Blessed & Cursed

If anyone ever tells you that doing God's will is easy, they are lying! Following what God says is often not only difficult but also inconvenient. That's not to say God is difficult or inconvenient, He's not. On the contrary, I have found Him to be quite easy and readily available. More so than any person I have ever met. And it is those characteristics that drive me to lean into the difficult and often inconvenient tasks He tosses at me.

I'm blessed in many ways, but I want to talk about one in particular. God has gifted me with a knowing that I have honed through the years. No, I'm not psychic and I'm not always great at discernment but what I am good at is hearing Him when He speaks to me. Hearing really isn't the right word though. It's not audible...it's more an impression that is placed in my mind. An instinct. I consider it a huge blessing because to me, what it means is God and I are in close contact. I can not think of a better being to be connected to so to have such closeness leaves me in awe daily. When it hits me, it's usually a connection to something or someone that requires careful attention to perceive. Sometimes I ignore it, yep. I do. But the thing about God is that if it is His will He will bring it back to me multiple times, as many times as necessary until I can not deny His movement in the matter. It has happened time and time again so you'd think I'd have learned to just be obedient right away. Ha! Maybe someday.

Unfortunately, with the blessing of His contact comes what feels like a curse at times. A feeling of craziness. An awkward walk that requires blind faith and trust that is challenging to follow in this world of science, fact, and 'do it yourself' mentality. Many times the actions He requests defy reason, or at least earthy reason. Many times, they require oddness and a general lack of concern over what other people think. This is the curse of it, especially to a person like me who struggles with confusing self-esteem with what other's think of me.

I liken it to Noah, the man who built an ark for God. Everyone thought he was crazy and I bet he felt crazy more than once as he followed God's instructions. I bet his heart was hurt by the passers by and scoffers, many of them who believed in the same Lord. I bet he had anger over being chosen, "Why me? Why me?"

I took a little hiatus from writing to take care of some very important personal matters that needed to be addressed and worked on. When the time was right, I took a seat at the computer to continue my career, ready to take on whatever project God had for me.

Blank.

Having writer's block is nothing new. I've learned to just walk away and give it time so I did just that. Again, when the time seemed right, I sat back down in front of the screen.

Blank.

Sigh. This went on for several months. I began to focus on my other job, I'm a transcriptionist, so at least I was being productive and making some money. Election day came and I awoke with an ominous feeling. I had a level of anxiety that was abnormal for me which to me was odd. This passed election was by means fun, but it wasn't anything to have THAT level of anxiety over. I found myself close to tears many times that day but just blew it off the best I could.

Soon after, a barrage of very similar incidents began to rain down on me. It was uncanny how many people came to me in a matter of only two weeks wanting to discuss the same subject: depression and suicide. It's a subject I know a lot about having struggled with suicidal ideation most of my life. I'm open about my relationship with depression and I believe that is why nearly a dozen people reached out to me asking for information on how to see it clearly, how to help a loved one, and two people I love dearly were in the midst of helping a loved one come back from an actual suicide attempt. I knew, this was no coincidence. This was a God-incidence.

I sat wonder if perhaps God was calling me to cease my writing career for the purpose of focusing on the lifting up of those who suffer with the debilitating mental problem of real depression. It made my heart sink to think He might be asking me to stop doing something I love (writing) to go and do something so people-centric. It's NOT what I wanted and I stomped my feet like a five year old a few times as I attempted to submit myself to His will.

Shortly before Thanksgiving, God put something in front of me that gave me great anxiety and sadness, much like I felt on Election day. It weighed on me for three days and I knew it was important but didn't know why. But then Thanksgiving hit and I became distracted.

A few days later, God put this VERY SAME thing in front of me in a DIFFERENT location and the same anxiety hit me. I knew instantly, God was calling me to listen. He was calling me to take action yet I had NO CLUE what action to take but I nodded my head and said, "Tell me what to do."

I spent the next two days crying as though someone had drowned my dearly beloved puppy right before my eyes. I was seriously mourning the loss of something I never had. Actually, I was mourning the loss of a "could-have", possibly "should-have" had. I knew I needed to to do something to easy the pain I felt and while I wish I could tell you the specifics and not be so ambiguous, I can't, so bear with me. What I can tell you is, I felt a little crazy and that crazy feeling made me scared to tell anyone what was happening within me.

I wrote my feelings in a letter with a plan to send it out into the universe and I knew exactly where I needed to go to release it. On the way there, I called two different friends I trust with my life and told them of my craziness. Both had compassion and understanding of what I was doing and were supportive, despite what I expressed as "sounding nuts." I knew exactly what to do to put this whole thing to rest and stick an "I'm done" flag in it.

Things did not go as planned though. What I desperately wanted to do was not safely possible so I sat in my car wondering what plan B was going to be. In the silence, God guided me someplace different and I followed obediently. Once there, His impression was clear...

LOOK!

"I am. I don't see anything."

LOOK CLOSER!

I widened my view of the world taking in every detail, as well as the big picture all at once. My heart skipped a beat when my eyes fastened to the very thing I was led by God to see. In disbelief at what I was seeing, I knew this little crazy trip of mine was not going to be a finale. No, it was only the beginning and I was about to have to become Noah.

Tenaciousness nearing obsession overcame me as I began to dive deeper into a mystery. God impressed, I listened and moved. Crazy, nuts, filled with compassion and God's agape love (crazy, nuts, and agape all fit together perfectly) I went where he lead, said what He asked, and watched a mystery begin to make perfect sense to me.

One morning, I was making breakfast and fell into the sweetest daydream, a wishful-thinking best-case-scenario ending to all of these events and I beamed inside at the simple thought of this possibility. But my smile was stolen by reality quickly as I spoke audibly,

"Who am I kidding? That's NOT going to happen!"

Quickly God impressed upon me something amazing and I spoke aloud again,

"But I could write a book about that!"

My smile returned instantly as I realized, God wasn't done with my writing career at all. In fact, what He wanted from me was a combination of the two things I thought I was going to have to choose between. Well, how about that. God sure is smart! In addition, just two days ago I was asked to be part of a start up Christian ministry that will provide support for depression. I feel very honored and I accepted.

That is how the idea for my current work in progress arrived. Depression, suicide, mystery, and the perfect daydream filled with enough hope to give any reader a chance to embrace compassion, understanding, and love. The story will be about two characters who struggle with depression, each handling it in a different way. Their lives will intersect and through their interactions, the reader can receive many messages. The depressed will learn that they are not alone in their struggle, that there is a way out, coping skills, and hopefully they will see pure hope despite their condition. The people who don't understand depression will become educated about what it really is and realize that it isn't as simple as changing your attitude or chosing to "let it go". In addition, they will learn hoe to see it, how to really notice it, and how to respond. Finally, the world at large will hopefully get a very important message about compassion and the importance of it in our everyday lives.

There is more to the mystery and my Noah-like actions that followed which have led to some good ole' hurt by passers by and scoffers (many of them who believed in the same Lord), as well as anger over being chosen, "Why me, Lord?". I have been attacked over this, I've been called horrible names, and I've been frightened but make no mistake, I will follow as long as He leads. I now fully understand exactly why I felt such dread on Election Day and believe me, it had nothing to do with the actual election. I now understand why God gave me so many emotions over a situation that had absolutely nothing to do with me, and I now understand that the persecution I face is just beginning. But here's the thing about God, He doesn't lead us then leave us when the going gets tough. No, He brought me this far and my obedience to the craziness has led to my current circumstances. I know without doubt He is holding me in the palm of His hand and He's got this! 100% got this. Whether it ends well or not, whether it causes tears or smiles (most likely both), whether it makes me look insane or simply like a person who cares- He's got it under control and I trust Him. I trust Him 100%, good, bad and ugly. He WILL and trust me, already has, made GOOD from a very sad and bad situation.

So, I here i am moving forward with my task feeling both blessed and cursed and I can honestly say, I wouldn't change a thing. Have an amazing day!

Have a Good Day ... Tomorrow

NOTE: This story is absolutely true and happened to me late summer 2016. I wrote this months ago for a different blog but the owner of that blog took a break so it never got published. It's time to share it.

I'm a person who suffers with depression. When I say depression, I don't mean slight blues or occasional sadness. What I mean is full-on, can't do anything about it, senseless, deep emptiness that leads to thoughts of suicide. Everything in my life could be going just fine then—BAM—I become depressed and am suddenly teetering on the edge of a very deep, dark abyss. I'm on medication for this but still have problems occasionally. I've dealt with it my whole life and learned the warning signs and symptoms, as well as how to see logic in the midst of something that is extremely illogical. In short, I am somehow able to see the truth in those times, even when darkness is doing its best to hide that truth.

Let’s talk about the truth: the truth is the depression will pass. The truth is not everything is horrible in those moments, even if it feels that way. The truth is it’s a chemical thing I have no control over and I am not alone in it. Millions of people know exactly how I feel and for us, it’s all very normal. But the truth is also an oxymoron. The truth is during the time that I feel that way, everything in me screams the opposite: that the feelings will last forever, everything sucks, and that something is terribly abnormal and wrong with me to feel so low and desperate for no apparent reason. In understanding the truth, I know how important not making one single decision while I'm in that space is. And the truth of that is that the choice to not make a decision can and will make me feel like I'm trapped in a tiny cage with no way out, which compounds the depression all the more. I made a meme of my mantra in those moments and I look at it often:

Experience has shown me, if I can just make it till morning, I know I'll be okay.

The world has become very self-centered. As such, it is not uncommon to be out in public and have someone yell obscenities at me for making a mistake or for no reason at all. For example, I got every curse word in the world yelled at me in a church parking lot once because I apparently ‘stole’ someone’s parking space. It didn’t matter that I offered to move and apologized. It also didn’t matter that it was a public parking lot and no one owned any of the spaces. Another time, I got blessed out in my own driveway by a woman walking her dog by my house (on the wrong side of the road, mind you). I was pulling my car out of the garage to park it in my driveway so I could wash it. She was walking by and thought I was going to pull out into the road so she yelled, afraid that I might hit her. Of course, it was her choice to continue walking forward instead of pausing, even though a car was backing out. Yet, she saw it as MY fault that she was scared, and that gave her the right to yell obscenities at me on my own property, even though I did not one thing wrong. Another example is when someone who was in a hurry got in line behind me at the grocery store and told me I was holding him up. There were lots of other lines he could have chosen. I only had nineteen items and was in a regular line, not an express line, yet the fact that the world aligned itself in a way that he was in a rush and I happened to make it to the line before him was somehow my fault. These may seem like small things, but I will get to the reason they aren’t in a moment.

The last few days have been rough. A bout of depression hit me out of nowhere and I could tell it was going to be a bad one. I knew my medications were working, yet this depression struck me for no reason I could fathom. I don’t really want to admit the strength of it because I don’t want the people who love me to worry about my mental state, yet I will be honest and say it was the type of depression that made me wonder if I was in fact going to allow myself to make it to the next day. I made sure not to make any decisions. I made sure I spoke to people I trusted. And I did my best to wait it out, hoping it would be gone in due time, even though it felt unchangeable. I reminded myself many times not to make any permanent fixes to a temporary problem.

I needed to go to the store, but I was afraid to be in public because I knew I was in a mental place where a stranger's unkind remark could have easily taken me over the edge of being able to hold myself together to make it to tomorrow. Thoughts of suicide were teasing me and tears were hard to contain. On my way to the store, I said a prayer asking God to protect me from any unkind words a stranger might toss at me, because I knew they might be a game changer.

I went in, picked up my few items, and headed to the check-out line. No one spoke to me and I was glad. I kept my head down and tried to be invisible so I could make it out of the store without any confrontation.

Finally, it was my turn and the cashier looked at me with a smile. She said, “Hi, how are you today?”

I’m sure the look on my face told her all she needed to know, so I was honest with my answer. I said, “Meh, I’m okay.”

She didn’t say anything else to me, just did her job, told me how much I owed, and I paid as she bagged my items. As she handed me my receipt, she said something odd. It was 7:30 p.m., so there were still several hours left in the day, and the conditioned response at that point would have been for her to say, “Have a good evening.” Instead, she spoke as if she could see the do-I-want-to-live-or-die war that was raging in my head. She looked me in the eyes and said, “I hope you have a really great day… tomorrow. And I mean that.”

Tomorrow. What an odd thing to say. It struck me hard as I left. Tomorrow. I walked away wondering if I would have a tomorrow.

I stopped outside to text my husband and another woman who worked there came over next to me. She was talking on her cell phone and was obviously on break. Once she was off the phone, she asked me the same question. “How are you today?”

I looked at her blankly and replied with the same answer. “Meh, I’m okay.”

One of her co-workers came out and they chatted for a moment while I sent my text.

Once the two of us were alone again, she started talking to me about the weather. I didn’t say much, other than to agree that the breeze was nice. I was ready to leave so I said, “Have a nice night,” as I began to walk away.

Her words stopped me in my tracks. “Can you do me a favor, please—”

I turned and looked at her.

“Be good to yourself tonight.”

Again, I was floored. What an odd thing for a random stranger to say yet—perfect.

I nodded my head then headed to my car as tears filled my eyes. I hope you have a good day tomorrow as in, ‘Hang on lady, you can do this!’ and Be good to yourself tonight as in ‘Don’t use a permanent solution for a temporary problem’. To me, they were the words of God spoken through the lives of two random strangers and, in that moment, those simple phrases changed everything. The words made me sure—tomorrow was going to be a certainty.

I truly am embarrassed to admit that my emotions dipped so low that hurting myself was a thought in my head, but that’s what depression does to a person. It’s not something that can be controlled; it’s not something that we can just choose to “buck-up” from. It’s real and it’s painful. Luckily, I have learned to live with it in a way that I don’t have to be its slave anymore. While I can’t control my emotional response to it, I can choose to work hard enough on the inside to control my physical response to it—at least to an extent.

On the other side of embarrassment is the gratefulness I feel for having a God who knows what I can and can’t handle. In addition, He takes me at my word when I admit my inability to function in the face of something unkind. Those words the store employees shared with me, well, God not only protected me from the unkind, He gave me a reason to believe in the good. A reason to have hope for tomorrow.

I would like for you to think about your last really bad mood. I mean, really bad mood. Now, imagine me, in the state I just explained to you. Got it? Okay, now imagine we cross paths at the post office and I accidentally step on your foot. I immediately apologize as your bad mood combines with my internal fight for life. How would you respond?

“Watch where you’re going, idiot!”

I already feel worthless and ready to end it all, but I’m fighting for a reason to stay. This statement could possibly be the last thing I ever allow myself to hear. That I’m an idiot because I made an error and my life has no meaning. It’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back and I finally decide—I can’t do life anymore.

“It’s okay, accidents happen. Are you okay?”

This response lets me know that you recognize that I understand I have made a mistake and I’m sorry. It shows me that mistakes are forgivable. It validates me as a person who is worthy of forgiveness and it takes things a step further and shows me that if a stranger can care even a little, then maybe things will be okay. That statement helps me see good in tomorrow despite the lack of hope I feel.

Do you see what I’m saying here? Your words have an amazing amount of power. All of them. Power to make or break. Power to salvage or destroy. Power of hope or demise. Had I experienced the unloaded bad mood of a guy who thought I stole his parking spot instead of the simple reminder that tomorrow was full of hope, I may not be sitting here right now typing. Did you realize you had that kind of power? Do you understand that the woman you crossed paths with yesterday and darted a dirty look to because she cut in line may have just buried her only son that morning? Are you aware that the annoying man sitting in front you on the bus who is bouncing his leg madly might have just found out he has terminal cancer? Did you know that most people who commit suicide have a smile on their face not long before they do it? Well if you didn’t, now you do, and you have no excuse to be nasty.

What are you going to do with the power you hold? While it is impossible to always be nice no matter what, make no mistake about this, it’s a choice to spew darkness on a person when the truth of the matter is, it’s just as easy to be silent. Silence is sometimes best—for everyone.

I want to quickly address something about suicide. While it is super important to be compassionate and supportive to people who are showing signs of depression, the truth of the matter is that if they are showing outwards signs of their ‘fight for life’, they are in fact fighting for it. It's the truly depressed who hide it so well that no one knows how they are feeling that we need to care for more greatly. Why? Because the whole reason they aren't showing their fight for life is because they AREN'T fighting anymore. They are done with the trouble of life and their plans to end their pain will come to fruition because no one can stop them when there aren't any signs. How do you know if someone has lost their fight if they are hiding it so well? You can't. So what do you do? How about this; treat everyone with compassion. Use your power for good because your compassion in the right moment just might make them change their mind and decide the extremely difficult task of fighting for life is worth it. Yes, it's a responsibility, and we all carry it as humans.

In closing, I would like to say two things to every single one of you, meant from the bottom of my heart…

I hope you have a great day… tomorrow.

As for tonight, do me a favor and be really good to yourself.

Edited by Lisa Miller https://www.facebook.com/Angel-Editing-Services-234668353364845

Compassion

I don’t think there is a person on the planet who can say they have never been hurt by another person’s action (or lack of action). I also don’t think there is a person on the planet who can say they haven’t struggled with forgiving something that seems nearly unforgivable. This may sound strange, but I consider myself rather lucky to have been given the disease of alcoholism, if for no other reason than it introduced me to the Twelve Steps of life recovery. Staying sober has meant I have had to live my life by these Twelve Steps. Now I gravitate toward the Christian version of the Steps which are called the Eight Principles and are based on the Beatitudes. Principle Six is a doozy… “Evaluate all my relationships. Offer forgiveness to those who have hurt me and make amends for harm I have done to others, except when to do so would harm them or others.” The scriptures that are paired with Principle Six are these: “Happy are the merciful.” Matthew 5:7 and “Happy are the peacemakers.” Matthew 5:9. This same idea is covered by Steps 8, 9 and 10 in secular recovery.

Back when I went through the Steps the first time, there were some people in my life who I didn’t think I could ever forgive. The hurt was too much and their negative impact on my life seemed too great to ever even consider offering them a pardon. But the more I looked at myself and took responsibility for my own actions and decisions in life, the burden of forgiving others seemed to lighten. Still, there were some I just couldn’t imagine ever letting go. The people by my side told me to just have faith that God couldn’t handle it, all I had to do is pray for the willingness to forgive and some day, it would happen. I trusted them because they had what I wanted (sobriety)… and I pressed forward, asking God (many times begrudgingly) for the willingness needed to forgive.

The willingness began to come and like a miracle… I slowly found myself free from resentments because of God’s gift of forgiveness in my heart. But, there was one particular person in my life I was having a really hard time with. He was a past boyfriend who had been extremely abusive emotionally and physically. He had stolen money from me, lied to me, and cheated on me repeatedly. I gave up my college education and family for him to move to Europe and be with him. He was my first experience in dealing with a true alcoholic and I myself had not yet set off my disease. In fact, I didn’t drink much at all back then for fear of his behavior. One of us needed to have our wits about us, and it was usually me. Looking back, so much of that was my decision… I decided to leave everything behind for him, I decided to stay with him after being beaten and discovering his infidelity and lies, I was the one who was so full of pride that I refused to tell anyone, I was the one who was so narcissistic (and codependent) that I believed I could change or “save” him but I was also the one who finally decided to leave him when I had had enough. I am thankful I did, even though it took me well over a year to do it.

Over a year into my sobriety, I was told by my sponsor that I had to work on forgiving… him. Wanting desperately to remain sober, I prayed. I prayed more… and then some more. I had learned from my other acts of forgiveness and amends, timing was everything. And more important than my timing, was God’s timing. One day something deep within my soul made me go out on Facebook and look for him… I wasn’t sure what I would do if I found him, but it was at least a step in the right direction. I didn’t find him, but I found his daughter (she was about 3 or 4 when he and I were together). My heart pounded in my chest as I considered what my next step should be. I waited a few weeks and finally I felt prompted to contact her. I knew she wouldn’t remember me, but I messaged her just asking her if she knew how I could get a hold of her father. I also took that opportunity to apologize to her for my selfish behavior when I was involved with her dad. I was extremely jealous of his relationship with her and felt like perhaps that had made things more difficult than they should have been for them at her young age. She wrote me back a few days later. She was sweet and said that my apology was accepted although she felt unnecessary. She went on to tell me that she had not had contact with her father in over five years. In the years that had passed, he had turned to major drug and alcohol use, was unable to hold a job, was homeless and basically a nomad. She had no idea where he was or when she would hear from him again. She told me she would be happy to pass on a message to him if I wanted her too. I apologized for her pain in dealing with her father and thanked her for getting back to me but just left it at that. No message needed.

In the hours after reading her message, something very strange occurred in my heart. All the hatred I had for this man who had been so horrible to me began to be reshaped. I was overcome with a deep empathy for where he was in his life. My heart ached for him as I looked at my own past and pain and knew exactly what he must have been feeling within himself. I understood the disappointment and self loathing, the endless cycle of wanting to be free and the inability to achieve it, the sense of loss, sadness and anger that addiction manifests within the addicted. I fell to my knees in my living room and began to sob uncontrollably. For the first time in the years since our relationship ended I realized I didn’t hate him… my heart had been overcome with compassion for his plight. I’m not sure how long I cried, but I know it was for awhile. I remember praying for God to find him and heal him the same way God had found and healed me. It was in those moments I felt forgiveness wash over me and in an instant the impossible was complete. It was a true miracle, a gift from God… to this day I have no harsh feeling toward this man. The forgiveness I found through compassion healed my wounds and I have only God to thank for that. Thank you Lord!

But the story doesn’t end there. Something even more amazing happened two or three weeks later. It was a normal day and I was checking my email while drinking my morning coffee. My heart stopped when I saw the name of the sender on one of the messages waiting for me… him. I hadn’t heard from him in over 15 years and I have to say I was scared to open the message and read it. Each time I had heard from him in the past since our relationship ended, it had been threatening in some way. I wondered if I should delete it… but instead, I opened it.

My jaw dropped open as I read his message. He explained that a few weeks earlier he had found himself at rock bottom and with God’s help he entered a 12 step recovery program. He said he was working the steps and it was for this reason he was contacting me. He had Googled me and found my website and got me email address from there. He then apologized for all the things he had ever done to me and humbly asked me for forgiveness. He was Step 9’ing me… “We made direct amends to people we had harmed…” I had done this very same thing to many people but never had anyone done it to me. I thought about the timing of all of it and was brought to tears again. Because of my obedience to continue searching for willingness to forgive him, because of my obedience to the prompting to reach out to his daughter, because of the information she shared with me… God had granted me the compassion I needed only weeks early to be able to completely honestly email him back that very day with these words, “I accept your apology and all is forgiven. In fact I forgave you before you even asked. Good luck in your recovery.” In addition, I wondered if my prayers for God to reach him and intervene might have been a catalyst to him finding recovery only a few weeks later. I’ll never know, but I do know this… prayers work and God can do anything.

Here I am years later, still working on my recovery. It’s kind of like an onion… you peel one layer off only to find another one underneath that needs to be worked on. I’m not sure how many layers I have peeled so far (at least 3), but I know this… there will be another one when I’m done working on the one I’m on now. Recovery is a life journey that is for anyone, not just the addicted.  It has helped me be shaped into a more Christ like being.

My current layer is very private and I have to say has been my most difficult to date, sexual repression. There are many times I don’t even want to work on it, but God tells me there are lies buried deep within my soul that need to be brought into the Truth and Light. He tells me not to be afraid and I am trying to be obedient to His promptings… and last night I had a very similar experience to the one I just wrote about.

Last night I wrote a letter to a guy whose carelessness with me caused me a lot of pain which then set in motion a path for me that eventually turned into my current state of repression. Of course I recognize I have fault and blame in the situation too, so I’m not just pointing the finger at him (there are certainly three pointing back at me). I wrote the letter not knowing if I would actually send it. I wrote it because I felt like God told me to. When I was done, I felt some freedom. I decided to look this guy up online and see if I could find him. He wasn’t on Facebook or Myspace. He wasn’t listed anywhere I could find but something inside me told me to keep looking. Somehow I managed to get just the right keywords on Google and finally find something about him. What I found shocked me… and it wasn’t pretty. It was the type of thing that brought me to an understanding and empathy of his own situation in life. It brought me to compassion, and from my experience… full forgiveness is not far behind.

I’ll finish up by saying this, there are a few people in my life I have not allowed myself to be angry at. I suppose I have thought it wasn’t appropriate for me to be upset with them so I have not allowed myself to feel ugly feelings toward them. When I have been angry, I have ended up feeling guilty for that anger and the guilt then makes me shut the anger out and tell myself “I forgive them… its okay.” But I have learned recently that this approach doesn’t work for me. I have learned that it is okay for me to be angry or upset with anyone who hurts me, no matter who they are. I feel it is important to let others be who they are, but at the same time, I need to let me be who I am too – as long as it doesn’t lead to sin. I decided a few months ago that I was finally going to let myself be truly angry at a person I have never allowed myself to be angry at before. But I did this with a condition… that I would not do so with the intent of staying angry forever. I would do it with the purpose of finding freedom through the anger with God's help. After several weeks of anger, I began to pray for God to help me forgive. I even asked some other people in my life to pray for God to help me find the willingness to forgive… and what has happened since has been nothing short of the hand of God answering prayers. Answers have come to things I didn’t realize, understanding has been presented to me by pure “accident”, my heart has softened and the door of forgiveness has begun to open. I am so very thankful and again in awe of God’s wonder. One thing is for certain, forgiveness is a process. Sometimes it takes longer than others but it always begins with one thing... finding the willingness to try. If God can forgive me for all my crap, then who am I not to forgive others… no matter how heinous the offense.