Forgiveness of Others vs. Forgiveness of Self
I have a real issue with forgiveness. Not of others really, of myself.
A perfectionist by nature, it is devastating to my spirit if I think that someone is mad at me, or that I've made a mistake in some way and someone else has to point it out.
As I've already mentioned in earlier entries, forgiveness was hard to come by in my household. My parents had a memory a mile long, and trespasses weren't easily forgotten or forgiven.
I learned to internalize my guilt and remorse and expressed it through self-injury and an eating disorder. I always wanted credit for trying, and that was almost always impossible in a "there is no try, just do" world.
For years, I carried around a tremendous amount of anger towards my father for what he'd done to my family and to my emotional well-being. In the end, I realized this anger was costing my father nothing and me, everything. If I was to truly be able to to move forward, I had to let it go. But to ask me to forgive him was almost impossible. I believed if I forgave my father for what he'd done, I'd in some way be saying that what he'd done was okay.
Not true.
To forgive my father allowed me to go forward and move past issues that had been holding me back. So what if he'd never apologized for what he'd done? So what if he didn't deserve my forgiveness? The reality was I was the one who was to benefit by forgiving him, and so because I was worth it, I had to do it.
But forgiving myself was a different issue.
Although I believed I deserved to move on emotionally, I wasn't in a place where I could allow myself forgiveness. Not because I was a bad person, but because I didn't feel like I had truly shown repentance. It sounds comical now. I mean, my body was black and blue, bleeding and literally starving to death. But I still didn't feel like it was "enough."
Why?
Because growing up it was never enough.
It has been tremendously hard to grow into emotional adulthood when so much of my growth was stunted in my childhood and adolescence. I've had to create new rules for myself and give myself permission for personal forgiveness even when sometimes I wanted to believe I hadn't done enough to say "I'm sorry" or to fix the mistake.
Forgiveness isn't saying it's okay. It's a matter of drawing a line in the sand and saying from this point on, I'm leaving these issues behind and looking forward.
Forgiveness is a very powerful part of the human make-up. It is critical that in order to be emotionally whole, we give ourselves permission not to be perfect and to grant ourselves the grace that most of us so generously bestow upon others.
I've learned that I am worthy of forgiveness. You are too!
A perfectionist by nature, it is devastating to my spirit if I think that someone is mad at me, or that I've made a mistake in some way and someone else has to point it out.
As I've already mentioned in earlier entries, forgiveness was hard to come by in my household. My parents had a memory a mile long, and trespasses weren't easily forgotten or forgiven.
I learned to internalize my guilt and remorse and expressed it through self-injury and an eating disorder. I always wanted credit for trying, and that was almost always impossible in a "there is no try, just do" world.
For years, I carried around a tremendous amount of anger towards my father for what he'd done to my family and to my emotional well-being. In the end, I realized this anger was costing my father nothing and me, everything. If I was to truly be able to to move forward, I had to let it go. But to ask me to forgive him was almost impossible. I believed if I forgave my father for what he'd done, I'd in some way be saying that what he'd done was okay.
Not true.
To forgive my father allowed me to go forward and move past issues that had been holding me back. So what if he'd never apologized for what he'd done? So what if he didn't deserve my forgiveness? The reality was I was the one who was to benefit by forgiving him, and so because I was worth it, I had to do it.
But forgiving myself was a different issue.
Although I believed I deserved to move on emotionally, I wasn't in a place where I could allow myself forgiveness. Not because I was a bad person, but because I didn't feel like I had truly shown repentance. It sounds comical now. I mean, my body was black and blue, bleeding and literally starving to death. But I still didn't feel like it was "enough."
Why?
Because growing up it was never enough.
It has been tremendously hard to grow into emotional adulthood when so much of my growth was stunted in my childhood and adolescence. I've had to create new rules for myself and give myself permission for personal forgiveness even when sometimes I wanted to believe I hadn't done enough to say "I'm sorry" or to fix the mistake.
Forgiveness isn't saying it's okay. It's a matter of drawing a line in the sand and saying from this point on, I'm leaving these issues behind and looking forward.
Forgiveness is a very powerful part of the human make-up. It is critical that in order to be emotionally whole, we give ourselves permission not to be perfect and to grant ourselves the grace that most of us so generously bestow upon others.
I've learned that I am worthy of forgiveness. You are too!