A visit to my mother is usually a vivid reminder of why forgiveness is so necessary.  In her mid-80s, she has treasured her hurts and wrongs and grudges until they are the stuff of her life and conversation.   The bitterness this has infused in her life spills out daily in predictable and unpredictable ways.

So I come home determined to do better, and I always hit the same wall:  what does better look like?  How does one go about forgiving, anyway?  There are wrongs I’ve forgotten, wrongs I’ve made a policy decision not to pursue further, and then — much the biggest category — wrongs I’ve collected and treasured every bit as much as my mother does hers.  Given time, I’m sure the poison these spots contain could contaminate my life in the same way.

But an intellectual decision that forgiveness, broadly defined, is necessary is not forgiving.  Contemplating individual hurts and acknowledging that yes, this ought to be forgiven is not forgiving.  Praying in a general way to learn to forgive is not forgiving.   Even saying airily that something is forgiven is not forgiving.

It doesn’t help that I’m coming at this issue from a position of weakness and discouragement.  This job, like so many others, seems impossibly huge and complex.   My recent personal growth efforts seem to be taking the form of a repetitive tour through the Gallery of Known but Seemingly Unsolvable Problems:  Yep, that’s a big ‘un.  That’s a tough one.  There’s an ugly one for ya!  Oh yeah, that one.  Haven’t made much progress there.  Yup, still stinky.  Damn, that one’s gotten worse since the last time I saw it.  Yuck.  Shit,  here comes that one again!

I keep hoping that I’ll find the key log, the one that’s holding all the others back, the removal of which would restore the proper flow. If such a thing even exists, I wonder how I would know it if I saw it.