Forgiveness

What is forgiveness?

What does it mean, to you?

I struggled with forgiveness for years. I defined it in the only way that I knew, from what I had been taught or what I had learned... and, I learned, in time, that forgiveness... just as ALL things do... has about as many definitions are there are people who practice... or not practice... forgiveness.

Does someone need to be forgiven?

Do we have to forgive?

Does the person/entity, whom we are contemplating forgiving, have to ask forgiveness, in order to be forgiven?

Is forgiveness conditional?

Does forgiving mean forgetting?

I read a book called The Locket, years back... that explained forgiveness in a way that I had never thought of. For myself, I had been taught that I must forgive, because it was part of my youthful Christian upbringing... yet, it was hard forgiving. Part of that was wrapped up in the idea that... because I had not forgotten... then, surely I must not have forgiven.

In time, I learned that we never forget... and I can parallel that thought with the death of a loved one... we never forget... we just find ways to go on living, re-arrange the thought processes, in order to deal with what is lain before us, in more positive and constructive ways.

I'm not going to hunt the book down, to get the quote exactly right... but, the essence of it goes like this... you don't forgive, for the other person's sake... not for their benefit... you forgive for your own sake... forgiving is letting loose the anchor that would keep your ship from sailing to new shores... or else we remain stuck in the same place. I thought it was an excellant way to learn how to forgive.

And it isn't, in my mind, about them asking for forgiveness... because, some never will.

Do all deserve forgiveness?

It doesn't matter... what matters is the forward motion of our ship... our soul... which can't happen, if we're anchored in anger and bitterness.

Sometimes ones do not know how to ask forgiveness... their reality is different from our own.

What we sometimes see as something that needs forgiveness, may be our own selfish mind, in no way connected to the reality of the situation.

Perhaps no forgiveness is necessary, after all... just forward movement.