“Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die” – unknown
When you hold a grudge against someone, think about whom it is really affecting. Is the anger you harbor in your heart hurting the other person? I don’t think so. It’s actually only hurting you.
For all intents and purposes, the other person is walking around and living their life blissfully unaware of the anger and the rage and the fury that control you. When you allow a grudge to overpower you, you are the only one who feels the negative effects.
The common cliché goes like this: forgive and forget. But I say that that’s impossible. How are you supposed to forget something that made you feel such strong emotions? Unless maybe you hit your head and get amnesia, but other than that forgetting things isn’t always a selective process. We can’t just force ourselves to erase a memory.
But forgiveness – now that is entirely possible. You don’t have to forget what the person did to you. You don’t even have to accept it. You can still feel like it was wrong. But staying mad about it is simply taking away your own power, your own happiness, and your own opportunity to live your best life.
You have to look forward instead of looking back. Don’t dwell on whatever happened in the past that angered you. Whatever the person did, or didn’t do, or said, or didn’t say – you can’t forget it, but you don’t have to focus in it. Perhaps instead of “forgive and forget” it should be “forgive and don’t focus on it.”
I recently heard a song by Eric Paslay called “Less Than Whole.” It caught my ear, persay, the first time I heard it. At first I just liked the soft melody that turned into a slow but steady beat. But then when I really listened to the lyrics, I fell in love even more.
The chorus goes a little like this:
“There’s nothing like forgiveness
To resurrect a soul
Better to give than get it
I’ve been forgiven so I’m lettin’ you know
Nobody should be less than whole”
I interpreted this to mean that when you hold out on forgiving someone, and when you let yourself hold onto a grudge, you are less than whole. You are allowing a part of yourself to be controlled by something that happened long ago. And the only way to become whole again is to forgive.
Don’t compromise your own happiness because of something that happened in the past, whether it was a petty little thing or a huge and devastating one. Because you don’t deserve that for yourself.
