Pour yourself a cup and let’s chat! Today I’m thinking of forgiveness. Something easier said than done. If you really have forgiven someone you also should have let that go.
Not being a saint my own self I can hardly pass judgement on other people’s behavior. A long time ago I was in confession with Monsignor. I had a notebook with a full-page and he just looked at me and laughed. ” Why don’t you tell me what you feel guilty about instead of holding up the line for 2 hours.” So I told him the one thing I felt guilty about was the fact that I was unable to have a relationship with my Mother. That even though I had forgiven her and let it go, I knew I absolutely could not be around her.
His response helped me a great deal. “You can forgive someone and love them but for your own self-preservation you can love them from afar”. So that is what I have done and continue to do. If you hurt me, I’ll forgive you. But I’ll love you from a few states over. Or I may not love you at all. I can say I’ll never trust you again. And I will not.
I compare it to sugar. I love sugar. But it doesn’t love me. It makes me violently ill. So I avoid it like the plague. But I still love it. It just doesn’t fit in my life. I forgive you sugar for tempting me but I’m keeping you out of my house. And I will not forget how sick you made me. Because remembering the pain is what keeps the pain from coming back.
So yeah, I’m all for forgiveness. Forget? That’s another thing altogether.
Great post. Forgive is one thing forget is another. I tend to stay away too. I’d rather be around positive people guess it’s because I can be negative myself thus being around positive brings out the better me.
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Very true 😊
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Good post. If you’ll indulge me I’d like to venture an opinion. To forget is often thought of in the sense of forgetting someone did something and we open ourselves fully to that person to do it again. I contend this is not the case. To forget is to remove the effect that that action(s) had on us. A great example of this was given in a video I recently saw on FB. In it a holocaust survivor that was experimented on as a child in Auschwitz told her terrible story and at the end forgave those who committed the atrocities, formally forgave them, sincerely forgave them. Afterward she stated that it was only through that forgiveness that she was finally released from Auschwitz. In effect, she had finally forgot. Oh sure she remembers the experience. But to fully and completely let go of the hate and anger, that is to forget. It is the emotional state that we allow to entrap ourselves. Forgiveness is not complete without forgetting. Only to always remember the action itself that we may never fall victim to the same again.
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Opinions are always welcome! Thanks for this!😊
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It’s the same with me, I can forgive people but never love or trust them again.
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Earlier this evening, I watched a video of a holocaust survivor. She spoke about forgiveness, and how it helps oneself in the journey towards self healing. I remembered that video while reading your post. Forgiveness is never the same as forgetting.
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I just realized someone else too mentioned the same video. Haha. Small world.
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I saw that too! Great minds!
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How about forgiving yourself? I messed up bad in my life, most days I forgive myself for what I’ve done, but I won’t let that guy back into my life, I won’t be him anymore. He’s not several states away he’s always waiting just under the surface to get control. I feel him waiting but I won’t let him live my life anymore. Does that make sense? I forgive but never forget my capacity to do harm.
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That makes perfect sense to me!
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I agree! If I forget the past, I am doomed to repeat it. Or: “fuck me once, shame on you. Fuck me twice, shame on me.”
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That’s a great way to preserve your own mental and emotional well-being, forgive and love from afar. I think I’ll try that with a friend of mine.
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Oh, I so needed to read the penultimate paragraph today! I’m on day 10 without anything more than the trace sugar in green veggie. My body feels much, much better for it after months of not feeling great, but … the cravings, uuuugh! I like and will try to emulate your approach of forgiving sugar (making it much less of a struggle) while keeping it far away.
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Good idea! 😊
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I can forgive you but forget? That’s another story to tell.
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