“Forgiveness is unlocking the door to set someone free and realizing you were the prisoner.” -Unknown

How I view forgiveness has changed drastically in my lifetime. I always knew forgiving people was important, even besides the religious reasonings, but HOW important is what evolved.

Growing up, I always struggled with putting the past behind me, specifically when I perceived people wronged me. Looking back, I was pretty hypocritical because I would always expect people to forgive and forget my shortcomings while not practicing my own preaching.

Say what you will about Charlie Kirk’s death but when his wife got up during his memorial and publicly forgave the shooter, man that gave me goosebumps and brought tears to my eyes. There have been multiple examples of family members of murder victims forgiving those that took their loved ones away as well. Those moments honestly changed my whole viewpoint of what forgiveness is. You do not necessarily forgive somebody for their own sake; this can happen though, particularly if they themselves are beating themselves up about what they did and genuinely mean the apology. The main purpose of forgiveness is to free your own heart and mind from the emotional baggage you have been carrying around.

I have been on this humbling journey for years. Unfortunately, I missed out on the opportunity to openly forgive somebody who had hurt me repeatedly the majority of my early years. It took me so long to reach that point where I felt like I needed to forgive them but by that time, they had passed away, leaving so many words left unsaid. I was terrified that I would no longer obtain closure and peace. That fear was sorely unwarranted since I have realized closure is mainly an inward thing, at least for me. While I have many regrets about how long I held onto the bitterness and grudges, the bad mood swings and the nightmares have all but ceased when I began letting go. Yeah, this person caused me so much emotional and mental turmoil, but I realized that I had done and said things out of anger as well that make me cringe to this day. I am still forgiving myself for these things today but the fact I have made tremendous progress in this regard, I feel so much lighter already.

If you are struggling to let go and forgive, I would highly suggest having somebody trustworthy to just sit there and listen you to vent. Crying or yelling may help you as well to release the anger and frustrations you may be shackled by. The more baggage you have associated with certain individuals, causes you to subconsciously build up more walls for those you may meet in the future. You begin to push people away due to your lack of trust caused by the people that hurt you in the past. Letting go of the past, allows you to thrive in the future