Days of Healing Days of Joy....................................................Dec. 11th

"Any man can seek revenge. It takes a king or prince to grant a pardon"......................................................................Arthur J. Rehrat

Revenge is the simplest and easiest of quests. But it is a self-defeating action. It doesn't get the job done.

Forgiveness, on the other hand, is the gesture of a healthier mentality and power. The nobility of pardon is in the elevated wisdom that by not forgiving we are, in fact, injuring ourselves. As long as we fail to forgive, we condemn ourselves to be fixated at our point of pain.

Carrying our anger, rage, and revenge from the past into the present can become an automatic response. We will probably need to work overtime to maintain and justify our outrage at what happened to us in the past, and at the price we have paid since. We can become so single-minded that it becomes a holy mission to carry this blind resentment to the grave.

But then we become like a grave, and the lack of pardon is the corpse within, contaminating everything we touch.
_____________________________
As I grow in understanding, I grow in forgiveness. Today I will practice my program and continue to grow.

This one hits very close to home for me. I'm guilty of carrying anger and resentment from the past into the present time. My oldest sister was my tormentor as a child and continued it into adulthood, and I don't know why. I've tried forgiving her for this, even in therapy but it didn't work and she continued the torment after I ceased therapy. I've asked her why she does this, but of course get no explanation. I recently got a "note" saying (tongue-in-cheek) that she was sorry and didn't deserve forgiveness. How am I supposed to forgive that? So I struggle with this, and while I should forgive for my own sake, not hers -- I'm still finding it very difficult. I have a lot of work to do on this.