I just recently read a wonderful newsletter about forgiveness, by Robert and Diane Masters. Forgiveness has been a powerful topic for me in the last year, it was a word I worked with intentionally and consciously. Having worked with rape victims and experiencing abuse in my own life, I know how difficult forgiveness can be, but I also know how important it is.
Forgiveness is directly related to love; eventually love for the other person, but ultimately love for ourselves. It is also a two-sided coin as we don't just have to forgive the people who have hurt us, but we also need to forgive ourselves for putting ourselves in situations where we were hurt. That doesn't mean we deserved what happened to us, or even that it was our fault, but we do have to take responsibility for the actions we took that put us in the position to be hurt in the first place.
It's easy for me to look back on my past relationships and feel angry, hurt, and justified in holding on to those feelings, but the truth is I am hurt more by holding on to those feelings because I am blocked from the self-love and Universal love that is always there for me. If I can't forgive those who have hurt me, I cannot forgive myself for allowing myself to be hurt and therefore I cannot move into a place of self-love that the hurt parts of my psyche so desperately need.
My dear boyfriend once said, and I'm paraphrasing here, that all people, even those who hurt others, are trying to achieve grace. There are those who have better tools than others to seek grace, but it's really what we all want. When people are hurtful, abusive, violent it really speaks to their inner pain and their inability to find that grace within themselves; that alone is a reason for compassion. How horrible it is to crave that divine love, the beauty and peace of grace, and never feel as though you can achieve it.
The people who have hurt me in my life are all people who are in deep pain and probably always will be. They caused me pain out of their own deep pain, not because they are evil. As someone who strives to bring love and healing to others, I cannot ignore the cries of pain that their actions belie. My own heart hurts at those expressions of pain and because of that, I can forgive.
I don't have to hold on to my pain and anger as a way to continually punish them (and ultimately myself), their lives are punishment enough. Instead I can forgive them and even love them in a certain way, knowing that they are doing the best they can with a very poor and unsuitable tool kit with which to do better. Has it been easy? Certainly not! In my weaker moments, when I am tired, stressed, overwhelmed or just a bit down, those feelings of anger and hurt can easily come creeping back in. But then I remember who I am and who we all are, that we are all beings on a journey trying to reach grace. In my worst moments, my own inability to achieve grace hurts. I understand that pain and then, I can understand their pain.
Forgiveness is one of the many paths to love, for ourselves and to others. It provides a deep healing that doesn't excuse the pain others have caused us, but allows us to see it in a different light. When we can forgive we move from a place of victimization, a place stuck in the past, into the glorious present, where hopefully, we are not being hurt anymore.
I will never be able to change the fact that I have been hurt, but I don't have to live there anymore, because that is no longer my life. In my journey to heal I have come to a place where I am loved and cared for by many people, and although I still have contact with a couple of people who have hurt me in the past, I am no longer hurt by them anymore, because their path to causing me pain has been paved over by the love and forgiveness I have worked for. Do they still annoy me sometimes? Yes, but that is more about my expectations that they be different than anything they do.
The power to not be hurt by others ultimately lies in our hands. When we are taken by surprise, or have specific expectations of another's behavior we can be hurt; I can still be hurt. But what I am no longer is a victim, because now I have the tools to understand where that hurt comes from within me. The focus is no longer on those who hurt, but how I am vulnerable within myself to be hurt. That's actually an empowering perspective. When I understand the source of that within me, I then have the power to transform that hurt into deeper understanding and strength, which ultimately leads me to forgiveness and love.
Forgiveness is difficult, but it is also vital to our well-being and our own growth. It takes time and a lot of work, but the love and grace we receive and then can give, through forgiveness, is worth every effort we can make. Love yourself enough to forgive and eventually you will find enough love to embrace the world.
Showing posts with label self-love. Show all posts
Showing posts with label self-love. Show all posts
Saturday, June 2, 2012
Sunday, July 17, 2011
The Love that Must Come from Within
I had a troubling yet revealing conversation last night which led me down a path of deep thought and some very necessary self-honesty. It has been 10 months since the abusive relationship I was in ended. I have spent a lot of this time processing through all the details of that relationship and trying to understand the effects of it on me and my son as well as the role I played in the abuse and that relationship.
I have to admit to a desire to reach a point where I am not reminded of the relationship or triggered by something because, in truth, I want to put as much distance between me and the relationship as possible. Who wouldn't? There are unpleasant realities that lie in sorting through all that happened and all that it means and being done would be nice. However, I'm finding that there is always more to understand and come to terms with and I have to release the idea of being done and accept what comes because, as I said, there is always more.
A lot of really bad things happened in that relationship as they do in any abusive relationship. It's easy to look at the person who is the loudest and the meanest and blame them for everything, but the truth is that anyone who would be seen as the victim in the relationship engages in the abuse equally if not more. I turned against myself, I did things I thought I would never do, allowed things to happen that were obviously wrong and hurtful and even though I was miserable and hurting I still made the choice to stay and participate. Common understanding in domestic violence is that there is a great deal of control and manipulation which make it difficult, if not impossible, for a victim of domestic violence to leave, but I have to understand that in my case it was the sad image I carried of myself that made me feel as though I deserved what was happening and, as was pointed out to me last night, that would lead to my ultimate self-destruction, my death.
That stopped me in my tracks. My death? I was on a road to death? I didn't want to see that, really had trouble acknowledging it but as I came to understand last night, where else does a path of self-destruction lead except to our own destruction? What is more, I was a willing participant, a volunteer. I was seeking my own end, suicide by proxy, I just wasn't willing to admit it. It boggles the mind, really, but it doesn't take much soul searching to come to understand that I thought so little of myself, had such a poor self-image and had rejected myself as worthy of love that instead of seeking the love I needed, I sought death. In my mind I didn't deserve love and I didn't deserve to live. That realization will hit you right between the eyes. There is nowhere to hide once you can accept that realization as true. You can't blame the abuser and hide under the details of all the horrible things that happened, you can only look to yourself and begin to understand.
At no time should anyone think that a person who is in an abusive relationship deserves what they get; no one deserves to be abused. But as a woman who was in an abusive relationship I cannot fail to acknowledge that I put myself in that situation, did horrible things to myself and allowed horrible things to happen. I made a choice to stay, to accept what was happening, to become complicit in my own abuse and to become a hand in my own destruction. I have to accept responsibility for the choices I made or I am doomed to make them all over again.
I have to understand that contrary to what I told myself I wasn't seeking love, I was seeking death and it came from a rejection of self so complete that I was willing to kill that self, but was too cowardly to admit it and do it myself so I found someone who would do it for me. How sad that is, how incredibly tragic and unfortunately, how common a tale that really is. Did I need love and want love? Of course, but the love I needed wasn't love from someone else, but was love from myself. I was never going to find the love I needed, wanted and deserved until I loved myself the way I needed, wanted and deserved.
As I have walked through my life I have looked for the important things like love and acceptance outside of myself, but these things must come first from within. If I don't love and accept myself first the only love and acceptance I'll find will be false. The people we are with are mirrors of how we feel about ourselves. I had to sit with that one a little bit for the full impact of it to hit me. The people we are with are mirrors of how we feel about ourselves and I was with someone who was going to kill me...damn.
I've had to do a lot of work to reclaim the self I rejected. It took a dark night of the soul to reclaim that part of me I had locked away and to learn to love myself again. The self I have reclaimed I love fiercely and deeply. No one will hurt me like that again, most especially myself. I cherish myself and my life and I have goals and dreams and desires, most importantly a desire to live a happy, healthy, long life. I deserve to be loved and cherished by me and in my relationships, but I have to remember that being loved and cherished starts with me. Without that, I really have no hope of achieving all I hope to accomplish. Above all, I cannot forget the dark potential that lies in denying myself love, it is a road that leads to a tragic end and I don't deserve that. No one does.
I have to admit to a desire to reach a point where I am not reminded of the relationship or triggered by something because, in truth, I want to put as much distance between me and the relationship as possible. Who wouldn't? There are unpleasant realities that lie in sorting through all that happened and all that it means and being done would be nice. However, I'm finding that there is always more to understand and come to terms with and I have to release the idea of being done and accept what comes because, as I said, there is always more.
A lot of really bad things happened in that relationship as they do in any abusive relationship. It's easy to look at the person who is the loudest and the meanest and blame them for everything, but the truth is that anyone who would be seen as the victim in the relationship engages in the abuse equally if not more. I turned against myself, I did things I thought I would never do, allowed things to happen that were obviously wrong and hurtful and even though I was miserable and hurting I still made the choice to stay and participate. Common understanding in domestic violence is that there is a great deal of control and manipulation which make it difficult, if not impossible, for a victim of domestic violence to leave, but I have to understand that in my case it was the sad image I carried of myself that made me feel as though I deserved what was happening and, as was pointed out to me last night, that would lead to my ultimate self-destruction, my death.
That stopped me in my tracks. My death? I was on a road to death? I didn't want to see that, really had trouble acknowledging it but as I came to understand last night, where else does a path of self-destruction lead except to our own destruction? What is more, I was a willing participant, a volunteer. I was seeking my own end, suicide by proxy, I just wasn't willing to admit it. It boggles the mind, really, but it doesn't take much soul searching to come to understand that I thought so little of myself, had such a poor self-image and had rejected myself as worthy of love that instead of seeking the love I needed, I sought death. In my mind I didn't deserve love and I didn't deserve to live. That realization will hit you right between the eyes. There is nowhere to hide once you can accept that realization as true. You can't blame the abuser and hide under the details of all the horrible things that happened, you can only look to yourself and begin to understand.
At no time should anyone think that a person who is in an abusive relationship deserves what they get; no one deserves to be abused. But as a woman who was in an abusive relationship I cannot fail to acknowledge that I put myself in that situation, did horrible things to myself and allowed horrible things to happen. I made a choice to stay, to accept what was happening, to become complicit in my own abuse and to become a hand in my own destruction. I have to accept responsibility for the choices I made or I am doomed to make them all over again.
I have to understand that contrary to what I told myself I wasn't seeking love, I was seeking death and it came from a rejection of self so complete that I was willing to kill that self, but was too cowardly to admit it and do it myself so I found someone who would do it for me. How sad that is, how incredibly tragic and unfortunately, how common a tale that really is. Did I need love and want love? Of course, but the love I needed wasn't love from someone else, but was love from myself. I was never going to find the love I needed, wanted and deserved until I loved myself the way I needed, wanted and deserved.
As I have walked through my life I have looked for the important things like love and acceptance outside of myself, but these things must come first from within. If I don't love and accept myself first the only love and acceptance I'll find will be false. The people we are with are mirrors of how we feel about ourselves. I had to sit with that one a little bit for the full impact of it to hit me. The people we are with are mirrors of how we feel about ourselves and I was with someone who was going to kill me...damn.
I've had to do a lot of work to reclaim the self I rejected. It took a dark night of the soul to reclaim that part of me I had locked away and to learn to love myself again. The self I have reclaimed I love fiercely and deeply. No one will hurt me like that again, most especially myself. I cherish myself and my life and I have goals and dreams and desires, most importantly a desire to live a happy, healthy, long life. I deserve to be loved and cherished by me and in my relationships, but I have to remember that being loved and cherished starts with me. Without that, I really have no hope of achieving all I hope to accomplish. Above all, I cannot forget the dark potential that lies in denying myself love, it is a road that leads to a tragic end and I don't deserve that. No one does.
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