I’ve been hurt. I’ve been broken. I’ve been belittled. I’ve
been cheated on. I’ve been manipulated. I’ve been emotionally abused. I know
what it’s like to be taken advantage of. I know what it feels like to be
disappointed. I know what it’s like to hold a grudge.
I have many stories of resentment, but I also know what it’s
like to forgive. Here’s one of those stories.
I was a very active kid. A diagnosis of ADD would have
certainly been true had I been tested. School was very difficult for me early
on. I couldn’t focus or sit still. My parents were concerned about me and got
me involved with different sports such as soccer, baseball, swimming lessons, wrestling,
and Taekwondo, hoping I’d come to control myself. All these activities I quit
after a few years doing them. My parents still jokingly remind me of a time I
was playing in a baseball game and standing in the outfield bored out of my
mind waiting for a ball to get hit to me. I would toss my glove up in the air
and catch it as a way to distract from my boredom. I just couldn’t stand still
in one place. One time I got so bored I remember picking some grass on the
field and decided to put it on my head like I had green hair. At least it gave
me something to do!
There is one sport that kept me attentive though:
basketball. It was a high-paced game that involved strategy, endurance, speed, quickness,
strength, flexibility and teamwork. Since I was a young boy I had been highly
involved with basketball. I was a slasher and got the majority of my points
driving to the basket and off fast breaks. My dad involved me with a team of
kids my age, and we grew up together as really close friends. We won over 80%
of our games and earned first place in many tournaments. My dad used to display
the championship trophies in his classroom, and I loved going in there to look
at them. My dad would take us to high school games to watch the older players. Watching
the athletes dominate their competition, we were inspired for our own future. We
often talked about how cool it would be to warm up to the band playing and hear
our names called during the starting lineups. We had a goal that we would win
the state championship when we were seniors.
When we got into middle school we were excited to represent
our school. When it came time for team selections, however, two of our players were
brought up to varsity. The rest of us stayed on the JV. This was very difficult
to accept at first. We were so successful together, and we believed our team should’ve
stayed together. The separation of teammates initially brought anger and
jealousy amongst many of us JV players. Nevertheless, we accepted our roles and
played the game that we loved. By having two of our teammates go up to varsity
it gave the rest of us incentive to step up our game. I focused solely on
basketball that year and got better and better. At the end of the season I won team
MVP honors. The following year we would all be together again and win many
games.
When freshman year came along, we once again focused on our future
goal of winning a state championship. My freshman year we were all placed on
the C-squad, and we won many games. That year I won MVP honors again, and I began
to envision myself playing college ball.
During our sophomore year we were once again split up. It
was a repeat, as two of our teammates were brought up to varsity and the rest
of us were placed on JV. The anger of the split fired me up once again, and I
worked my butt off to improve my game. I won team MVP for the third time in
four years. I held on to the hope that during my junior and senior years I was going
to be on varsity, and I intended to continue my improvement and be the leader
on my team. I went to many camps that summer and practiced my offensive moves
and defense every day. My friends would come over to my house to play games
like 21, hot-shot, bump, 2-on-2 and 3-on-3. I constantly sought out competition
from other players. Junior year came and more of us were called up to varsity. I
received very little playing time, and was given the option of swinging to the
JV for three quarters so I could get playing time. I accepted, and helped lead a
younger group to a winning record. When senior year came I was expecting to be
a starter. After the teams were announced the coach called me into his office.
He told me I was the 7th man in the rotation, and he said he only
played six players consistently, yet he still expected me to be cheering on the
bench. Hearing this shattered me, but I knew I could prove him wrong. During
practices I competed with the starting guards. I made sure the coaches saw that
not only was I a better player but I was a fierce competitor. Nevertheless, when
the first game of the season came, I played only four minutes. After another
game of limited play, I decided I no longer wanted to be part of a team that
didn’t respect me as a basketball player. I told the coaches I was done and
turned in my uniform.
I went on to play intramural college ball, though it wasn’t
the same passion I had in high school. It took me a long time to get over the
resentment I held towards my high school coach and the players that took my
place. The thoughts of betrayal made me extremely bitter, and I was angry for
many years. Like before, this anger drove me to respond, and I put my focus on
the development of my younger brother, who had watched me play during my middle
school and high school years. He became my crutch of the hurt I experienced in
high school. He became a tremendous player and he was very successful in high
school, leading his team to the playoffs, making the All-Area and All-League
teams. He was offered several sports scholarship from various colleges in the
Pacific Northwest. I basked in his glory, yet ten years after my heartbreak I still
held a grudge.
After my brother’s basketball season was over I knew that I could
no longer hold on to this resentment. In a way, this resentment had positive
effects on my brother’s personal growth. It led me to passionately work with
him on his game and gave him an opportunity to develop as a skilled player.
Twelve years his senior, he had to constantly compete and improve his game
against me. Within me, however, this resentment was unhealthy, unproductive,
and kept me bound to the past. Finally, I decided to let it go and forgive my
coach and those two players. The relief I felt was incredible. I finally felt
free from a ten-year burden.
Forgiveness is the Doorway to Freedom
“Life is an adventure
in forgiveness.” Journalist and author Norman Cousins
Everybody has their own story of hurt, and everybody at one
point or another has had to deal with feelings of anger and resentment. These
bitter feelings always lead to one thing: bondage. This prison holds us to the
past traumatic experience(s) we want to forget and move on from. Yet these
prison bars are hard to break through.
Forgiveness is essential to experience a life of freedom,
love, and peace. In order to forgive you must go beyond the ego which seeks
justice and revenge. You must go deeper within yourself, below the layers of
the ego, to the part of yourself that calls for freedom, the part that is
connected to love and spirit. Once you have found this place of inner being you
have already initiated the healing process and are on your way to freedom. As Christian
author Lewis B. Smedes says, “To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover
that the prisoner was you.”
How to Forgive Someone Who Has Hurt You
The healing process takes time, but there are a few things
you can do to speed up the process of recovery.
1.) Give up on hope of a better past. This
was a profound statement when I first came across it. How easy it is to relive
our past hurtful experiences and imagine a rewrite of the ending. This irrational
imagery creates a false hope that leads nowhere. Accept the reality of the
hurtful event and move on.
2.) Be present. After suffering through a
4-month depression, the one thing that helped me forgive was being present. By
focusing on the here and NOW you center your mind on what is, not a story that has already happened that you are recreating
in your head. Be here now in the present.
3.) Choose to
be kind over being right. You were served an injustice, horrible and undeserved.
It wasn’t right and it wasn’t kind. But as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. declared
to the injustices of the system, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only
light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” Don’t reproduce
that which hurt you. Instead, spread kindness.
4 4.) Stop playing the victim. Stop looking
for occasions to be offended- that’s easy. It’s also very wounding. There is no
justice in further wounding yourself. In fact, you only further open the wound.
Transcend the victim mentality, and instead focus on what will make you
stronger.
5 5.) Send love to those who have hurt you. Did
somebody do something that irritated you? Send them love. Did somebody really
hurt your spirits? Send them love. Reach beyond the ego and access that part of
yourself that is connected to all things and all people.
6.) Forgive them not for their sake but yours. Initially,
we may think forgiveness is letting the abuser off. It’s quite the contrary. Instead,
you are allowing yourself to let go of all those hurtful feelings you’ve held
onto.
7.) Acknowledge that we are all humans doing
the best we can with our present awareness and resources we’re given. All
of us have developed a certain level of awareness and given a certain number of
resources to be used at any given time. We are human. Acknowledge that the
person who has hurt you may have been given a lower level awareness and fewer
resources. They acted upon what they have been given.
8.) Utilize this time as a growing experience.
All experiences in life, good or bad, can grow us. Seek the opportunity to grow
from your hurt. Hurt oftentimes breeds the greatest growth experiences.
9.) Be like water. As Bruce Lee once said,
“Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless, like water.” Don’t attach to one past
moment or you’ll drown in the incessant waves. Ride with the ever-changing waves.
10.) Remember: time always heals. For me it
took ten years, an unnecessarily long time. But time finally led to my healing.
You may reopen that wound over and over, but eventually there will come a day
when you will finally be able to move on and embrace life again.
If you feel in bondage from a past hurt or experience,
forgiveness may be your doorway to freedom. Grow this center, and experience a liberty
like you’ve never experienced before.
Forgiveness Quotes:
I can have peace of
mind only when I forgive rather than judge.
Gerald Jampolsky
There is no love
without forgiveness, and there is no forgiveness without love.
Bryant McGill
The weak can never
forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.
Mahatma Gandhi
Darkness cannot drive
out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can
do that.
Martin Luther King,
Jr.
The heart of a mother
is a deep abyss at the bottom of which you will always find forgiveness.
Honore de Balzac
Forgiveness is not
always easy. At times, it feels more painful than the wound we suffered, to forgive
the one that inflicted it. And yet, there is no peace without forgiveness.
Marianne Williamson
Forgiveness says you
are given another chance to make a new beginning.
Desmond Tutu
When you forgive, you
in no way change the past- but you sure do change the future.
Bernard Meltzer
Never forget the
three powerful resources you always have available to you: love, prayer, and
forgiveness.
H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
It’s one of the
greatest gifts you can give yourself, to forgive. Forgive everybody.
Maya Angelou
To err is human; to
forgive, divine.
Alexander Pope
We think that
forgiveness is weakness, but it’s absolutely not; it takes a very strong person
to forgive.
T.D. Jakes
To forgive is to set
a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.
Lewis B. Smedes
Lewis B. Smedes
Forgiveness is the
fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.
Mark Twain
Life is an adventure
in forgiveness.
Norman Cousins
