One thing I have come to love about life is its beauty. You see, life is so aesthetic with so many cheats and hacks that once we master them, it becomes smooth sailing as our experiences become very easy to navigate.
Many times, our challenges in life stem from our relationships with people. We get offended, and then we expect an apology, but it's not forthcoming. Thus, the heart is heavy, and the mood is swinging towards anger, depression, and sadness.
One is faced with all these heightened emotions that a simple apology would have fixed if only it was tendered. Unfortunately it wasn't, and it becomes difficult to move past the situation. In this instance, the individual feels stuck because mostly they don't understand that forgiveness doesn't have to be a request from the offender but a decision of self so as to be free from the hurts and burden.
Recently, a friend of mine had issues in his relationship.He had a disagreement with his fiancee, which led to him being verbally abusive, and because of this, the lady called off their engagement. Something that started so lightly escalated, and before my friend knew it, his relationship of over 5 years was hitting rock bottom.
At first he thought his fiancee was just being angry and would come around, but to his disappointment, he saw the girl moving on and no longer being interested in the relationship, which greatly devastated him.
He started apologizing to her, begging her to forgive him and promising to be better, but then the issue was that the fiancee never held any grudges because, according to her, she already forgave him even before he came begging.
The response my friend got about being forgiven didn't sit well with him because he questioned, if truly he has been forgiven, then why is his fiancée not accepting their relationship back?. He came to me with his concerns, and I didn't have any other option but to intercede.
I reached out to the lady to hear her own side with reasons, and best believe I got more than what I bargained for because after hearing all that my friend said to her, I couldn't bring myself to beg on his behalf. I felt even worse when the girl questioned, "How does she move past all the abusive words he used on her?"
You see, forgiveness is easy, but forgetting is where the problem lies, and it gets worse with the emotional trauma of pretending all is well when you bear secret resentment towards your offender.
I understood my friend's fiancee-turned-ex perfectly, especially when she told me going back to my friend would traumatize her more than being away from him.In fact, she said it was easier to forgive him as an ex than as a girlfriend, and I really did feel that. Sadly, when I went back to my friend to tell him to give her space and time, he was angry at me, saying I couldn't get a simple task right.
You know, it is easy for him to push for the relationship to be mended because he wasn't the one hurting. Given my life experiences, I have since learned to put myself in people's shoes before expecting anything from them. Another life hack or cheat code that has since strengthened my human relationships.