I don’t know about you but for me, many spiritual phrases are like gobble-de gook. I don’t get it- WHAT DO THEY MEAN? Surrender, forgiveness. In a very real way as my understanding increases, these ways of being can not really be described with words, they are filled with paradox and to truly grok them, one must have direct experience. Or as the Zen saying goes, “the finger pointing to the moon is not the moon.” Yet forgiveness is such an important concept and tool for liberation I want to give it another crack.
In the last few years there were situations/people I could not forgive. One was a biggie and consumed me for almost two years. The others were smaller yet also very painful. What I have come to know is that without vision, I can not truly forgive- I will be giving lip service to it or covering my rage and hurt over with goody two shoes mumbo jumbo. (I am having so much fun with these silly phrases like mumbo jumbo!) When I genuinely forgive, a dam opens up, often with a burst of tears. I have come to realize that the tears are my own sense of liberation from my self imposed prison. Judgment is a prison as both Way of Mastery and Course in Miracles claim. That it is now my direct experience even though for years it was, yea, mumbo jumbo. When I forgive, I return to my original nature of innocence, of love. Now this might seem like a small thing, yet the deeper I dive into it, the more the pit of judgment is a swamp of frozen, trapped energy.
So how to climb out of the pit? What my direct experience has shown me is that the only sincere, effective way to free myself is with vision. Vision, for me, is when I have enough altitude to see why someone is doing what they are doing. This type of seeing has a translucent quality, as though I can see through the person to their deepest wounds, fears, foibles. Or sometimes it is just a single image that frees me. That is what happened to me yesterday (I am posting this maybe a month after I first wrote this). Something happened that felt like a blow to the solar plexus. By now, I’ve been through this enough times to no longer need the baseball to the head to be willing to forgive. I literally get that judgment is the poison in my own body so immediately I am looking for a way to forgive what feels like a transgression to me. So I immediately surrender (yes, I know, what does THAT mean but that will maybe come in another blog if I get inspired). I ask to be shown how to see the situation so that I can truly forgive. In this case, the image of a trapped animal popped in my head immediately. Then I get the impulse to open a book someone had the notion to send me. I immediately went to a page that describes exactly what was going on in this situation with the added bonus of explaining what leads to rage- so I also got a deeper understanding of my father. The synergy of these two experiences led to a tidal flood of release- I see clearly the dynamics and feel set free. My direct experience is that liberation flows through forgiveness. So on this leap day, I continue with my deep desire to see the innocence of all situations and people.
P.S. Any women feel the urge to propose marriage? I just looked up where the tradition comes from and thought I’d share it now, since I wouldn’t have another chance for four years.
It is believed this tradition was started in 5th century Ireland when St. Bridget complained to St. Patrick about women having to wait for so long for a man to propose. According to legend, St. Patrick said the yearning females could propose on this one day in February during the leap year
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