I was watching Oprah last night and she had a man on her show who witnessed his wife of 28 years and 20 year old son be murdered in their home, then he was shot, and his other son was shot too. He survived and so did one son. when the police started to investigate the murders, they discovered the son who survived was the mastermind behind it all, and he got two people to do it. The son spoke with Lisa Ling from death row while the father went on Oprah to say, despite everything he has forgiven his son. WHAT ???
In watching the show I tried to place myself in his situation and I sruggled in saying without a doubt if I could do what he did, I am still not sure, then I got to thinking why is it so hard to forgive ? I am one of those people that find it very hard to forgive someone. I usually just move past the situation, but never forgive or forget. I have realized that once you do forgive it is a lot easier to move on.
There was a siuation about four years ago. A friend really hurt me, for reasons I still am not clear, nor will I ever be. The pain, betrayel, and anger I felt well in that moment in my life was out of control. My first responce was not to forgive but to get her back. I didn’t, actually, I couldn’t. Despite everything I couldn’t hurt her like she hurt me. For awhile I went through the motions of life but the question still remained the same why did she do this to me ? But about two years ago I let it go by forgiving her.
I wrote her a long letter. I wrote I was sorry in the letter, because maybe i had done something that she felt she had to get back at me, who knows. so I apologized for everything that I said or did that hurt her. I wrote I knew that she would never say those words to me but it was alright, and you know what ? IT REALLY WAS ALRIGHT. The day I mailed out that letter, I made peace with it all. I understood what it meant to forgive. I never heard from her and I never will. Its okay. I am okay .
So after remembering about that instance where I was the one forgiving, I get what the man on Oprah was saying.
Forgiveness to me is a gift you not only give to someone but a gift that keeps on giving to you. Why struggle anymore than you have to.
Here is a nice quote from Eric Hoffer which I feel sums it all up:
The remarkable thing is that we really love our neighbor as ourselves: we do unto others as we do unto ourselves. We hate others when we hate ourselves. We are tolerant toward others when we tolerate ourselves. We forgive others when we forgive ourselves. We are prone to sacrifice others when we are ready to sacrifice ourselves.
It is all so very true.
