Showing posts with label forgiveness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label forgiveness. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Letting go of past relationships

Just when you thought you were over it, you accidentally walk into the bar, club, restaurant, coffee shop or store where you once were together, in love. You were there together, before you had the talk about what you really wanted. Before the big fight. Before the reconciliation. Before the next big fight and then when you finally broke up for good.

Why do you wonder if you did the right thing? Why do you miss your ex? Why is closure so hard to close? As the saying goes, breaking up is hard to do. Letting go of past relationships and closure might be even harder to come by. Next time you face this dilemma, try these to finally let go.

Answers
What is really bugging you about the breakup? If you don't have some idea of what really happened to you, it's going to be a lot harder to move forward. Write out what this relationship was for you from the first day you met to the day you broke up. The universe supports loving relationships of equality. Was it an equal loving relationship? Did this person bring out the best (or worst) in you? Was this a sexual relationship, a fling or real attraction and love?

Advice
Ask the friends you trust, "What did you observe in my relationship?" Often the people who love us can see what we can't but they won't open up or give advice to you unless you ask. They don't want to hurt your feelings about your choice. It's so much easier to idealize the past than accept that your relationship had some real flaws that would have erupted over time. Sometimes the questions can be answered by meeting with your ex, but be careful! No sex with your ex or, you may be on different time lines of grief and it can be painful if it appears that your ex is "over it" and you're not. Your ex may also already be seeing someone else which may just make you feel like dog poop.

Reclaim Yourself
There's a reason that people sell the house when they get divorced. Shared space is intimate space. If your place looks like he just left for work ten minutes ago or her toothbrush is still hanging in the bathroom, you're wallowing. Buy new sheets. Paint, move furniture around or have a "newly single" house warming party. Your environment reflects your mind. If it's a shrine to a past relationship, how can you heal? It's not about denying your feelings. It's about letting your mind rest in your own home.

Forgiveness
Even if you can't forgive them, forgive yourself! Relationships don't fail. They change. You may not be ready to forgive your partner for any number of things (like cheating!), but you must forgive yourself. Letting go isn't possible without accepting and loving your own willingness to love. If you are waiting for your ex to say something you want to hear or just to return your DVDs, you're giving them power over your process. Stop empowering them over you. Forgiveness is hard but whether given to them or to yourself, you feed better energy than anger and feeling miserable.

Feelings
Resist the temptation to run out for a replacement person in the first few months. If someone told you their grandmother died, you wouldn't tell them to go out and get another grandma. You would give them all the time they needed to think about their relationship with their loved one and what it meant to them. The need to heal takes longer for some. Some put up false pretense of getting over someone quickly but they are hurting tremendously inside.

Grieving
Grieving is a process of going deeper into consciousness. Therefore, grieving the end of a relationship opens you up to a deeper experience in life. Pain is a necessary part of growth. Take a treasured object that represents your relationship and set it free. Perhaps you can donate a piece of jewelry you received to a charity, release a love letter or painting of you two into the ocean. By marking the end of this important person in your life, you are honoring the time you had together and you are honoring yourself for having the courage to love.

Bar advice. Letting go of past relationships only happens when you arrive at a place of rest and acceptance. It will come. Trust the process and experience your pain. It will conclude into clarity. It will lead to peace. Eventually.

Monday, April 23, 2007

Pain, trust and forgiveness.



Bar advice. Getting help from family and friends will help in the healing process. Seek prfessional advice if need be but remember this. Time is a great healer too.

Love is forgiveness

Most of the lovers do not forgive their loved ones. They may forgive their sworn enemy, but they may not forgive their lover. Do you agree with me? Why is this so? It should have been exactly reverse. Somehow it's a always the case of a third party.

What is love? What do we understand by loving someone? How is love different than other relationships and emotions? In love, we give our whole mind and heart to our beloved. We try to keep our beloved most comfortable. We take care not to hurt our darling. In love, we care for each other. We are in the mood of giving in love. Giving always gives more pleasure in love than anything else. If we give things, our heart, our being, our soul, our time and more; it doesn't matter to us because we feel so cherished and want to make the other happy.

If our lover makes a mistake, shall we berate them? Shall we blame them and give them pain? Shall we hold it against them forever? Shall we call them betrayer? If we do all this then it is not love, but a business relationship. You feel you have given so much now want the truth, faithfulness and everything else in return. You feel sad and confused. What has gone wrong?

In love, we have to forgive. We have to pacify our beloved that mistakes are a way of life and everybody does them. We have to tell them not to worry and we are with them. We have to tell them to stop thinking of what happened and think of good things and try to live life joyously. But a majority of us behave in reverse. That is our failure. It was never love to begin with. If you believe that you love your partner, please learn forgiveness.

A quick story is whereby I was forgiven for flirting with another girl and her friends told her about. It was really nothing and there was no intent for anything to happen. i guess I did not consider what her feelings about it would be. She confronted me and the girl about it. Nothing really did happen but it hurt her to know that I did something of that nature. In the end we had a long talk and I apologised for what happened and for hurting her. We made up and she cried for a while but was glad that we had sorted things out.

One thing that normally happens when women find out that a guy has cheated, not in my case though, is to seek out the other woman to confront her. She does this to see with her own eyes what was so special about the other woman. Also, she wants to give her a piece of her mind. The one thing is she forgets is that the guy is a willing party to the actions taken. She should be dealing the issues with the guy instead of the other woman who may not even know that he was seeing anyone. The worst thing happens to be the lack of respect that the guy has done if he sleeps with another when he's in a relationship. There's really something lacking in the relationship if this happens. Both need to tackle the problem with great desire.

If they are a married couple or not, forgiveness can still be allowed. Why? It hurts yes but the shame and guilt has been placed on the head of the culprit. The one you love and reality are still in love with although he may have done this terrible thing. It will take time but people can work things out. If it be the girl that has made the betrayal, most men will be devastated. Professional help may be need but it can be done as well.

Bar advice. The human heart is a fragile thing but it's ability to love and forgive is great. You may not know just yet your own ability.