When considering things in your past that you are having a
difficult time forgiving, have you ever considered why you did what you did?
For me, I came to the conclusion that I was completely lost. I lost my moral
compass and at the time and I actually believed I was making the better
decision. I can’t explain how this happened. My wife in her wisdom says that my
brain was hijacked. I would have to add to that that so was my heart and soul.
This in no way is trying to devise an excuse for my actions but just a way to
say that something happened that wrongly convinced me that my decisions were
the best ones for me at the time.
Some of you may have feelings that you should have done
something to prevent a bad thing from happening but you didn’t. So, you end up carrying unnecessary guilt and
shame your whole life. Many times, you
may not even have an idea what you could have done differently, but you believe
it is your fault anyway. I once knew a
woman who lived her entire life withdrawn, shy, and socially awkward. After she died, her husband and I were talking
and he told me that she had a completely normal childhood until age
twelve. At that time, her parents owned
a small general store and one day they asked her to run an errand for
them. When she came back she found her
parents dead from stab wounds following a robbery. Something snapped in that twelve year old
heart and she was never the same. Her
husband told me she blamed herself her entire life for their deaths, thinking
that had she been there she could have prevented the whole thing. A twelve year old girl!
She isn’t alone. I’ve
heard abuse victims, both child and adult, blame themselves for the abuse they
suffered. They believe that if they had
only acted differently, said the right things, fought the right way, or fought
back at all they could have prevented the angry attacks. They believe it is their fault they were
abused. The toll this takes on their
lives is devastating. Let’s get
something straight. I don’t care what
you said or how you said it, what you did or how you did it, you do not deserve
to be abused. Abuse is the sole problem
of the abuser. Period!
Another reason we
make decisions we later regret is that we are trying to fill a void in our lives.
You may have no idea at the time what that void was or even that that’s what
you were doing but whatever you did brought relief from the emptiness even if
only for a moment. It was only when you discovered that your decisions were not
working in your life and were, in fact, becoming destructive that you realized
you needed to change. Unfortunately,
often it is only through the process of realizing what doesn’t work that we
inch closer to discovering what does.
Reflection on and processing of the events in our lives that
we can’t seem to forgive is imperative.
Did you make poor choices to escape pain? Are you putting unrealistic or impossible
expectations on yourself thinking you could have changed the course of events
that were beyond your control? Are you
allowing space in your life to understand that you are human and will make
mistakes? Do you extend the same amount
of empathy to yourself that you do to others?
Can you use bad decisions to learn and grow rather than allow them to
turn you bitter and angry? Give yourself
a break. Bad decisions and poor choices
are part of the journey of life. What is
important is how you deal with them.
Reflect on what life lessons you could learn if only you would release
yourself from the shame in your past.
Tomorrow: Finding the silver lining
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