Yes, Yes we heard it already:
Forgiveness is good
Holding the grudge is bad
But
In the sharpness of it all, in the middle of outrage, feelings of betrayal, pain and anger how can you possibly pretend that what He did is ok. When you’ve been let down hard, why would you ever bother removing swearing words from sentences that contain Her name?
To forgive doesn’t mean what they did is ok. It simply means loving and respecting yourself enough not to let inevitable mistakes and faults of others rob you of your life. It’s just hygiene for the heart.
❓ Have you already noticed how you feel after yet another session of spiralling into thinking about the whole mess? Feels pretty shitty doesn’t it? It probably completely drains you. Kills your of enthusiasm, good mood, motivation. why would you do it to yourself? You might as well direct your attention, energy, thoughts and efforts into making yourself feel better, not worse. Now in this difficult time you need all the support, love and kindness, including your own. Don’t hate yourself by pouring buckets of misery onto your own already-suffering head.
❓ Do you really want to keep playing a victim? It can be kind of cute, especially if you are delicate-looking Bambi of a girl. There will be plenty of (secretly self-doubting) macho men and women who will readily dash to rescue you from this cruel world. But the role (like any role) of damsel in distress comes with its own (nasty) downsides. You sentence yourself to feeling small, increasingly dependent on others for safety and happiness. Marilyn Monroe is a reminder that even being a bombshell of a damsel will not play out well.
❓Are you sure that this pain will not contribute anything positive to your life? Are you sure you didn’t need the jolt created by that asshole to change smth in your life? It’s that ‘what doesn’t kill us’ thing. Let’s be honest, until the shit hits the fan we are rarely willing to REALLY change anything. It’s like we need a rude awakening’s bitchslap to get us to get clarity and motivation.
❓ For a badass level of forgiveness ask yourself this uncomfortable question:
are you sure he really is an asshole/she is really an abominable bitch? Could it be that he is just a human with his own struggles, problems and failures? Could it be that she just fucked up and not yet mature enough to see it? Could they be actually pretty decent people, just not matching you on some value that happens to be important to you? Why should the world dance according to YOUR values and decisions what’s right and wrong? Look, maybe they should. Maybe your values will save the world. But then go and figure out how to make other people willingly enthusiastically accept your values, rather than force-feed them to those close to you and pout when somebody isn’t buying it.
Forgiveness doesn’t mean accepting that what they did is ok. It simply means loving and respecting yourself enough to take your life into your own hands.
In the next posts I will share the differences between wallowing and analysing the situation to learn from it and share my own stories about ‘betrayals’ that helped my own little Bambi-damsel to graduate from a spoiled princess to an almighty queen.
