Monday, May 5, 2014

Forgiveness Challenge Day 2: Forgiveness & Physical Health

Today's challenge talked about the science of forgiveness and how our spiritual, emotional, and physical health can be affected when we haven't forgiven someone.  I know that's true for me.  When I haven't forgiven someone and I see that person, I get knots in my stomach and my heart rate speeds up and the reptile part of my brain starts shouting, "Run, run, run!"  Where before there might have been ease and flow in the conversation, now I am anxious and constricted.  I can see how over time the constriction could cause more serious health problems.

Today I had a massage, one of my favorite things.  As the masseuse worked deep into the knots that live perpetually in my upper back between my shoulders, I had a memory surface from at least 15 years ago of someone I worked with and had a difficult relationship with for awhile.  As I remembered that time, I wondered if the people who have hurt me or who I have resented are living in those knots in my shoulders.  If I could release the pain and the hurt and the anger (most of which I don't ever consciously feel anymore) would the knots in my shoulders release too?  I don't know the answer to the question, but I found myself thinking about that person from long ago and releasing him.  What happened just doesn't matter anymore.  Maybe the massage and the intention to forgive will loosen the knots just a little. 

Jesus said, "If you forgive the sins of others they will be forgiven them, and if you retain the sins of others, they will be retained."  How I long to grow in the spiritual life to a point where I never retain the sins of others.  That's between them and God.  I want my heart to be full of forgiveness - and it often is when I'm sitting in my house thinking about it in theory.  It's when I come face to face with other people that it becomes more difficult.  One of those things to which I can say, "I will, with God's help."  Without God's help, I stay caught up in the hurt feelings.  With God's help, grace is possible. 

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