Every year at the Winter Solstice I choose a word for the year. The point is to be mindful about how the word plays out in my life and to work with the word whenever it comes up. Last year my word was "forgiveness" and I thought when I drew it I was sure I knew what it would mean in my life. After ending an abusive relationship with my ex-boyfriend obviously this year would be a journey in forgiving him for all that had happened between us. I was prepared, open to forgiveness and ready to come to a place of peace about our relationship. Surprise! It's never what you think it is and I have to say, I've struggled with the lessons of forgiveness that come my way.
It's true, I did need to come to a place of forgiveness for my ex but that was such a small piece of the work I had to do around forgiveness. The biggest hurdle, even up to a couple of weeks ago, was not forgiving my ex, but forgiving myself and not just in the context of my broken relationship but for all the hurts I have experienced and have inflicted on myself. It sounds simple, if we love ourselves it should be easy to forgive ourselves. But there's a lot that's tied up into forgiveness and forgiving ourselves is harder to do than we think.
In order to forgive myself I first had to accept responsibility for the unloving acts I committed against myself. Sounds pretty intense when I put it that way, but all lessons begin with us and we are harder on ourselves than we are on others. All the secret grudges, all the failed expectations, the betrayals, the withholding of love made it incredibly difficult to forgive myself. As I worked through the things that happened in my past relationship, I realized that I kept not only myself but my son in a hurtful and abusive relationship and forgiveness seemed to slip further and further away. And it wasn't even limited to this past relationship, but was a theme in my whole life. I realized that the journey to forgiveness wasn't just about forgiveness, but was also a journey to love.
Many of us have hurtful stories about our past and mine, in comparison with people I know and have talked with, is nowhere near as bad as it could have been. But as my first therapist said, "Pain is pain and the damage done makes no comparison with others' pain". My parents both deal with personality disorders and eating disorders, alcoholism and drug addiction run rampant in my family. It was an emotionally abusive household and to help with that we were part of a very strict and unforgiving version of Christianity. The messages I got growing up were that I didn't matter, everyone else mattered more than me, my feelings were not to be tolerated, and expectations were ridiculously high; I could never be good enough. I was a sad and lonely little girl, desperate to have my parents' love and approval and quick to punish myself at each and every failure of their expectations and desires, and I failed often.
This theme followed me into my marriage. I wanted to be the perfect wife and perfect mother. I wanted my husband to see me as an equal, to be a partner, to earn his love, respect and admiration for all that I was and all that I could do. But the people we choose are reflections of ourselves. I believed that my feelings didn't matter and everyone else mattered more than me, so I chose a man who could never see me as his equal, whose value of me only came from how I made him look in other people's eyes, who couldn't appreciate the various quirks that made me the person that I was and in that marriage I was, again, a sad and lonely little girl.
By the time I met my ex-boyfriend, I was desperate for any thread of love I could put my finger on and I was swept away by him. But in spite of four years of therapy I hadn't learned to love myself so again, I chose poorly. I was so desperate to be loved and to not be alone that I stayed in an abusive relationship and kept my son there too. We fought constantly and said horrible things to each other and I believed every criticism and every accusation. My self-worth and self-love weren't really low, they weren't even realities I could recognize. The best thing that happened in that relationship was my ex leaving me and I regretted that for a single day.
It would be so easy to say I just need to forgive my parents, my ex-husband and my ex-boyfriend and be on my merry way, but it isn't that easy. Forgiving others is so much easier than forgiving ourselves. I have to forgive myself for the choices that I made that hurt me and others. I have to forgive myself for every poisonous word I whispered in my head when I failed. I have to forgive myself for shutting out the inner voices of a hurt little girl who told me to leave so many times, for turning her away when she cried for love and I wouldn't give it, for hurting my son. And to do that, I have to love myself enough to know that withholding forgiveness of myself continues to hurt me in a way that is totally contrary to self-love.
So that has been my journey. Learning to love and value myself enough to forgive myself for the hurt I have caused both myself and those I care about. Forgiving myself for the choices I made that hurt me was hard enough, forgiving myself for the choices I made that hurt my son has been the most difficult, but I'm getting there. As I've gone through this journey I've had the opportunity to talk to a lot of people about self-forgiveness and so many of us struggle with it, but it really is a key component on the path of living an emotionally healthy life; and it's worth the struggle.
This is probably something I am going to struggle with for a long time. I learned self-forgiveness as an adult and it's certainly not second nature, but even though my year with this word is done, I am not done with this word and it is in my best interest to be mindful of it as I move through my life. When I started this process of healing ten months ago, I thought the end-point would be my healed self, and so it will be, but not in the way I was thinking. There is no end-point until I'm pushing up daisies and while healing is an important component along the way, this isn't a journey of healing so much as it's a journey of love. I know, enough with the love already! But it is.
The over-arching theme of my life has been one in which I seek union with the Divine. But how can I possibly understand Divine love if I can't even love myself? And if I can't love myself, how can I hope to draw people to my life who love me? And if I can't love myself, I can't forgive myself and I can't move forward because I'm stuck in a swamp of self-loathing and recrimination. They're all connected. So as I move along this path of love I must hold forgiveness close, understanding that love and forgiveness are inextricably intertwined.
Winter Solstice 2011 just passed a few days ago and indeed I chose another word. This year's experience with forgiveness has made me a bit wary of this process and it was with some trepidation that I chose my new word. The word for this year is "integrity". I put the word back in the bowl with the others and chose another word. But integrity is my word for this year and so I fished it out knowing that I can't avoid the lessons. I am interested to see how this word plays out in my life in the coming year, but I know it's not going to be anything I expect. I have some preliminary thoughts about places I can go with it, but that's going to be nothing in comparison with what life itself will bring about.
It is my hope, as always, to be open to these lessons and accept them with courage and grace. My eyes and heart will be open, but I have a secret hope that it won't be too hard. I guess we'll have to see. In the meantime, I am mindful that words are powerful when we work to give them meaning in our lives, they can be transformative. There is now enough forgiveness and enough love in my life to face this new word's challenge. I value integrity and am committed to it in my own life, we'll have to see where the lessons lie.
As we are in the holiday season, I'm very aware that this year the most precious gift I have received is forgiveness and I'm so grateful I could find it. I'm holding on tight to it so I don't have to go in search of it again. It's been a powerful word for me this year, transforming, and I'm grateful that attention to a single word can be so powerful if we are willing to pay attention and to open ourselves up to the lesson.
