Confusing questions with perplexing answers......

Good Evening to all those wonderful people out there holding their breath in anticipation
of this post. I've been since the last post meditating on how to best broach this subject. I acknowledge up front that I don't have "the" answers, but at least I do have the right questions. :-) The subject for tonight is "Forgiveness". Yep, you read that right. Questions like (1) how do we do it, (2) why do it at all, (3) What is it anyway, (4) What good does it do, (5) What does it mean to me if I do or don't do it. I know there are those out there much better qualified to answer these questions, but let's face it, this isn't their blog, it's mine, right ? :-D I'd like to point out some things that I've learned over the years. First, let me say that the main reason to forgive is because we in the Judao/Christian world are told to by the Bible we read (or at least hear about). But, for purposes of discussion, I'm going to talk about the benefits to us personally, emotionally and mentally. First of all forgiveness is mostly for our own benefit. Of course it's for the other person too, but the most benefit comes to the person doing the forgiving. It keeps us from being angry, bitter, fearful, hateful people. The opposite is true of those that chose not to forgive. It tends to make us angry, bitter, hateful and fearful in our outlook on life. To me that's a good enough reason to forgive. Second, Forgiveness is a choice. Yep, we make a choice to forgive or not to. It's rarely if ever easy. It's rarely if ever a one time thing. Sometime we have to continue the choice for a long time. As long as we are unforgiving we're giving control of our feelings to the person that we feel has wronged us. Let me interject quickly that forgiving someone does not mean that we are going to start trusting them again in the near future. Trust is earned. That too is a choice, but a separate one. I can forgive a snake for being a snake but that doesn't mean that I'm gonna start trusting it enough to pick it up. This is the one of the toughest things that we ever do, but it's one of the most necessary things. Let me say that I've heard most of the arguments about why one can't forgive. I've heard them because I've heard me say them. One last point. The person that is most always the very hardest to forgive is "ourselves". Before we can move past things we do have to work on forgiving ourselves. Not easy, huh? Ok, Ok, enough you cry!! Give us a break you groan!! Alright...Enough wailing and moaning. I'll move on to other things. I just hope this helps someone somewhere. ........And so it goes.........