Forgive or not?
The term forgiveness is used by almost every type of person on the earth. In different languages it’s different, but you get what I am talking about. It seems though that the act of forgiveness is a dilemma. Oh, it’s not a problem for us to say I forgive you, and its generally accepted that we will feel forgiven. But, are we? The act of forgiving is far more than words. It entails the removal of the thought, the emotion, and the reactive nature within all of us. How is this accomplished? Just by saying forgive me? I don’t believe that’s all there is to it. It is necessary to say, but to truly forgive one must ultimately forget as well and to the point that one truly can’t remember the offence any more. I do not have that kind of power within myself. There is at first a great struggle with the offence, ensued by a great effort to stop the pain. After we bring the pain into control then we suppress all the feelings to the point that now if we can bury all this, it will go away. Not! Unfortunately, that just doesn’t cut it. Now we are stuck with deep-seated issues that will evidence themselves in our lives going forward from that point. No, it’s not over, in fact it has just begun. In most cases, we struggle with this dilemma our whole life and sometimes we take it to the grave. We don’t have to though, we need help. Often, that help can come only from the offended. Offences come to all of us at sometime or another and usually we just shrug it off as bad manners or some such thing. In these cases, it really doesn’t take hold of us and there is no big deal, but when the offence wounds us very deeply it could take a lifetime to fix. So where do we start? It truly starts when one of the parties reaches out to the other and the two actually take the time to work it through together. Something in us must find a safe place to put all this hurt, so that we seek to find common ground on which we can put this issue to rest. It’s not easy, but if the relationship is worth having then we will spend whatever time and energy working it out. Having done everything to find forgiveness, we must find a way to forgive ourselves. This is the big one. Truth be told, it is going to take some real negotiation within to reach the place where we can let it all go and forgive ourselves, because it’s just about us. Oops, I for got about the most important part, God. God and each of us will also find a place to struggle over this together, and as we wrestle through the long night, we will awake in the morning a free forgiven person. Now and only now will we truly forget.
May I always find forgiveness throughout my life.
May you find the same.
Spiritualhypster 
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