Our planet is a curious place.
Filled with a remarkable array of both animate and inanimate objects, its surface and all that dwell thereupon morph from moment to moment. Never were there two moments exactly the same in history. A snapshot taken today of the earth in its fulness would be hardly recognizable if shown to our forefathers 100, 1,000 or 5,000 years ago. Forms of life come and go, but life itself is given new expression continually. In that sense it could be said that life itself never dies.
The one constant in life is change.
Seventy-five percent of your body is water and that water is replaced roughly monthly. Roughly seven percent of your body is blood cells or blood fluid. Those cells are replaced every 30 days or so. In a study published in the Annual Report for the Smithsonian Institution in 1953 scientists found that ninety-eight percent of your atoms are replaced each year. Atoms make up molecules, molecules form cells, cells combine to form tissues and tissues make up organs.
You are given the gift of a new you, every year.
You are not the same person you were when you began reading this post, two minutes ago. In fact, hardly anything on earth is the same as it was two minutes ago. The earth has spun a little, moved a little in its orbit, the sun has moved around its center point. You are different, your pets have changed and so have your friends and even your enemies, for that matter.
Why is it then that people are so prone to holding grudges? A grudge is a petrified opinion about something or someone. “I hate uncle so-and-so because of how he treated me the other day,” one might say. And for the life of the grudge otherwise valuable life energy is poured into hurling words or sticks and stones to settle the score. With the amount of grudges held in the hearts of men and women it’s no wonder that adrenal exhaustion is one of the most common ailments of patients in complementary and alternative medical clinics!
Grudges fester like a gangrenous wound. They rarely are contained to the wound site, in fact, deeply held grudges tend to eat away at the fabric of life, like acid in a paper cup. Misery seeks company, so grudge holders tend to seek out others of the same feather. Commiseration. Not a pretty sight.
The only way to release a grudge and to begin living is to embrace and extend forgiveness. That said, forgiveness is not for the weak-hearted or the weak-minded. Forgiveness is, as Gandhi once said, “an attribute of the strong.”
The forms of life are ever-changing. One trap of the human mind is to try to lock in an ideal experience and to try to hold on to it ad nauseum. I once saw a talk show that featured brides who, a full year after being married, secretly put on their wedding dresses daily(!) when their husband was away and watched the wedding ceremony on video. A little extreme, of course, but it illustrates the point. Obsession with the way things were is like running in quicksand. It gets you nowhere.
Further, an over-reliance on the forms around oneself gives a false sense of security and happiness. The forms themselves are wonderful, but remember that they are ever-changing. Is it not the life that animates the people and animals around you that evokes wonderment? Is it not the living done in the house that makes it a home? The bricks and mortar are great, but only as a setting for the enjoyment of life.
It’s a bit sad that most people spend their childhood wishing they could grow up quickly and be adults, while most adults wish that time would slow down or that they could be as children again. There is a certain irony to life when it is not lived properly.
To live life fully, to experience love fully, you must be adept at forgiveness. Men and women have struggled with this concept through the ages, trying their best to find some other way around the inevitable consequences of failing to offer forgiveness. They’ve made heroes out of those precious few who revealed the power of forgiveness no matter how extreme the hardship – Martin Luther King, Jr, Desmond Tutu, Mahatma Gandhi, Jesus, and so on – but for some reason when the going gets rough they forget that forgiveness is well within their power too.
Our planet is a curious place.
Gregory Hake 
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I was visiting with a friend recently who contentedly said she had nothing in her life that warranted any complaint. I chuckled with astonishment because many would think some of the things she and her family are dealing with right now are pretty horrible. But in her genuine expression in that moment I almost couldn’t remember what the things were that I’ve gotten myself riled up about over her situation. Most would fall down in a heap of futility and take others with them, but her attitude created an atmosphere where I would have had to work really hard to continue holding any grudges supposedly on her behalf (funny how quickly we take up causes allegedly on behalf of others). It is clear to me from this that forgiveness creates an atmosphere of blessing and generation. It blessed her, it blessed me, and it certainly sent a blessing out to anyone connected to the situation. Whether they receive it or not is not our concern – what is of concern is that the door is opened for creative change.
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Yikes, forgiveness is contagious! Cover your mouth and nose and run! Just kidding. Thanks for your comment and have a great night.
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Desmond Tutu said without forgiveness, there is no future. It may not change the past, and it certainly does not turn a blind eye to atrocity, but it does change the future. Humanity is at a critical point where the cycles of reprisal and counter-reprisals have to be broken. What an eye-opener to look closely at the reality that a life consumed with retribution (regardless of the size of the perceived offense or hardship) wastes our opportunity to live a life worth living. I recall in your post on Aimee Mullins ( http://bit.ly/bhEoby ) you asked “Do you see adversity as an opportunity to deepen your understanding?” No matter what we perceive we’ve been dealt in life, has our creative capacity to make a positive difference in the world been taken away? It seems our hearts would have ceased beating already if that were the case. I’ve heard it said that to forgive is to set a prisoner free – you thought the prisoner was the person you were forgiving except you discover that the prisoner was you. Has anyone ever had that experience before? It is humbling! Your post today holds the keys to the restitution of living. Let freedom ring!
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I certainly have had that experience before. It is amazing how powerful and freeing forgiveness can be, even if the inteded recipient doesn’t receive it or worse, throws it back in your face!
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If forgiveness were the attitude in which we approached each moment instead of something done as an afterthought, we truly would be in position to receive the gifts of newness which life is constantly seeking to give. Thank you for presenting this so clearly!
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I read once that forgiveness is the economy of the heart – it saves the expense of anger, the cost of hatred, and the waste of spirits. Your blog posts have been looking at new business and management models a lot this week. It makes sense to take a look at the emotional mismanagement driving so much of the continued insanity in the world. Powerful post!
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A benchmark for emotional maturity is the realization is that our past can no longer be blamed for our actions in the present.
People tend to approach life from the perspective of familiarized emotional reactions stored in the brain, and they respond automatically with ‘familiarized’ behavior in an attempt to feel in control, regardless of what would seem reasonable even to the person themselves. Because emotional reactions can be triggered unconsciously and then bypass the mind’s reasoning process, it takes a power stronger than the mind to change the emotional patterning. The heart has to change.
Forgiveness means a fundamental change occurs in the heart. While we may agree with the spirit of forgiveness when the sun is shining, if there is not the maturity in our heart to take responsibility for forgiveness when the rains come we will on the same hamster wheel again, reinforcing the mind’s sense of justification and hurt.
If we find ourselves rehashing instead of releasing, embrace it as a good cue that we are participating in something that is draining our life’s energy – take a step back from it, take the significance out of it, and let our hearts open up to a creative and intuitive flow actually representative of who we are. We were not designed to live our lives at the end of the whip of an outdated locked-in pattern.
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I like the suggestion to “take the significance out of it.” As a teacher, it is second nature to look to reduce the significance in issues and events that come up for my students. I may look to show them different ways to view the situation, or new ways to approach their parents. When working with young people it’s obvious that when too much significance is attached to the perceived issue it becomes a huge emotional energy waste. But I notice that as adults we don’t tend to offer that same help to ourselves. Instead we tend to act as children do – we immediately cave to the emotion of the issue and argue, pout, blame. What’s even worse is when we refuse to take the significance out even after it is obvious the thing is destroying us. “I just can’t help it.” There comes a time to cut our losses and take action to restore our connection to the flow of life. Gregg, thanks for the insight as to how and why we can “help it.”
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An interesting approach, thanks for sharing! Sometimes we are called to handle hugely significant things, yet we can’t let the proportion disturb our sense of calm and our ability to reason.
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I like that thought, Lucy, that “forgivenss means a fundamental change in the heart.” Well put!
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One of the latest trends is to reinvent yourself. I believe it is possible. Everyone goes through one of the major life changes such as death of a close friend or family member, a job loss or change and for some it is divorce. This is usually the point at which we decide to reinvent. I see forgiveness as a survival tool and when we’re at these crossroads it becomes a revival tool. Dump the baggage and as is said “get a life” …the one we choose for ourselves.
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Great post! There is so much more available in life than to waste it holding a grudge. Why live like that when we all have a choice to start today, to forgive and move forward. As you mentioned, our body creates a new “us,” why can’t we follow the wisdom of a beautiful design and be willing to let a new “us” be created as well in our heart, perspective and thoughts.
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This has been a perpetual subject in my own life. It is one of those ideas that sounds counterintuitive and only when you experience it for yourself do you understand the freedom and powerful effect it has on you physically and emotionally.
I’ve had the “watershed” experience of forgiveness when I made a conscious decision to forgive and I’ve had the ones that forgiveness was reached over time when the sting of the hurt had dissipated.
In my experience the first was far more powerful and liberating. I felt the the strength that Gandhi cited and I felt a constriction in my heart and feelings, that I really wasn’t aware of, immediately loosen. My question always to myself is why wouldn’t I always automatically do that for myself. Why hasn’t this become second nature?
It is not a habit that humanity has developed. It is still so miraculous that ,as you said, hero status is the result.
Being involved with our initiative to end school bullying, I see the results of not knowing we each hold the powerful tool of forgiveness. To teach our children this is to give them protection that is far stronger than laws or organizations. It is the principal means to nullify the effects of the “mean girls”syndrome and the “gang harassment” that has become so popular in our culture.
This frees the victim from the isolating hopelessness that hate and resentment creates and I think would stop some of the disastrous situations and destructive behaviors we see such as suicide or retaliation.
This subject has not been exhausted until forgiveness becomes the “norm”, the first thought that enters our minds as individuals and nations.
This would signal the end of so much strife in the human condition.
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Thank you for sharing your experiences with forgiveness. Powerful evidence!
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Appreciate your post, Gregg.
There is a wide body of research illustrating the fact that disease is linked to the inability to let go of certain beliefs and emotions. You can read more about the research in books like: Molecules of Emotion, Feelings Buried Alive Never Die, Your Body Speaks Your Mind.
Cancer for example is a result of resentment and the inability to forgive. . .yourself or others.
Disease is the result of a block in the flow system . . a block at the physical level of the body just may be linked to a block in the heart and mind. Everything in life is about flow. When we let go—life just naturally happens!
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The world and consequently the nature of disease appears to have grown much more complex, particulary since the industrial age. From what I understand the new system of medicine called “Integrative Medicine” is attempting to assess the emotional and spiritual nature of patients as part of a holisitc review. The “find-it-and-fix-it” approach to healing dominant in the Western medical approach is under pressure as the medical conditions it was designed to handle, acute and trauma cases, are now the minority. Chronic illness now represents the majority of health care issues we face as a society, so the time is right for the emergence of a more inclusive, holistic, integrated approach.
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I often see people assume that forgiveness is for the weak-willed or the naive. I find forgiveness important because it allows you to let go of the people in your life that are wasting your time. I think that people believe that if you forgive someone, that things go back to the way they were before the person did whatever you forgave them for, but that runs contrary to the point you made that life is change. One benefit of forgiveness is that it lets you make a clean break without the lingering ties of a grudge that keep you firmly attached to the person or thing that affronted you. That is only one of the benefits of forgiveness, a tool that is both rarely used and very powerful.
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Resentment is like a glass of poison that a man drinks; then he sits down and waits for his enemy to die. Yep our planet is a curious place.
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