Now, now, a new decade is here. 2010! If you ask me should I shout out aloud, I will not say I would when I am one year advancing in my age but young at heart..ha..ha.. We should count ourselves blessed to step over the line of the next decade. I always have daunting thoughts each time when the clock ticked to the close of the year to embrace another new year.
Normally, reflection will flash in within me about what was done and what was left undone in the past months. I am not the kind to impose on myself to make any specific New Year resolution. However, there is always something to think about what I want and can do in a small fraction to go forward to a more enriching life. Aha! Why posting this not before 2009? Well, it’s timely too because it is just 8 days away from the Chinese lunar new year.
I like the following article someone sent me which arrived timely in my mail box me on “The Art of Forgiving” and that is something I like to make peace with myself to go forward daily with this art for this new decade beside other good values in life.
THE ART OF FORGIVING
The most creative power given to the human spirit is the power to heal the wounds of a past it cannot change. We do our forgiving alone inside our hearts and minds; what happens to the people we forgive depends on them. The first person to benefit from forgiving is the one who does it. Forgiving happens in three stages:
1) we rediscover the humanity of the person who wronged us;
2) we surrender our rights to get even;
3) and we wish that person well.
Forgiving is a journey; the deeper the wound, the longer the journey.
Forgiving does not require us to reunite with the person who broke our trust. We do not forgive because we are supposed to;
We forgive when we are ready to be healed.
Waiting for someone to repent before we forgive is to surrender our future to the person who wronged us.
Forgiving is not a way to avoid pain but to heal the pain.
Forgiving someone who breaks a trust does not mean that we give him his job back.
Forgiving is the only way to be fair to ourselves.
Forgivers are not doormats; to forgive a person is not a signal that we are willing to put up with what he does.
Forgiving is essential; talking about it is optional.
When we forgive, we set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner we set free is us.
When we forgive we walk in stride with the forgiving God.”
- Author Unknown
Let us be forgiving. Wish you a blessed year with the “Art of Forgiving”.
