As some of my readers might know, I recently had reconstructive surgery on my ankle, and with that came a few realizations for this older young man:
1. I’m not at Westchester High when I could just hop out of bed and dunk a basketball anymore.
2. You can’t take any aspecet of your health for granted.
3. Life is too short to sweat things that are not as important at the end of the day.
Prior to my injury, I attended a wedding in DC where two friends of mine from undergrad finally got married. It was a beautiful out-of-the-box-of-western-tradition wedding where I learned as much (or more) than I actually observed. One of the great things about the wedding was that it served as a mini-homecoming of sorts for me, since I opted to attend the wedding in lieu of homecoming this year.
Of course, with any school reunion, comes those who you are glad to see and thankful that are prosperous and doing well, and then………. there are them other folks who you could live the rest of your life without seeing again and it would affect you in one bit. At this wedding, unfortunately, a couple of those folks were in attendance. One of them in particular is someone who I have not literally said a word to in over 4 years.
“Damn Rich, you’re one of the nicest guys I know. What did this person do to you that you haven’t spoken to them since you last had hair?”
Well…….. what said person did is irrelevant to the topic. What IS relevant is that, despite my love for Christ and my want to be better and grow in every aspect of my life, one of the things that I (and alot of people I know) struggle with forgiveness. A lot of it is based on the reasons mentioned in my blog about lasting perceptions. A friend of mine mentioned to me that, in most cases, it’s not about the deed per se that someone did, it’s more about how the person who committed the deed made you feel as a result, and that feeling is what lasts in a person’s mind. In my personal case, although my overall feeling about it was “why me? what did I ever do (or not do) to you?”, the deed itself was of higher ramifications than how I felt about it. For me, that’s where my struggle lies.
Now, I know that I will get the requisite responses to this, saying that I’m not a true Christian and that I need to ask God for X, Y, and Z. But sometimes, God places things on your heart so that you are now positioned to go to the next level in your walk, and to me, forgiving someone gives them (in certain aspects) access back into your life. In most cases, the people in your life are there (or not there) because of where God has you placed, and forcing the issue to placate image or ego isn’t always the best thing to do.
Now there are a few examples of people who have not done right by me (in a small or large way) that I have found it in my heart to forgive them (one of them I spoke to for the first time in years last night actually), but with others it’s a struggle due to mainly my ego (I’m just being honest).
But, as Christian as some of us like to be, most of us (although it’s not right) do have a threshold on forgiveness. There’s just that certain level of hurt, deceit, or “lack of act right” that makes us sound the “awwwwwwww helllll naw” alarm in our minds and hearts and we just shut the door to that person (or group of people) and say to ourselves “I doubt if I would ever forgive him/her/them for what has been done to me.”
How many of you who grew up in a single parent household have forgiven your mother/father for not being there when it was their choice?
How many ladies could forgive a man if he sexually assaulted you?
How many brothas out there could forgive their wives if she cheated on you with your best friend or your brother (or sister)?
What about forgiving someone who killed your mom or dad?
You think the Brown family will ever forgive OJ?
You think Cubs fans will ever forgive Bartman?
You think Shaq will truly forgive Kobe for ratting him out in Colorado?
For you, what is that threshold that you struggle with? Do you struggle more with the deed or with the person? Where do you draw the line? I’m definitely curious to hear your thoughts on this and what you do to address it.
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