Forgiveness

Everyone wants to be known but have you made yourself known to yourself? I would like to pose an idea that the concepts of knowing yourself, truth, and forgiveness are all related. I was in a conversation having to do with forgiveness — a topic that had come up often that entire week. Forgiveness can be such an agonizing subject and word. There is so much wrapped up in it; either we have to forgive ourself, or we have to forgive someone else. Either way it can be hard. It makes you swallow pride, reflect, and change how you would rather act and behave in the situation. Yet we need it. Forgiveness needs to be both given and received. And there are so many layers to forgiveness, and don’t forget its friend, grace — that thing we give when someone does not ask for forgiveness; but, we choose to act in a forgiving manner in that situation anyway.  

But it is those times when we have messed up and done ourselves wrong, that we then have to pick ourselves up and move forward. Forgiveness can be a recovery time; but how can we forgive ourselves? How does one move past this? How does one recover? It is that time when you have to come back to what can be a daunting mess. It is a time when you either find out that you believe God loves you and will never leave you nor forsake you, that His grace is sufficient, that your future days will be better than your past. A wise man told me “oh, these are the moments when you find out what you are made of”. You are stronger than what you have given yourself credit for.  

Forgiveness is such an odd thing yet is so needed. At the root of forgiveness is something we all want though and we accept rather easily; truth. I think most people like truth; we don’t want to be lied to — it does not build trust and instead tears it down. Yes, truth is easy we know what we believe is true and we may even recognize absolute truth, so yes this is easy. But forgiveness is still a word that sometimes makes us cringe.  

How does this fit into knowing ourselves? It is interesting if we are not true to who we are it has been said that we are actually causing tension in our body, which in turn dissociates us from feeling what is really there.

For example, this was related to those who people please. Every time, you give an answer or response, that you do not agree with, it causes your mind and body to become stressed. This stress/ tension/ disconnects you from you and creates an effect of you not being able to relate to yourself as well. It is almost as if your mind and body are trying to make your lie to yourself become true. You say you agree with something you don’t and then your body tries to rewire so that that disagreement is lessened by you not feeling what you actually believe to be true.  

So, I pose that forgiveness is not so much different. Assuming we are designed to be able to forgive not only ourselves, but, also others. So, when we don’t forgive something in us has to break to balance out the situation. You have probably heard it said that forgiveness is for you not the other person… but why?! It is because how we interact with the world affects us. If we break something or someone breaks something of ours, something else has to change / break to try to make the situation congruent again. I think maybe we can say this to be true is a situation where a teacher may treat a child like a bad student and at some point the student may say “well if they are going to treat me like a bad student I might as well be one”. Whereas if the student chooses to forgive the teacher for their bad behavior the student would be recognizing that the teacher is wrong and that there is no need to align with that. Our bodies and souls want to be congruent with both ourselves and our environment. Or as the saying goes, we become what we hate.   

Likewise, if we start hanging around an amazing group of people, we ourselves are likely to become better if not amazing because that is what our mind and body want to align with in order to make ourselves congruent with our situations. So, how do we know ourselves?  

1.      Be True to Yourself

Know and stick to your position, and live it out. It is okay, to change, grow and evolve but in doing so let it be a conscious decision of why you not only choose to believe something but also the way you choose to live it out. 

2.      Have A Supportive Environment   

Being around a diverse group of friends and people is great; but also make sure that you have a few people around you who share some of your ideologies, behaviors and ambitions. It is the combination of both groups that will not only solidify your voice but also allow you the space to exercise your voice, change ideas, learn and grow.  

3.       Forgive and Gain Prospective 

I think that it may be hard to forgive because we may only be holding one prospective as to how or why a situation happened as it did. However, in many situations where one may be blaming themselves there could be a number of possibilities and possibly some outcomes that we cannot even imagine. Possibilities and outcomes that could have caused you to be in a situation with the same result, where there is no fault of your own or very little. It can just be good to consider that all the outcomes that are possible are not all the outcomes you could even imagine. So give yourself a break and forgive yourself. Plus there is a bonus anyway: forgiveness improves a vast amount of mental and physical functions in the body, so truly it is better for you.  

You are amazing! You are beautifully, and wonderfully made. Your potential is yours to discover and grow. Everyone does not have to agree with you and you do not have to agree with everyone. Treat others with respect and give them real answers and responses that are sensitive to the situation; but do not undermine your beliefs. With this new found freedom, boldness and courage, take a moment and explore who you are; you just might find a new and amazing side of yourself you did not know was there!

Kenisa Nunley, founder & CEO of “Gowns and Gardens”, and “Gowns and Gardens House of Charities (GG House)”, is a native Los Angelino and an explorer of life. She has a background in consulting, business development, events, and is a graduate from the University of Southern California, with a Bachelor of Arts in Global Business and an emphasis in marketing.

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