This word seems to come up a little bit more often lately. Considering that we are in a lock-down and have been a product of some of our deepest feelings and emotions, the word ‘forgiveness’ sits in the back of our thoughts among the memories we have been holding down and hoping to suppress or forget. It is also a word that will have a different meaning to each of us. For some; this is such a simple thing to forgive and just move on because the situation is minor in most ways. Any time you can move on through a situation and get it behind you, take that road immediately and allow yourself the freedom of not adding to the weight of any stored unresolved situations that you are holding onto.

   Sometimes the weight of unresolved issues converts to illness, sleepless nights, panic attacks, labored breathing, anger, poor health, depression, an inability to make choices or decisions and move forward…have I forgotten anything?  Have you considered that as long as you carry that burden around, you are teaching it to those that are around you, or the people in your life are a product of that environment?

   What I am going to talk about may not be a perfect ‘fix’ for what you are going through, but it might open a door to a different perspective or a better understanding. It might help you find a way out of that never ending story of who did what to whom, and why you can’t get on with your life.  Not all adventures down the path of forgiveness will be easy, but every journey begins with the first tear, or the first step in that direction. There is no magic fix and the words you are about to read are my thoughts and my perspective…let me take your hand for a little while and see where this journey might lead us…

   Sometimes we need to get angry enough to make these steps into recovery. Once in a while our own health, or lack thereof, will cause us to evaluate what things we can do in order to get back in charge of our own lives. Once in a while memories will begin to surface. For some of us there will be trigger points that we have not yet identified.  Is there a smell, touch, place, person, sound, etc. that triggers you into deep feelings that you can’t control or explain? When those feelings or emotions control some aspect of your life, it is important that you get some help getting to the bottom of that. In situations such as this, forgiveness is most often the last bridge you will want to cross.

   NEWSFLASH…don’t be deceived into thinking that the things you must forgive are always buried in the distant past. While that will be true for some of us, you may be someone that has a current situation that holds you hostage even more so than something in the past. In a strange way, we usually think of forgiving something that happened long ago, and we quickly forget the job we lost, the relationship that caused us night terrors, the home we are about to lose, the anguish we are having with a family member, or what about a neighbor that terrorizes everyone in the neighborhood, the unfriendly divorce? As you are thinking your way through this just remember to consider where you are today, not just where you were as you were growing up into maturity. Pain, abandonment, victimization, terror, judgment, invalidation…all of these, and more, come at all stages of our lives.  If they are happening to you now, there is a good chance that it continues to occur because you did not deal with it earlier, or it is a major part of your soul’s work in this lifetime.  It might be a lifetime carry-over, and that would be another lesson to have.

   The things we may need to forgive might seem endless. Being in a relationship where you are ultimately controlled would rank among these.  Being in an abusive situation occurs more often that many realize.  Abuse is not just physical, it is also emotional.  We often discover that the physical pain is a little quicker to process.  When there are emotional scars, those are very often in multiple layers and may have occurred over a long period of time.  These feelings are deeply associated to learned behavior.  That is what will control our own lives for a long period of time, and cause us to develop the learned responses that are hardest to work through. We are a product of our upbringing and our environment. Unless we work through these situations we will become teachers, or sadly we may become a perpetrator of the same behavior to others.

   In order for us to move to forgiveness, we must first have gone through the process of becoming aware of what the situation is, and where it comes from. In some situations that may come about fairly easy.  Becoming aware is a process that will look different for each of us.  No two situations will ever be the same, or play out in the same way.  You just have to do the work!  This leads me to what I feel may be one of the strongest points that I want to make.

   To forgive any situation is not to condone it in any way. When you have been able to walk through the path of awareness and come to this place… what you do is to set yourself free from the control the other person, or situation, holds over you.  To forgive is to give you the ability to move forward into a healthier life. In this moment you will retake authority of your own life. This is not just about forgiving others. Perhaps one of the hardest things we learn to do is to forgive ourselves so we can move on with our lives.

   We could so easily overlay this scenario over almost any situation you are going through, the patterns and the solution will fit.  This is true from abuse, molestation, relationship issues, financial control, invalidation… I think you get the picture. Whatever hurts, if there is a person or situation that causes this and holds you hostage… move forward with it and set yourself free.

   When you are forgiving a situation, you begin the process by having that thought in your head.  What is important for you to do is move that energy from your head to your heart.  It is from the heart energy that our forgiveness must come.  Just to think about it does not accomplish the release you are seeking, but it is how you must begin.  At some point you will know when the energy has moved from the head to the heart.  At first it is what you think, ultimately it is what you feel.  Get the picture?  Visit my website and go to the Heart2Heart section and use this to help you work through many situations in your life. Considering all of this, I hope you will ask yourself this question… what is the purpose of my life and the lessons I have learned from each of these experiences.