(This blog was originally posted on September 15, 2014)
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| Photo courtesy of Microsoft |
Have you ever
got stuck in a blame-game with someone, refusing to accept some responsibility
for your role in the situation or to accept the other person’s apology for
hurting you? Do you ever hold onto the anger and emotional pain about something
that occurred so long ago that you don’t even feel those emotions anymore but
keep holding onto them because…you don’t even know why? Would you be willing to
let go of all that negative energy if you knew this release would help you feel
better, to be at peace and free you from the emotional baggage you have been
dragging around?
I recently saw
this quote from Inspirationboost.com,
and it really resonated with me: “Forgive. Not because they deserve
forgiveness, but because you deserve peace.”
At some point
during our lifetime, someone hurts us. This injury may be physical or
metaphoric, intentional or accidental, but long after the physical wounds have
healed some emotional scars continue to feel raw. To assuage this pain and gain
a sense of control over what happened, we may claim that the injury was
justified or believe that we somehow brought it on ourselves. Indeed, it can be
very difficult to see past this pain when someone you once cared about is
hurling verbal and legal barbs your way during an acrimonious divorce or
dissolution of a business or social relationship. You may even resent and even
guilt/shame for having ever trusted him or her with your heart (and your
finances).
The problem
with holding onto these negative emotions is you are the one who continues to
suffer emotional pain long after the relationship is ended and you and the
other person have parted ways for good. Whenever you dwell on the negative
events that happened during the relationship and the sadness or anger that you
felt at the time, you reinforce the strength and the habit of feeling (and feeding) those negative emotions. This
continued bombardment of thoughts, memories and negative associations with the
past relationship overloads the conscious mind, triggering the fight/flight
mechanism and putting you in an even more hyper-suggestible state (hypnosis). Since
we are most suggestible to ourselves, every time we repeat a thought or
behavior you reinforce its strength and power in your subconscious mind. In
other words, you are hypnotizing yourself to perpetuate this unwanted behavior.
Ultimately, the most effective way to heal from that hurt is to forgive the
person who inflicted it so you can pursue the life that you want and deserve to
be living.
© 2016
