One of the most important lessons I learned this year was the liberating power of forgiveness.
The year is ending.
A new dawn is upon us and yet our hearts still bears the marks left upon it by people closest to us. Marks we can easily erase, if only we make the decision to forgive.
We ask the good Lord everyday to forgive us of our sins and wipe our slate clean.
We get up from our knees with such light heartedness because we know in that moment that all is forgiven.
Every day we fall back onto our knees in prayer and every day we get up lighter than when we went down.
I wish we could do that before the year comes to an end…forgive.
My prayer is that we forgive and forget every misdeed committed against us by our very own selves and others. I pray we find the courage to forgive ourselves for ourselves.
Forgiveness is a gift you can give to yourself. I know many us of have tried and failed at a number of things this year, so I hope that you can forgive yourself for every failure.
Because at the end of the day you tried. You tried to do the right thing, you tried to start that business, you tried to get fitter, and you kept trying at whatever it was.
The effort you put in, that’s what counts. God knows it and you know it.
If you had known better you would’ve done better.
The thing about forgiveness is that it relieves you of carrying that burden of resentment.
You become lighter when you forgive. Forgiveness is liberating.
It’s having enough courage to stand up and say I forgive. I’m done with this. I’m moving forward.
Forgiveness is a gift you can give to yourself to be at peace.
You don’t forgive because you are weak but because you are strong enough to realize that only by giving up the hurt and pain can you truly fully live and love.
So my prayer is that you find the courage.
Because it takes courage to forgive.
Courage to understand that the act that requires forgiveness can and could be committed again, by the exact same person, or by a different person.
It takes courage to be able to forgive and try again. Courage to say
“I forgive you. I’m finished with this. “
But courage takes time to develop.
It is not an inborn trait, it’s a virtue that is nurtured and developed with time.
Any one of us can be courageous. All of us should be courageous.
For courage is the most important of all the virtues.
Without courage, you cannot practice any other virtue consistently. It’s impossible.
Think about it for a second.
Think about love, kindness, forgiveness…by loving you risk not being loved in return, by showing kindness you risk being unappreciated, by always forgiving you risk being taken for granted. Patience too takes lots of courage. It takes courage to put ourselves at the very centre of risk.
You can be kind, true and fair now and again. But for it to be consistent, one needs courage.
And that is how you can start to forgive. By slowly developing courage so that you can be able to forgive time and time again.
We forgive so that we can glimpse a piece of heaven.
We forgive to grant ourselves the gift of peace and lightness. Forgiveness isn’t a ticket to be invited back to our arms or dining tables. No
When we forgive, we are cleaning the open wounds on our hearts so that when the time comes, when we’re granted the gift of forgetting, the pain from those scars will not be felt anymore.
And because we’ve felt this pain and carried it for a while… we become careful of how our actions and words could inflict that same pain on another heart and soul.
Forgiveness is but a start to a process of self compassion, healing and moving forward.
Forgiveness is one of the highest forms of self care…for to allow the bitter roots of anger and resentment to fester is to allow the goodness within us all to be poisoned. When we forgive, we can avoid that.
Forgiveness has nothing to do with absolving a criminal of his crime. It has everything to do with relieving oneself of the burden of being a victim–letting go of the pain and transforming oneself from victim to survivor.
I know that when your memories are freshly opened wounds, forgiveness is the most unnatural of human emotions. But it can still be done.
I urge you to forgive, forget and start afresh with the coming year.
A new dawn is upon us.
And with it a chance to wholly and fully begin again.
I hope you find the courage to forgive.
Keep hanging onto hope_Naks.
