Day Eighty Three

When we talked about forgiveness before we discussed how we can let go of our shame and embarrassment by forgiving ourselves by accepting, apologising, and changing our behaviour.

Another way forgiveness makes sense to me is by moving away from the idea that forgiveness means you are approving of the behaviour. Forgiving others, and yourself, doesn’t mean you’re co-signing the behaviour as something acceptable; you are simply letting go of the power it holds over you by living in the shame and anger.

This is an ongoing process, and one that has taken years for me, but knowing I can still disprove of treatment I had endured and things I had done whilst moving past it, was so freeing. It let go of the chatter that was endlessly taking up space in my brain.

The pain that lived inside me over the mistreatment is still there in some ways, but it resides in there alongside all the things that make it bearable. I can engineer my life so the people who caused me the greatest harm are not in it, and I can use my experience of recovery from their actions to help other people who are in the middle of the pain, because as I have reiterated, we are not alone.

I also have a great example of forgiveness from all the people that forgave me. I got caught up in the people that held my actions against me, and looked past my Champions and my friends who saw the good inside me past the things I did when I was in pain. I put the microscope on their love and forgiveness, and it helps me move forward knowing I’m a loveable human who made human mistakes.