Foregiveness

I'm not sure where to start on this matter as it is still only a concept to me. I'm still in the process of learning its varied facets.

I came across this topic on Paul's spiritual diablog and I started thinking about my progress or my lack thereof.

Almost two years ago I decided to live on my own believing that being away from my source of grief I would be able to recover enough to achieve some spiritual healing and thus be able to learn a little more about forgiving my past hurts. The universe, alas, have other ideas and I found myself in a circumstance that not only tested my construct of forgiveness but also of friendship and self worth.

Without going into details, I've been ruminating on several issues concerning forgiveness along with other issues related to it and these are some of them.

When I decided to move on from a current or past hurt, I realized forgiveness is part of accomplishing that goal. However, deciding to forgive and accomplishing it are two different matters. I thought making the decision forgive is the first step towards achieving that end and that the rest of the process will reveal itself to me as I go along. After all intentions shapes one's experience, according to Gary Zukav.

My issue at the moment, one that I seem to still be stuck on for the last year and half, is how does one achieve forgiveness when the ones who have hurt you in the past continually hurts you every time you see them. As it turns out there really is no respite from it so my original idea distance being a key factor in recovery seems to be a dud.

I've realized that the reason why my offenders keep hurting me is because I am vulnerable to them. This vulnerability stems from the fact that their words and opinion matter to me. This also means that despite all that I have learned about self worth and self respect, I still need their approval. Otherwise I could just invoke the dictum, "Sticks and stones may hurt my bones..." and I’d continue to move along.

How does one go about fortifying one's sense of self worth and self confidence enough so that one becomes oblivious to the ill opinion of one's family or people one regards as friends? Is it really possible to insulate oneself from such hurts? Isn’t pain part of the lesson of forgiveness as well as betrayal and love?

I thought I’ve managed to figure out the former as I thought friendship have a self-appointed-shelf-life, which depends on mutuality and some form of set conditions but this part of my belief system is also in flux at the moment. As for the latter, I have a sneaking suspicion that a person is always vulnerable to one’s family because of unconditional love. It is this lack of condition that gives this relationship its free-fall-nature and thus places one in a constantly vulnerable position emotionally because it is part of our genetic code to love family members no matter how they treat us.

Does this mean then that the only thing a person should do is to turn one’s back from one’s oppressors whether they’re friend or family? Can one really do this? Does this not mean that a person has turned one’s back on the karmic circumstances that has been dealt to them? The karmic lesson that is to be learned then from that circumstance will be forfeited and will therefore be delivered in a more compounded manner?

I am baffled by this probability and also quite fearful of it. However, although I do not intend to carry along the burden that is the result of not forgiving I am still in the process of figuring out how to navigate this tumultuous path towards spiritual healing.

It seems like there are more questions than answers at the moment. Perhaps these questions are part of the lessons too and so it continues…