Saturday, July 29, 2023
Forgiveness is an act of giving to yourself. “For-” indicates an intentional permissiveness to move onward, and “give” indicates to relinquish. So forgiveness is a form of abdication, relinquishing the obsession of keeping the past in front of you, rather than the future. Forgiveness is the gift of insight into tomorrow. It’s also not about those who wrong you. It’s about yourself. You are giving yourself the gift of moving onward, of letting go, so that the past may be as it is.
Forgiveness is not technically an interaction with others either, it’s an “inner action -” a way of moving away from the past, not towards it. Another thing we get wrong is asking God for forgiveness. God is not dualistic that way, God is infinite and doesn’t forgive. God is love, and that love is always “on.” If God forgave, it would make him changeable, and that’s just not the case.
We often hold great disdain over what we cannot control. If we cannot control, we harbor frustration towards it. Forgiving is releasing that frustration towards someone or something that seems to hold you back. Let go of wishing your upbringing were different. Let go of hoping anything about your past would ever improve. We must learn to for-give, to get out ahead and to quickly adjust our perspective from the rear view to the fore view. Seeing things as they are is what forgiveness is about, not about putting the past “right.” That’s resentment. Resentment means to keep re-sending negative thoughts about the past over and over again. Many of your circumstances were not chosen, so why would you be upset about that? Forgive yourself for seeing wrongly, adjust the view towards the future, and accept the gift of what is. That’s forgiveness, and it’s always about being good to yourself.