The vision statement for my spiritual center is Love Only, Forgive Everything, Remember Who You Are. To me this implies that if I bring love into all areas of my life and forgive all resentments, I won't lose site of who I am.
But what happens if you do the exact opposite of Love Only, Forgive Everything, Remember Who You Are? If you judge everyone and forgive nothing you forget who you are. I know because I’ve done this.
I judged people all the time (still do sometimes). I judged the person in line at the bank for asking too many questions when in my opinion they should’ve been doing online banking. I judged the guy blasting music in his car with all the windows down for the world to hear. I judged my wife (just being honest honey) for loading the dishwasher wrong.
The problem is when we judge we are light years away from love. When we judge we’re hiding behind our own protective walls and not allowing ourselves to be vulnerable. Love is the remedy to this.
Love is the magic elixir to judgement.
Love could mean having healthy boundaries. It could mean leaving a toxic job or praying for someone that you don’t like. We get to decide what love looks like for us.
Just remember, love is the truest form of who you were created to be. And it can also be the hardest thing to lean into when it’s not your practice.
Now lets talk about forgiveness. I had a woman rear-end my car the other day and she was hardly apologetic. In fact she questioned my looking at my bumper to see if there was anything wrong with it. “Are you kidding me?” she said as I ran my finger over my bumper. She said “if you’re going to do that I’m out of here”.
There ended up being nothing wrong with my bumper but the woman’s attitude wrapped around me for the better part of an hour. I wanted to scream at her. How dare you be rude to me after bumping into ME!
I took on her attitude and let it consume me. In fact I kept replaying the event over and over again in my mind. That’s not love. That’s me giving something negative all of my attention. And more specifically that’s not me loving myself in that moment.
Love is being able to let things go.
So how can we love if we can’t forgive? We can’t. There is love and only love… even if someone hits your bumper.
You don’t have to figure out how to forgive you just need to be willing. That’s the first step. The rest will happen on its own because forgiveness is who we are.
Just know this, forgiveness is crucial to remembering who you are because forgiveness allows us to be happy and free and in the present moment. We wont be at peace if we’re holding on to something like I was.
I was pissed off and in a shitty place. That’s not me. That’s not who I am.
Love is remembering who I am.
I’m a father who takes pride in modeling healthy behavior for my daughter. I’m a husband who loves his wife and loves being emotionally present for our relationship. I’m a good man. A vulnerable man. But I can’t be this man unless I love only and forgive everything.
It’s time we all step out from behind our protective walls, lean into love, let go of resentments, and remember who we are. That’s a world I want to live in. That’s a world I want to raise my daughter in.
Love,
Zachary