Good morning, Team! It’s Friday!

Closing in on the last two topics of Cultivating Emotional Resilience, found in Dr. Sood’s book, Handbook for Happiness, today we’ll spend a few moments on forgiveness.

In understanding forgiveness, I never heard it described this way but,

“…our minds have no natural system for getting rid of waste.”

“Hurts pile up as open files and black holes.”

I am condemned. Closing files is not easy but critically necessary. I’ve been waking up in the middle of the night and my mind is in a black hole loop trying to resolve hurt feelings, working overtime to resolve those things that can only be solved through forgiveness, a voluntary choice.

“It means you choose to give up anger and resentment knowing and accepting that the misconduct happened.”

“Forgiveness isn’t:

•Forgetting the wrong

•Allowing a wrong to continue

•Excusing the wrong

•Denying the wrong

•Letting someone harm [you]”

I recently went through an exercise recommended in the book where you mentally put all of your hurts in a folder. Recognizing this much crap is too heavy and too toxic to handle, I forwarded the folder to my higher power and let God deal with it. I’m done.

I will have to repeat the exercise for old hurts and new ones but I’ll get better at it each time.

Isn’t it time to forward your files and detoxify? It is an amazing feeling when you get there.

Have a blessed weekend!

Eric