On Forgiveness

I've spent the last week both angry and depressed, my only two emotions before recovery. My anger is outward, blaming others. We all know that emotion. Sometimes it is destructive but many times it is telling and almost necessary to understanding what is unacceptable behavior. So as long as we don't act upon our anger and cause more destruction than the cause of our anger, it is okay. It is justifiable.

I can always feel the difference between this kind of anger and the kind that takes flight and starts bombing both the guilty and the innocent. I've even learned to express my justifiable anger tactfully and with kindness, really. I did this the last time my spouse drank. I told him I was leaving, that I could no longer live with his drinking and driving. That I could no longer live with the legal and financial ramifications when, not if, he got caught. I had nothing left to learn living with an active alcoholic.

But something else happened to me this last week besides justifiable anger that soon disipated as I gave it to God and forgave the offense. I became angry with myself for my actions/words years ago which I thought I had forgiven, because I believed that those actions/words were the cause of what I was angry about. I thought I was so powerful as a parent, that my child's behavior more than a decade later was my fault. And so I let myself fall into depression, blaming myself, feeling sorry for myself, because I had not been a perfect parent.

It comes down to forgiveness, not just of another's actions/words but of my own. I have not truly forgiven myself, so my actions/words continue to haunt me and cause me anguish. They control me still. But not for long, for this morning, everything I read pertained to forgiving myself. My Higher Power knows that I am finally not just aware of my need to do this but willing to take this step. To truly put the past where it goes, behind me. It doesn't mean I will forget it for it has been a great teacher. I forgive so much easier because I am forgiven...

There is so much I read this morning that I want to share with my friends in blogland, but this was the most powerful quote from a book my sponsor recommended to me more than a year ago. I have been plowing through it and almost stopped reading it, but I'm so glad this morning that I picked it up again. It's as if this is the message I was to gleam from this book. It was God's message to me today, and I only had to suffer for a few days before receiving it, before realizing that I needed to hit another bottom of sorts before being open to this great lesson:

"Forgiveness...has to do with letting go of the past--giving up the claim to control the past and refusing to be controlled by it." (The Spirituality of Imperfection, pg.223)

Amen and Amen!