I am really appreciative of the willingness and desire of my guest blogger, my daughter Michal, to create and share yesterday’s gratitude blog. First of all, it’s exciting to me that she’s interested in and thinks a lot about the blessings in her life and is enthusiastic about sharing her insights. Second, it’s so cool that she’s such a good writer and has the maturity and depth of wisdom to share thoughtful perspective on a variety of subjects. And third, it’s great when one is tired and overwhelmed with a bunch of tasks that need doing to be able to turn the important work of writing this blog over to someone with the capacity to carry it out without missing a beat. Thanks, Michal!
I find today that I am continuing in thought about concepts of letting go and forgiveness. I realized that I had been holding my breath–figuratively and literally–anticipating an encounter I knew I was going to have with a person who had been a source of recent heartache in my life. While I knew that on the surface I could manage to be calm and professional, I was less certain about how I would feel on the inside. When we met this afternoon, as part of a meeting with a larger group of people, it was easy and natural, and if I had been holding my breath I was able to let it out. It let me know that I have progressed through some of the stages of healing and forgiveness, and while I’m fairly confident that I’m not completely over the pain, finished with grieving, and ready to fully move on, I can nevertheless say that I’ve made a lot of progress.
Forgiveness and letting go is not a sprint; it’s definitely more of a long distance endurance race. We don’t instantly arrive at forgiveness: even if we can truly forgive from our heart, we nonetheless find that the grief and anger and wounded-ness remains for a time. We heal from this in stages–sometimes smoothly, sometimes in fits and starts. But if we start with the intention of wanting to heal, of wanting to let go without wishing ill on another person then we can’t help but move toward that, even if our progress is sometimes painfully slow. I am not much of a grudge-holder: even when it would seem legitimate that I would be righteously angry with another human being, I nonetheless have a hard time with clinging to the anger and other emotions. And as I get older, the less I am interested in holding on to “old junk,” past hurts, perceived injustices, etc. At the end of the day, Jack Kornfield’s three questions remain, “Did I love well? Did I live fully? Did I learn to let go?” How I answer those questions will determine the outcome of my life. Given that, many of the small petty challenges I face from different quarters fade into insignificance.
I am grateful for the primer I’m receiving about forgiveness. It must mean that I need to be doing more work with this both within myself and the people around me. It isn’t easy work, but very worthwhile. I am glad to have reconnected with some of the people who have “broken my heart.” Their presence provides me with a gauge of how I’m doing in the letting go department and the ongoing opportunity to keep working on it. They are, in that sense, the gift that keeps on giving. And for that I am truly grateful.
