Who Are We, Really?

"Spirit am I, a holy Son of God, free of all limits, safe and healed and whole, free to forgive, and free to save the world."  --A Course in Miracles, Workbook Lesson 97

When we know who and what we really are, it is easy to forgive others.  When we know who and what we are, we know who and what everyone else is, too.  

Knowing this higher truth is the easiest path to forgiveness.  All that is required to forgive is a recognition of this higher truth.  It can happen as quickly as flipping a switch.  When we stop our everyday thinking and simply know that our trespasser is as much a "holy Son of God" as we are, we are seeing them through the eyes of forgiveness.

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Does Victimhood Feel Good?

It must.  After all, we so often choose it.  We choose victimhood over peace and we make that same choice repeatedly throughout our lives.

When events transpire to leave us feeling like victims, we relish and cherish those feelings.  We fan the flames of our emotions, firing up the feelings of betrayal, hurt, and pain.  Our minds run amok with thoughts like "I can't believe he did that to me.  He is such a jerk.  I didn't deserve that!  Why would he do that to me?  I am always so good to him and then he turns around and does this to me!"

Or perhaps we simply run through the moment of betrayal and hurt repeatedly in our minds reliving the hurt.  We indulge in these thoughts.  Each time we experience it again in our minds it gets bigger and bigger, always more horrible, more hurtful, more painful.

Or maybe we harbor fantasies of revenge. Like the day we show up having lost twenty pounds and looking amazing.  That will make him regret what he did.  Or maybe we fantasize about hurting him just as badly as he hurt us and making him pay for what he did.  Or maybe we hatch elaborate plans about how we could take back whatever it is he took from us.

Sometimes we choose to stay in victim thoughts for years at a time.  Most of us have certain events in our past that are still defining us as victims, even though twenty or thirty years may have passed.  We are allowing our belief in victimhood to run our minds.  And when something runs our minds, it runs our lives.

Does this feel good?  In some twisted way, it does.  We cherish these feelings.  If we didn't, we would let them go. Or perhaps we simply don't know that there is another pathway available to us.

The truth is that at any moment in time we can stop being victims.  Our victimhood requires our continued belief that we have been wronged or harmed in some way.  We need to buy into the game in order to be victims. However, if we choose forgiveness, we are no longer victims.  We can be free of  the pain.  We can heal the wounds.  The contents of our mind is something that we have total and utter control of.  We can choose what we allow to exist in our minds.

Perhaps victimhood feels good.  However, wouldn't freedom feel better?  Wouldn't peace feel better?  Wouldn't living in love be vastly better than this experience of fear we are creating in our lives?  After all, choosing to be a victim is to choose fear over love.

Take a few moments and examine where in your mind you are allowing victimhood to rule. Is this really the choice you wish to make?  If not, forgiveness is the pathway to peace in your mind.  If you're not sure how to forgive, there are many easy processes outlined in "Forgiveness is the Key to Happiness".  One of them will be the perfect way for you to let go and release victimhood permanently from your mind.

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Alice and Otto and The Happy Dream

https://www.tahoedreaminteriors.com/forgive-someone-now/Last night while watching the Oscars, I started thinking about the short film, The Lady in Number 6, which features Alice Herz Sommer, a then 109 year old holocaust survivor.  Alice died last week at the age of 110 and was the oldest living concentration camp survivor.  Her joy and appreciation for life were infectious.  Watch the clip below to see how much she loved both music and people.

Alice reminds me so much of a neighbor I had years ago.  Otto lived down the street from us and was the delight of the entire neighborhood.  Everyday he strolled the sidewalks greeting us all joyously.  He had so much happiness and generosity in his heart.  He loved everyone and wanted nothing more than to connect with each of us personally.  There were always dog treats in Otto's pocket and friendly teasing for any neighborhood children.  I was shocked one day to see the concentration camp tattoo on his wrist.  I never quite got over it.  How could Otto, who had witnessed and been victimized by the worst in human nature be able to bring out the best in human nature in his own self?

Alice and Otto have something huge in common and it's not their concentration camp background...it's forgiveness. Both manged to somehow forgive their horrible past.  They were living proof of the happiness that forgiveness brings.

A Course in Miracles promises that if we live a life of forgiveness we will eventually find ourselves living what it calls "the happy dream" life.  Alice and Otto both forgave and ultimately came to live that happy dream.

We each are in total control of only one thing: our thoughts.  What we choose to fill our minds with defines who we are and what we become.  

Both Alice and Otto lost just about everyone they knew and loved in Hitler's concentration camps and yet they lived on to forgive and love the world.  If they can forgive the terrifying experiences of the camps, then we are each certainly capable of forgiving our own past wounds.  Let Alice and Otto be a shining example of what each of us is capable of achieving, if we will only just do it.  Forgiveness is a lifestyle.  Take the first step and begin to forgive today.  Just take a look at Alice and her joy.  Don't you want the "happy dream", too?

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And if you want to get started today forgiving someone but don't know how, this quick and easy $2.99 downloadable forgiveness process will allow you to forgive today:

When You Were Sad, You Cried and Then it Was Over

"Can you remember a time, perhaps when you were very young, when life as it was--just the fact that it was early morning or any old day in summer--was enough?  When you were enough--not just because everything was the way it was.  Nothing was wrong.  When you were sad, you cried and then it was over.  You were back to a fundamental feeling of positivity, of goodness just because you were alive.  What if you could live that way now?"--Geneen Roth from Women, Food and God

Can you remember back to that feeling of innocence?  You felt happy most of the time.  You were at peace.  There was a time long ago when you did not hold grievances.  You just were.  Life just was.  You just watched and accepted it.  You didn't judge what you saw.  You just noticed.

"When you were sad, you cried and then it was over."  We can do this now.  When life give us bumps in the road we can let ourselves feel the feelings.  Then we can forgive, release and accept.  And then...it will be over.

This is how we lead a happy life.  Forgiveness give us inner peace.

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If you don't know how to "feel the feelings" and forgive, here is an easy to use audio download that will take you through a comfortable guided forgiveness process for $2.99:

  

Jennifer Hadley's Words on Non-Judgement

I get Jennifer Hadley's daily emails and prayers in my inbox every morning.  She is so clear-headed about seeing the world only from love and I really admire that about her.  This morning she had this to say:

"One of my favorite lessons in A Course in Miracles is #68,  Love Holds No Grievances. I honestly think if you work this lesson for a whole year you’ll be totally transformed.This lesson tells us “It is as sure that those who hold grievances will forget who they are, as it is certain that those who forgive will remember.” 

Forgiveness can seem so difficult, but the key is to realize that forgiveness is non-judgment. If we stay in a dedication to practicing non-judgment then we actually will never have anything to forgive. Forgiveness is releasing attachment to the negative meaning we’ve made of things. It’s releasing the opinion. It’s mind opening and mind-liberating."

Non-judgement.  Can we stay in a place of non-judgement today?   Can we release our opinions and just accept whatever comes up in our lives?  When we do this we are at peace. When we learn to live like this, then forgiveness truly becomes our lifestyle and we become happy.

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Are you an eternal victim?

A friend sent an email this morning saying she had found this statement thought-provoking: 

"When you forgive someone, you make a promise to not hold the unchangeable past against your present self. 

Free yourself of the burden of being an eternal victim."

These are quoted from an article called, "10 Painfully Obvious Truths Everyone Forgets Too Soon." http://livelearnevolve.com/10-painfully-obvious-truths-everyone-forgets-too-soon/

When we are wrapped up in thoughts of victim-hood, reviewing over and over in our minds how we have been wronged and put upon, we are stuck.  We are stuck in fear, negative emotion, anger and hurt.  We are contracting.  There is just no way to go truly, happily and creatively forward when victim-hood is the pattern of our reality. 

As the quote above says, the past is unchangeable.  Why are we allowing it to rule our lives today?  What insanity possesses us to allow events that happened twenty years ago to create our worlds today?  

Forgive and release the past.  Let it go.  Flip the switch from fear to love and watch your life change.  All things are possible but only when we are expanding.  In contraction we cannot create anything of true value.  But, when we are in a state of love and acceptance,  we create happiness and inner peace in our world.  It's just that simple!

If you want to start forgiving your past but are not quite sure how to start, there are many easy forgiveness processes outlined in "Forgiveness is the Key to Happiness".  

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Get started right now!  If you want to to try a simple 20 minute forgiveness process today, download "Forgive Your Past Now".  It's a guided audio that will allow you to forgive and release a painful memory from your past today.  It's easy and it works.  Why not start creating happiness in your life today?

Forgiveness Life Lessons

Each of us is working on certain assignments in this lifetime. You will probably find that your most painful past memories will be oriented toward certain themes.

As an example of how this works, let’s suppose you father died in a car crash during your childhood. If something like this has happened to you, then abandonment could be one of your big issues. Look at your lifetime and see how many times abandonment has been a major theme. 

If you believe that your father abandoned you, then your first wife may also abandon you. Later, your best friend may abandon you in some way. This theme could be repeating itself over and over throughout your life. 

The only way to end it is to deal with it for once and for all. Go deep and strike it out at the root with your forgiveness. Once you do that, you probably won’t have to deal with it again. If you find that you do, it means that your forgiveness hasn’t really gone deep enough. Keep probing to find what is buried down there that needs to see the light of your forgiveness.

Forgiving and clearing through big life themes like this is the way to take large strides toward creating inner peace. Of course every day forgiveness of daily events is important, too.  Forgiveness IS a lifestyle.  But probing deep into your past to discover the important life lessons that have become themes in your mind is essential work.  As you uncover and release these, you will begin to discover true happiness. 

Forgiveness is a lot easier than you may think. If you're not sure how to forgive, there are many easy processes explained in depth in my book, "Forgiveness is the Key to Happiness":  

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