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Purpose of Forgiveness
What is the purpose of forgiveness, friends? To let something go, not to continue to live it. I have an awkward history with forgiveness. I was not forgiven for not forgiving. It is releasing the hold that person’s words or actions had on you. I think letting go is a good meaning for me. And…
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See What Is Right
Identifying something as wrong… Has that ever done anything useful for you, friends? Served a constructive purpose? Is that like me saying I wish I had done this or that? Yes. Does that make you function better? Einstein had an insight that applies to this, and it has been said in many ways by many…
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Feel The Heart
How do you feel the heart? When you are in your community, the events around you happen all of themselves. Everyone sees everyone else. Everyone is aware to some degree of everything that is going on in their environment. You don’t have to choose this. You can embrace this rather than try to shut it…
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Clearing Your Head
I am convinced emotion is a big part of memory. It’s been proven, to the point of a phenomenon called flashbulb memory. When you are in pain or afraid, your amygdale underscores every element of that event. Then will replay it involuntarily the next time anything even remotely resembles that. So forgiveness is clearing your…
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Starting Over
Anyone get really ticked off lately? End:CIV – In a nutshell, it talks about how civilization as we know it is the ‘machine’ that is destroying the planet. Ah yes, also known (though not commonly) as the cyberpunk movement. So why do you become angry with this? Because it does seem to be true and it’s…
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Your Power
Can you better the world by practicing forgiveness? I would say you can interact with it with more wisdom and clarity, so potentially yes. Not directly, but yes your point is valid. I’ve said this before, but people can use forgiveness to control. i.e. in the church, for instance. Often times, the idea that things…
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Forgiveness Is For You
Forgiveness is giving up all hope for a better past. That sums it up perfectly. You are here now. Can you be here now if you have old grudges in your mind? Can you pay full attention to your life that way, or actually help make anything better? Hoping for a better past is truly…
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Forgiveness Is Not Permissiveness
Forgiveness is not permissiveness. If you shove me, I will not like it. If you shove me, I won’t appreciate it at first. It isn’t pleasant to be shoved, but I will take a moment and look around. If you shoved me out of the way of a speeding car about to hit me, I…
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What Good Is Judgement?
Let’s argue the other side of things. What good do your judgements do for you? Has anyone had a better life from things they judged? I could say they help you avoid danger. Wasn’t that your experiences? I have heard many stories of people who made a judgement and it cost them their life. One particularly…
Category: Forgiveness
The need for forgiveness is universal. Forgiveness is not someone else’s sanction. You do not need anyone’s permission to exist. Forgiveness is just tolerance for error. It has nothing to do with altering someone else’s state of mind, that’s well outside of anyone’s realm of influence. When someone comes to you seeking forgiveness, they are actually just seeking consolation, affirmation that you and they are at peace. They cannot ask you for what they will not give themselves.
Forgiving is not forgetting. Forgiving is seeing any event as it is, just an event, one of many possible events that can happen at any given time, and realizing that as anything arises it can just as certainly fall away. The only thing that persists is your own attitude.
“When you hold resentment toward another, you are bound to that person or condition by an emotional link that is stronger than steel. Forgiveness is the only way to dissolve that link and get free.” Catherine Ponder
“To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.” Lewis B. Smedes
“The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.” Mahatma Gandhi (Indian Philosopher, internationally esteemed for his doctrine of nonviolent protest, 1869-1948)