Prompt 13 – Best Gift:  The holiday season is typically a time we focus on others, sometimes at the expense of ourselves. So let’s look back on how we cared for ourselves. What was the best gift you gave yourself this year? Did you buy big, fluffy towels? Did you have a massage on a day when you really needed it? Did you forgive someone and give yourself the freedom from that grudge?
The truth shall set you free…
And so shall forgiveness.
Mahatma Gandhi once said, “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.”
Forgiveness is something, I’ve learned, that is an act more for yourself than it is for the other person. Yet it is not easy. The easy way out is to stay angry, or to place blame on others and not accept your own responsibility in a situation. Forgiveness is a hard battle, usually with your own ego that was hurt. But if won, it can be the most rewarding, generous thing you can do for yourself. Yet if you choose not to forgive old wounds, you cannot allow love into that part of your life. And where there is no love, there is suffering.
Do I sound like Yoda yet? Good, he was quite wise, you know.
In fact, little did my 5-year-old self know how wise Yoda really was. Only does my 32-year-old self now see the answer has always been there. Last year, I let go of someone that did not serve my highest purpose. But this year, I finally forgave them for their actions. Little did I know letting go of them was only the first step towards healing myself from what had transpired between us.
There was a powerful quote that I read about 4 years ago in “The Power of Now” by Eckhart Tolle:
“If his past were your past, his pain your pain, his level of consciousness your level of consciousness, you would think and act exactly as he does. With this realization comes forgiveness, compassion, peace.”
This passage struck a chord with me when I first read it. Things clicked into place. People do what they do based upon what they know and their life experiences. We are each different people, we come from different backgrounds, and each of us have different experiences. No one person is the same, and we will never, ever know what exactly it’s like to be in someone else’s shoes. If we did, maybe we would do as they do. But we don’t, and we’re not, nor will we ever be. It’s a simple concept, but so rarely do we remember this when faced with trying to understand why others act, think or speak a certain way that we take issue with. My hurt, to some degree, was by his doing. But keeping my hurt alive is my own doing. I was not going to suffer at my own hands any longer. And the minute I forgave him for “what he did to me,” I became free from the awful thoughts running through my head, free from the anger in my heart, and free from the pains in my stomach when I would think about him.
Only when I became free of those things did I realize how much I had given my own power away by holding on to my anger and resentment. Forgiveness is the key to regaining your power back. Forgiveness is the key to holding love and light in your heart, for you and for others who are worthy of receiving it. Forgiveness, undoubtedly, is the greatest gift you can ever give yourself. But it can only come from you.
