Forgiveness, Inside and Out

This is my sixth post in a series, where each Monday I will post about a point of reflection or insight that I will use to reflect and meditate on during the week. In order to make it a bit more focused and interesting, I will attempt to do this with topics beginning with letters from A to Z. I have often found that having a specific topic to reflect and/or meditate on during the week really lends itself to interesting insights and growth, because you not only have several days to reflect and meditate on the topic, but you have several days to put any lessons and insights that you discover to work in your every day life. For those that follow me on Twitter (@JasonLivingNow) I will try to write updates as the weekly topics come up during meditations, moments of reflection, or just during every day life. To view the current and previous entries in this series, please visit the: Reflections and Insights A Through Z section.

My son enjoying a kiddie pool, and some puppy kisses!

F= Forgiveness, Inside and Out: Learning forgiveness is an essential tool in living a truly happy and fulfilled life. Every one of us has had past experiences that have caused us hurt and pain, forgiveness involves releasing the power (control) that the memories from these experience have on us. We cannot change negative events from our past; however, we have the power to control how that event will shape and effect us in the present, and in the future. We may never be able to “forgive and forget”, but at the very least we can rise above those past experiences, and not let them continually cause us to feel hurt, pain, anger, and resentment.

Holding onto negativity from our past is a serious roadblock to personal and spiritual development. By hanging on to past experiences, you are only hurting yourself, because continually holding onto anger and resentment is not hurting or effecting the person that caused you pain, instead it is only causing pain to yourself. Also, if you continually focus on the past, you will never be able to fully live in the now, and enjoy your life fully and completely. You must be able to release the past, and forgive those that have caused you pain.

This is something that I have had to really work on over the past few years, because instead of truly forgiving people and events in my past, I merely covered them up and tried to simply “move on” with my life. However, this never truly works, because until you truly examine past experience, and forgive those that caused them, they will continually lurk beneath the surface, only to continually break through into your dreams, waking thoughts, and emotions. I may decide that I don’t want anything further to do with an individual that purposefully caused me pain, but I can forgive them for their actions, and wish them well in their life.