Forgiveness? Psh.

Today, I read an article about forgiveness. The author took the unusual stance that, sometimes, it’s just fine if you don’t want to forgive. His friend was murdered and he was startled that the person officiating the funeral (several days later) urged everyone to forgive and move on with their lives. The author, having less than a week to deal with the grief of losing someone, let alone making sense of the violence surrounding the death, essentially said, “no!”

He brought up the point that our culture seems to have the idea that everyone needs to forgive to be healthy. It’s something I've thought a lot about in the last few years, too. My dramas were much less violent than murder (while slightly involving death), but my drama-traumas were a big deal to me. I still haven’t forgiven. I've wrestled with the idea of forgiving everyone and have had a lot of pressure from a variety of sources to do so. But I find that forgiveness, much like growing taller, happens to everyone at different rates. And sometimes doesn't happen as much as you might have imagined.

Hmm. That actually isn't a great analogy. It’s not that people who don’t forgive are somehow stunted. It’s more like setting good boundaries. Sometimes people do horrible, ass-hat-like things to you, and you can still be an awesome person without forgiving the ass-hats. You can even unfriend them all on Facebook and still be an awesome person, in spite of what mutual friends might say.

Bah. All it comes down to is this: people deal with what they are dealing with as fast as they can. If you are holding your breath to be forgiven for acting like an ass-hat, you need to know that it’s about the other person, not about you. You might not ever be forgiven. And you need to learn to live with that and try not to be an ass-hat in the future. As for me, I have wrestled mightily with blame (of myself and of others) and of hate (also of self and of others) and I’m at peace with my choice to not forgive some people.

Here’s a link to the article, if you’re so inclined: http://www.slate.com/articles/life/doonan/2013/04/steubenville_rape_forgiveness_oscar_pistorius_forgiveness_let_s_stop_forgiving.html

An Erinku:

I know my last few blogs

have been blargy.

Soon I’ll be back to stories of

coffee, tipping over, and playing music.