“Today I decided to forgive you. Not because you apologized, or because you acknowledged the pain that you caused me, but because my soul deserves peace.”
– Najwa Zebian
What is forgiveness? Forgiveness, in very simple words, is when you decide to let go of the pain and be the joyful, appreciative and loving person that you actually are. When you forgive, you are not saying that the act committed (or the series of acts committed) are justified or okay. They never will be.
When you forgive, you are letting go of all the anger, the pain and the resentment and thereby, allowing in the joy, the appreciation, the love that you so want to feel. Don’t you like it when you are in joy? Don’t you feel good when you find yourself appreciating things/people/places/experiences? Don’t you find love such a wonderful feeling? The answer to these questions is yes and you do that because that’s who you are, that’s who your inner self is. When you hold yourself in anger (however justified it may be), you are far away from your true inner self and you feel pain in that separation. You don’t like it but it’s so difficult to let go as the resentment feels so justified.
Yes, forgiveness can be difficult but living in anger, resentment, pain, hatred every time you think about it – isn’t that difficult too?
You may decide to continue the relationship or continue the relationship and also reach out for help or you may decide to either temporarily or permanently end the relationship and firstly get to a place where you feel safe … – whatever you choose as per what gives you the most relief (i.e. as per your path of least resistance which only you know), what is more important is what you feel within.
Forgiveness means letting go of the pain, the anger and the resentment in your heart and feeling the relief that you so much want to feel. Forgiveness means looking at the situation, whenever you feel ready to, in a way which makes you feel relief and therefore, closer to the ease you want to feel. Forgiveness is your gift to yourself.
“Forgive because you deserve it.”
― Abraham-Hicks
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Photo credit – Darius Bashar via unsplash.com
