Saturday, February 16, 2013

Humanity- To Hurt or To Heal?

A couple posts ago, I wrote about the nonexistence of forgiveness. Being the emotional person that I am, I have been pondering that concept ever since. I ride waves of knowing exactly how to deal with my feelings; one minute I think I can forgive everyone else's sins and leave the past behind, then the next I'm cursing the day I made that first fatal mistake and wondering why I ever chose to forgive. It's a wild ride. My ex is in a show this weekend in town; he has the starring role as Prince Charming (oh the irony). My first reaction was to rashly throw out all evidence of this fact- papers went directly in the trash and I casually ignored the bulletin boards around town. Now as I sit here, fairly calm after a grueling zumba class this morning, I wonder if I should go. I still fall into the trap now and then of believing that I can alleviate my own guilt and regret by supporting those people in the past who have hurt me. So I try to play nice, to rekindle friendships long gone. I know it is a bad idea, but I do it anyway. 
The thing is, this method may work for other people- being friends with exs or trying to forgive a friend who stabbed you in the back, but it doesn't work for me. My guilt brings me back into the relationship, and then I end up more scarred than before as I'm spit out for not the first, but the second time. But it's so tempting, isn't it? I guess old habits do die hard. I lead myself to believe that I can have another friend in town, or start writing to an old friend, and it will all just resume as before. Well the truth is, it doesn't. Life doesn't work that way. I wish it did, and for those of you who can forget and forgive, well you are better people than I. 
I grew up Catholic, so forgiveness was part of the spiritual regiment with which I am well accustomed.While I attended church when I was younger, I have strayed in my older years. I still consider myself to be religious, I pray and attend mass occasionally. The chapel was always my place of calm in college, and I would often sit in the pews watching the sunlight fade through the stained glass and just think. I haven't been the greatest Catholic of late, especially with all this talk of forgiveness not existing, for which a certain old friend of mine with whom I no longer communicate would shake his head. It isn't that I don't think it exists, it's that I wonder whether I am capable of performing such a heavy task. How do you absolve someone else from his/her sins against you? How do you forgive yourself for your words and actions that have hurt others? 
I can not figure it out. I have claimed to forgive, but then I get hurt again. I ignore, but that hurts as well. Now, I didn't intend for this post to be a lecture or a depressing rant, but I really do grapple with the concept of humanity and our need to hurt and heal. What does an apology really mean? It never erases the hurt. 
Some of my friends have told me that I just need to get over it and move on. I have moved on in a sense, but I recognize that I am a highly emotional person, extremely receptive to love and thus extremely vulnerable to hurt. I am the people pleaser, not so much in that I forget myself, but I like to make sure others are happy. Therefore, I can't simply "let it go" or "get over it." It's just not that simple. Everything that has happened in my life, every person that has entered into it, has a part to play. They are pieces I don't take lightly, and as such, do not discard lightly either. 
So while this post has to end at some point, my emotions do not, my feelings attached to certain people or events do not. They are all a part of me, and while I have physically moved on, I am allowed to mourn the pieces that used to make up my life. For me, I just have to make sure that mourning does not morph into obsessing. There is a fine line between remembering the past and still living in it. 
So I write to you dear readers this morning, an emotional being, vulnerable and full of questions. Maybe some can relate, maybe some have no idea what it is that I am trying to express. I hope my musings are helpful for at least one soul out there. Remember to enjoy your life because it is important. Remember to always remember.

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