Please enjoy this excerpt from my new book, The Beautiful Road, coming soon!
No time to read? Listen here!
Of course, the word forgive is often coupled with the word forget, as in forgive and forget.
But beautiful someone, let’s take a closer look: we need to forgive, first for our own sake. It’s not a coincidence that we use phrases like “let it go” and “drop it” to talk about moving on. Unforgiveness is heavy. It allows bad experiences to literally weigh on us. It’s profoundly unhealthy to hold on to old offenses and cart them around with us like a wagon full of bricks that, let’s face it, just gets heavier as time goes by.
Forgiveness is designed to set us free.
But, and I say this with profound respect for your personal pain, be careful about the forgetting part.
Memory keeps us safe
Memory protects us and is hardwired into our psyches to keep us safe.
At two years old, we touch a hot stove, and never forget the experience. Knowing the stove is dangerous protects us from harm.
At 12, we confide a secret in someone who tells the whole school…and never forget the embarrassment. Knowing that a person isn’t trustworthy protects us from spiritual harm.
At work, we share an idea with a colleague, only to watch them claim it as their own. The experience sharpens our instincts, and we keep our best ideas under wraps in the future.
In the same way, remembering — i.e., knowing based on experience — that someone is capable of treating us badly or that a situation (job, relationship, group of people, social gathering) isn’t positive and may even be soul-sapping for us, protects us from harm.
Learning backwards, living forward
So yes, we can and should forgive, but forgetting can be in a very clear way, dangerous. One of the most often cited quotes by poet Maya Angelou is popular for a reason: “When people show you who they are, believe them.”
This is not drama, beautiful someone. It’s not, as we may be accused of, “holding on to the past” in an unhealthy way — a charge too often leveled at us by people hoping we forget their bad behavior.
Forgiving but remembering is living smart, like the intelligent, learned, emotionally mature people we are. It’s learning backwards, living forward.
#forgiveness #forgivenessheals #forgivenessjourney #forgivenessandlove