I had a vision this morning. It came like a concept.
Tell me if you have not had this experience. You recently took a photo of something you saw in your day just a few days ago. You think of that photo you took while in conversation with a friend and you go to "pull it up" but you end up sliding those images of everything else that happened between 'now' and that other moment just days ago. Your friend, on the other hand, leans in to see the photo you are talking about. They are thinking that you have it handy, but you are scrolling left, left, left and you are seeing the receipt you got from the candy store, then the contact information for that guy who hit your car, then the goofy face your wife was making when she tried a peanut butter and pickle sandwich for the first time. "You know what I mean?"
There is that awkward feeling you have that someone is watching you review your last few days of life, or at least what you felt was important enough to capture. The person who is watching leans in and then they get a felling of empathy, "What if that was me scrolling to find an image on my phone?" and they step back and twiddle their thumbs.
Our lives are like our camera roll on our phones. For me, this has been the case even before the smartphone came on the scene. It happened to me back when the conversations would require someone stepping over to the computer to see a photo of Johnny who made that face like he always does but all the downloads I have made are in that same folder.
Our lives are a lot like that. Many of us, when we are alone, go through our 'gallery' and look for those inconvenient and possibly embarrassing images that might be seen over our shoulder and we sort them to another folder. We know that they are still there but they will not bee seen if we decide to look for and show someone that awesome BMW we saw on the way to work.
Our lives are like that. We keep moments in time, and categorize them, sort them, and file them away like evidence we may need in the future "in case he sues me." It's kind of like receipts or contracts that we save to prove our rights in a deal we made. Couples have shared memories, especially of fights or arguments they have had, filed away to bring up when needed. They are like ammunition in our arsenal we can use on the them, throwing it in their face saying, "Take that!" The ammunition is useless against anyone other than your spouse because that other somebody was not present when the argument or offense took place.
Lone moments in time can trigger a feeling or emotion when something reminds you of an event that you filed away. This is called "getting triggered by..." a situation or a place. As soon as you are triggered, you are out of control and all logic and reason go out the window. That file you are keeping is your key. It opens the right to lose your cool and fly off the handle. Do you really want to explode in the middle of the grocery store? I think not. It is embarrassing and people may even see you as crazy. So what can we do about that? Here are some scenarios and the solution.
Offense
If the issue being triggered is an abuse, theft, or offense, you need to throw it away. It goes in the garbage can and gets taken to the street! I would go as far as to watch as the garbage truck takes it away. You are keeping a receipt proving that you own that experience. Yes, it happened and you can keep the memory of it. It is actually impossible to forget it. What you want to do is give that offense and the offender to the judge and let them await their sentencing and consequential jail time.
Regret
If the trigger is something that you did that you wish you could undo, intentional or accidental. Again, you are carrying that stinky bag of left over chicken bones, day after day, and year after year. Why are you saving it? Take it to the street and make sure it leaves. You will still remember it but you will stop torturing yourself with guilt. Things that you have done to others are like stab wounds in your soul. They wound you and those wounds can be reopened at a moment's notice if you are saving them like a receipt - guilt can be triggered to resurface. Again, you are out of control of your faculties when you are triggered.
Badges
The above are both situations that we hold on to because "We have a right" to carry them around with us. When we are triggered, it is like the badge that an FBI agent carries. He uses it when he is claiming the right to ask for information that you would never give to anyone else. You cannot just say, "None of your business!" and walk away. The badge triggers and initializes the start of a different kind of situation in which everyone present is involved.
If you have not thrown your badge in the trash and watched it leave in the garbage truck, you are claiming the right to change everyone's situation. Think "the freak out at the grocery store" and how pulling rank on people that were never involved with that memory or offense is kind of silly. It only impacts Your appearance and behavior in that situation.
Forgiveness
I purposely left this word out up until now. It carries a connotation of walking up to the offender and giving them a free pass. That is not what it means at all. It means tossing those stinky chicken bones. It means giving the person to the judge. It means giving up the right to take a pound of flesh at some point in the future.
Give it to Jesus. His actual name is Salvation that is what people called him when he walked the earth. "Hey Salvaton, how should we pray?" the disciples asked. Yeshua (Salvation) replied, "Pray thus: Our Father who art in heaven..."
He is The Judge who will actually make sure the offender serves time. He will also save you from serving time. Give those things to him. Ask him to heal the wounds in your soul. But you have to address each wound individually and repent if you are the offender. Let me give you a quote from the Bible that follows the prayer Yeshua gave us, one that nobody talks about. Hello CNN! Home of the incomplete or edited quotes...
Matthew 6: 13 And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil. 14 For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, 15 but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
As we turn to the man whose name is Salvation, as we rely on our promised Salvation, we should ask ourselves if we have read the prayer he gave us and its caviot.
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