What blocks us – on the paths to creativity, spirituality and justice?

I think some of the blocks on all three paths are the unforgiven places in our journeys. Someone once told me that the people we haven’t forgiven are living rent-free in our brains.

If we can accept that forgiving doesn’t have to mean we have to accept being treated poorly, unfairly, unlovingly, we might be able to find it in us to let go, and in the words of  Dr. Fred Luskin, Forgive for Good. (This is a very helpful book.)

I was thinking about how forgiveness can actually open us up to be free to be who we really are, when I came across this quote by Frederick Buechner

When somebody you’ve wronged forgives you, you’re spared the dull and self-diminishing throb of a guilty conscience. When you forgive somebody who has wronged you, you’re spared the dismal corrosion of bitterness and wounded pride. For both parties, forgiveness means the freedom again to be at peace inside their own skins and to be glad in each other’s presence.                               

So – Before I stop writing about this – I do think the hardest person to forgive can be ourselves.  God’s love really is bigger than anything we’ve ever done. So maybe it’s time to breathe in God’s forgiveness – to let ourselves believe we are loved enough to be worthy of forgiveness, and a new day in which to be who we were created to be.

May God’s forgiveness heal our broken places and set us free –