the musings of this nigerian gal

Remember the blog post I titled Jailbreak?

There I talked about how forgiveness frees you and how bitterness only imprison you.

Now here’s the thing. When someone hurts you and you, you know, take the bold step to forgive the person, you think you are free until you see the person again and everything within you want to either strangle or avoid the person.

For example, girl and boy are dating. Boy was supposed to propose to her but instead spouts one nonsense about him being in love with girl’s sister, and how he didn’t see it coming and so he proposes to girl’s sister. After many tears, girl decides to forgive both boy and sister. Until they have the effrontery to send girl an RSVP. And the girl, as per she has forgiven them, decides to attend the wedding. Except that as she watches boy and sister dance, her heart pinches, her eyes burn, and the thoughts that run through her mind is how she hopes sister gets small pox during the honeymoon.

Relatable, yeah?

Perhaps we have been told that forgiveness is a one time thing. Something you do and get it over with. If you still feel hurt, you have not forgiven the person.

I wrote a story where the mother of the male lead character told him that forgiveness is in two phases; when the person is not present and when you see the person after the first forgiveness.

Let me explain.

So someone hurts you, right? And after a conversation with God, you decide to forgive the person. So you say, “I forgive Tonia.” And then you cry and you find release in your heart.

After that personal time with God, you see the person and you feel the hurt flare to life — especially if he/she isn’t even sorry about what he/she did.

Rather than avoiding the person, you start working out that forgiveness. So you can go to the person and let them know that you have forgiven them. You can buy the person something. You can pray for the person. You can remind yourself out loud that you forgive the person.

You take one. And take two. And take three. And take as many shots as you need to till you can look at that person, speak to or about that person without the constriction of pain in your heart.