behind forgiveness in order to receive healing? Do you still struggle with making the decision to forgive? Let’s talk about it, feel free to let me know in the comments.
