I learned a few years ago that if you don't forgive people their transgressions, its like you're drinking poison and expecting the other person to die from it. It doesn't work. You have to forgive people in order to heal and move on in your own life. With coming to terms with my past and forgiving people, I feel like it's propelled me to new heights in life. I no longer am an angry and depressed person. I found my smile!
Well, about 3/4 of the way into the show, they started talking about forgiving yourself, and as soon as they said that, it kinda woke me up. Forgive myself??? Hmmm, that's a new concept I'd never explored! As they kept talking, it hit me that I never forgave myself for not ammending my relationship with my real father before he transitioned in October of 2011.
My father and I never really had a solid relationship. Sometimes, we'd go for 10 years without speaking to one another. This was the way it was for my whole life, and I finally accepted it for what it was about 10 years before he transitioned. Long story short, we had a HUGE falling out around that time and I chose not to speak to him ever again. I chose my pride over trying to come from a place of understanding how he thought. I wasn't able to accept him for who he was. I wanted him to be who I wanted him to be, and when he couldn't, it upset me pretty badly.
Then one day, out of the clear blue, I get a message from a friend on Facebook telling me they were sorry to hear about the passing of my father! WHAT THE HELL??? The passing of my father? Are you freaking kidding me? That news definitely threw a wrench into my plans. When I asked my friend how she knew, she said she read it in an obituary from the local newspaper. So I immediately got on the Internet to find out if it was true and sure enough, it was. Not only that, I found out from the obituary that he endured a lengthy battle with cancer and passed on two days before I found out. I never even knew my father was sick. No one told me. If I had known he was sick, I definitely would have put my pride aside and ammended my relationship with him. But I didn't know he was sick, and it was too late! Come to find out from my father's girlfriend who I met via the mortuary, he thought I wouldn't have cared if he was sick, lived, or died, so that's why he never reached out to tell me.
Suddenly, I was riddled with an overwhelming feeling of guilt. In my state of grief, I couldn't get over the fact that I had too much pride to let the past be the past. I also couldn't get over the fact that my father passed on believing that I didn't want anything to do with him. That broke my heart so badly. And as I sit here and type this, it still breaks my heart. I haven't forgiven myself totally and completely for my actions.
I know that if I don't forgive myself and move on from the chains of unforgiveness, I will be bound by this guilt for the rest of my life. I have to be gentle with myself like I was with everyone else. I need to seek God in all of this and allow His wisdom to shine down on my life! I need to open my heart and find peace in the decissions I made not to have my father in my life.
I need to forgive me!
