Sunday, January 15, 2012
Forgiving Self
Any of my readers that have followed my blog know that I keep coming back to the subject of forgiveness. Talking to NewCounselor this week I understood why. I have a 3 inch binder filled with speeches, blog posts, and thoughts on forgiveness. I am also reading a book Forgiveness is a Choice. I continue to study this concept because the person I want to forgive most is myself. Regret, shame, sorrow, are all feelings that I experience now that I am connected to my emotions. My past, I can not change but I feel sad at what happened to me and things that I did. I went with the theory that if I learn to forgive others I could learn to forgive myself. Principles that apply to others also apply to myself. One of the things that I learned about forgiving others is forgiveness and trust are separate. I can forgive someone without trusting them. I am starting to see that the same can apply to me. I believe that learning to trust myself will be a challenge since this is something that builds with positive experiences. To have these experiences, I will need to put myself in situations that can trigger negative reactions. WOW. A gate way to a whole new adventure.
Torn emotions. This weekend on the day my friend celebrated being cancer free, another friend announced the death of her sister to cancer. The next day family came to visit from out of state. The kids and their children gathered at our house to share food and happy chatter. Happy, sad, joyful, mourning crashed together each demanding their time. Hitting overload.
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6 comments:
Forgiving self is tough. Funnily enough, forgiving others is becoming easier as I forgive myself, sort of like the "Love thy neighbor, as thy self." "Forgive thy neighbor, as they self." Neighbor may have been put first, in the sentence, but it starts with you.
Hello Ruth
In my humble opinion, if something is done maliciously and with intent and the perpetrator shows no remorse, why should they be forgiven? That doesn’t mean you can’t move forward.
Forgiving oneself shouldn’t be too difficult, if after doing something wrong we are sorry and regret it; we deserve to forgive ourselves.
When we are children we cannot be held accountable for our wrong doings because we lack the benefit of life experience. Children really don’t know right from wrong; that has to be taught.
XX, Molly
When alcoholics get sober they find "living life on life's terms" still means there are days when we have to face the roller coaster of emotions we used to avoid by getting plastered.
We can't always be happy but we can always be optimistic.
I struggle to forgive myself for the years I wasted as an adult victim when it was always within my power to walk away. But then, I remind myself that years of conditioning as a child are not easy to overcome.
"If only" is a useless and destructive phrase I try not to use.
Hugs P/M
Thank you Laurel, it is interesting that I found that by forgiving my neighbor it is easier to forgive myself. The two are diffinantly connected for us. :)
Thanks Molly for reminding my what I struggle with. I was held accountable as a child for wrong doings I hadn't done. Now I am in the habit of blaming myself for what somebody else does. Like I could some how prevent them from making a mistake. I appreciate you comment.
Thank you P/M for sharing you perspective. Your description of struggling to forgive yourself fits what I struggle with too. I agree that "If only" only does damage.
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