Hey there folks, welcome to episode 12 of a pebble in a pond.
Oh boy, this is gonna be a rough one. I know it's gonna be a rough one because I've
I've tried to record this now. Well, this will be the fourth time. I haven't really been able to get through
different parts of this and so I've just decided to rerecord the whole thing because
It's a it's a tough
Tough concept today. We're going to be talking about forgiveness and
More so than any of the other topics this is one that is going to probably hit home for most people
I
Don't there's no easy way to get through it. There's no easy way to
work on it and there's really not an easy way to
Hold it near in your heart if you either are somebody that can forgive
or you're somebody that can't and
Most people can most you again, but there are a lot of people out there that just don't have it in them to forgive
So what we're gonna do is I'm gonna go ahead and we're gonna start the music right away
so does I tell you as soon as I finish telling you what we're gonna do and
I'm gonna go ahead and I'm gonna just start with some quotes and I'm not gonna
I'm not just gonna have one quote and talk about it
I'm gonna go ahead and talk about a couple of quotes because forgiveness is something that
transcends
everything really
you're talking about
ideas and concepts that
Are so deep and so difficult for so many people that
I feel like we should give the voices of our past a little bit more
Respect and a little bit more appreciation
On this episode because they're gonna say things in ways that I can't say them
probably
At least right now
without
Just you just hearing
A bearded man cry for an hour, so we don't want to do that. So instead we're going to
Talk about a couple of quotes. We're gonna get into those a little bit and we're just gonna go from there. I
Can't tell you how difficult this topic is for me and
how much it
It hurts at a certain level to discuss it
That is why I'm not gonna go ahead and talk about it
At a certain level to discuss it. That is why I wanted to make this episode and
That is why we will get into I will discuss some personal things
So if that makes you uncomfortable, I apologize for that
But I think that it's important
For people to understand and for people to see a real example of what
forgiveness is how it works
how a lot of people can get through it in their minds and
The power the transformational power that it holds
so
So without further ado, let me go ahead and play the song
When I was thinking about doing this episode I had a couple other ideas in mind for a couple other topics and
I was trying as hard as I could to give myself a reason to do those other topics
I really wanted to avoid this one for as long as I could to try to give myself a chance to really
You know work through what I was trying to do
And I think that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to do this episode
I wanted to do this one for as long as I could to try to give myself a chance to really you know work through
some of the issues that I have and you know put myself in a place where I'd be better off talking about this
But then as I thought about it, and I really got to
I don't want to maybe an understanding of where I am
I just I just figured I would record this episode for I
guess so that someday I can go back and I can listen to it or maybe somebody else can listen to it and and
I guess see a point in time where you know how I've changed and how I you know kind of a kind of a benchmark and
So I'm I'm approaching this episode like I said I've tried to record it a few times now
I've had different segments work out and and I liked it, but then it just didn't fit with the other stuff
I was trying to do so this one. I'm
I'm going to kind of peel the veil back a little bit
Before we get too far into this and I'm gonna tell you that I'm basically recording this all in one shot
I'm not doing as many edits. I'm not gonna do segments really
I'm just gonna basically talk and see what happens
The reason there's it's a kind of a twofold reason one because I wasn't able to get through it
Without
Crying and being extremely emotional the other way and this way at least it'll be more organic and I'll I'll have to
work through it in real time and
Also, I'm really looking to maybe
Record episodes live instead of recording them and posting them. I'm thinking that maybe I will
I'll start recording them like during a tick-tock live or you know, whatever whatever social media I can do it on
And I'll just do the episode live like that so that people can actually take part in the conversation
I had originally planned on having guests and things like that and I probably will still do that
I just have to get
Scheduling issues worked out and things like that and I have to come up with some topics that people really want to talk about with
me, but
For now
My I think my goal will be to try to do more episodes in in this manner where I'm
I'm
Studying throughout the week. I'm learning about the topics. I'm
I'm starting, you know, I'm starting to feel comfortable with them and then I'm starting to feel comfortable with them
I'm starting to feel comfortable with them. And then when I go in to record the episode, I'm just gonna
I'm just gonna let it go. I'm just gonna
Have it be more of a stream of consciousness kind of thing instead of a you know me kind of building an episode
Anyway, I just thought I'd touch on that before we dive too deep into this
For two reasons one because I think it needs to be said and two because it kind of postpones the pain
anyway
First quote I wanted to get to was one that I read
I don't even know
I will say this I've
for those of you that have listened to the ticktocks and or the scene in the ticktock channel and
Those of you that have listened to other episodes you probably know that
I've always
Been a collector of different quotes and things like that and and really there are very few people more quotable than Mark Twain
however
This is a quote that I
Read I don't even know I was probably 13 or 14 and I really had no idea what it meant and I
You know it was one of those things that I'd read it and I kind of just overlooked it and then as time went on
And I lived life
It hit me harder and harder every time I saw it and
Anyway
Mark Twain once said forgiveness is the first thing
Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it
That's
That's painful to read because it's so damn true. It is so damn true
you know you think about
you think about what it takes for you you to get to the point of
forgiveness
What it the pain that you have to endure? I mean we all go through little things, right?
We all we all have
You know little
Dealings with people where they're disrespectful or whatever it may be and these are kind of they are big but at the same time
They're kind of small like they're just slights. You're not you're not as
You know that they're not they're not soul-shattering
but so there's not really as much of a need for this
movement towards forgiveness for that
but
When somebody really really hurts you when someone betrays you and someone lies to you and someone
you know does the things that the people do and
It leaves you
Stunned your world is shattered
It's it's nigh impossible when you're feeling that pain to truly forgive
But when you do
It doesn't like you're never gonna be in a good state like forgiveness doesn't come from you being healed
forgiveness is how
You become healed and so with that quote forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that it has crushed it
that's very
Representative of what it is like
to
Really try to forgive someone when they've hurt you you you you're crushed
you it destroys you and
Oftentimes the only way
To feel whole again or to work your way back there is through forgiveness
you have to be able to
let go of
the anger and even hatred that you can feel towards somebody when they've hurt you and
Try to find a way towards love and understanding
And a lot of forgiveness before we get to the next quote. I wanted to say this a lot of forgiveness comes from perspective and
understanding
how
Someone could do something like that to you
You really have to understand it from their perspective and
Oftentimes especially in today's world that is very very difficult for people perspective is not easy for people to
appreciate and understand and
Oftentimes, I think social media has a lot to do with this, but oftentimes people
feel the need to
Kind of put their own
their own prejudices their own biases on
Hypotheticals, you know we tend to want to think about
How we would do it if we were in that position and not how the person would do it because they're in that position, right?
Like we have a hard time putting ourselves in somebody else's shoes. We always think about
Just the fact that we're in their shoes and not the the miles they've walked if that makes sense to people
you know, it's important to understand people's perspective how they've arrived where they are and
then
while
Each of us may have chosen a different path
That would have led us away from hurting someone you
Have to be able to kind of chart that path and say oh, I see how you got there
I don't agree with it, but I see how you got there and because I understand how you got there. I
Can forgive you?
The next quote that I wanted to use or I wanted to share I should say is
by Maya Angelou
And she said one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself to forgive
forgive everybody and
I think that I mean it really doesn't get more powerful than that or more honest
It's important as we
Go through and talk about forgiveness that there's an understanding of what exactly forgiveness is and
this quote
Really does lead me to that
forgiveness is
thought of as
Something you give to others you are you are giving it as a gift and it can be it is to a certain degree it is
But
Forgiveness is usually for yourself
You forgive when you've been hurt
now
The the act of forgiveness is
Giving someone a gift. It's giving someone
It's basically saying you no longer owe me for this you you are nullifying a debt. That's what forgiveness really is
You are saying to somebody
You hurt me or you did this or you did whatever and because of that I
Am now you are now indebted to me in some way you either owe me, you know an apology
You owe me whatever it may be and when you forgive you're saying
You know what? Don't worry about it
this one's on the house and
That's really what forgiveness is but but the reason that you forgive is not necessarily to make somebody else feel better
And that's important to understand
Forgiveness is never going to remove shame
It's never going to take away
The regret that somebody feels for hurting you it's never going to
You can't shrieve someone of their sins through forgiveness. So what is the purpose of it?
It's for you. It's for the person that does the forgiving
There's there's
Numerous studies plenty of medical literature out there lots of studies that have been done that show that
People that are able to forgive legitimately forgive to let go of
Hatred or anger or whatever it may be are
Are actually physically better like we don't have as much heart disease
You don't have as much you know any of the other things that come with anxiety and and stress
You're able to let go of that. It literally makes you healthy
You're able to let go of that. It literally makes you healthier to forgive people. That's a scientific fact
That's not me extrapolating some, you know, fly-by-night
Study that's literally been done over and over again
But but how do we do it?
How do we just let go of those grudges of those of that pain of the wounds that people cause you?
How do you let go of that?
well
it takes time and it takes a
Conscious effort it takes understanding
it takes like I said an understanding not just of yourself, but of
Their perspective and that's really key. That is a really important part is understanding perspective
it is always important to remember that
We the way people see the world defines their reality and
The way so the way I see things and the way you see things are very very different
Your reality is defined by the way by your perspective as is mine
When somebody comes along and they hurt you
It changes your reality
And here's here's something that I think most people can agree with on this is is that often
Times that the people that you need to forgive
Are the people that you trusted the most
the people that you relied on to the people that you loved and
They come along and they do or they say something that wounds you deeply
What what is important to understand there is the way that that shatters your entire worldview. It shatters your reality
You thought this person was
everything
You thought they were
You thought they were perfect and to a certain degree right?
you knew they weren't you know about their but you thought you could trust them and
Then they come along and they do or say something and it literally will shatter
Not just the reality that you knew
understanding all of the past
The like basically since you found out about the betrayal or the lie or whatever it is that the horrible thing they said
But then the future like it changes the way that you view them from that point on it changes everything
about the dynamic and
so
When you think about that you have to understand that
To forgive
Is to not just
Say hey, don't worry about it. Hey, I got this one. This one's on the house
It's not just to say that it's to say I am letting go of these feelings
I'm letting go of it. I I'm not gonna carry this burden anymore. I
I I'm better than this and I deserve better than this
Forgiveness isn't just about giving yourself a gift as Maya Angelou said
It is one of the greatest gifts that you can ever give yourself. It is it truly is it's about
Understanding who you are and
appreciating your own self-worth your own value and
Knowing that if someone hurts you if someone has come along and caused you that pain
that is going to haunt you and
linger with you and stay with you for
days or weeks or months or years or a lifetime
That they did it because
They were not on your level. They were not
You had raised them up and put them in a position where they could do that
to you and
Once they've done it
You understand that they're no longer they no longer deserve to be in that position
That doesn't mean that you hate them. That doesn't mean that you think less of them necessarily
It just means that you have to remove them from the pedestal you put them on
And so when you think about what Maya Angelou said here, you're giving yourself a gift of
true in I don't want to say enlightenment, but a true understanding of
the
of a shared reality
And I think that kind of is the is the defining thing there, right like
If somebody does something that hurts you if somebody does something that causes you pain
We I think we all kind of understand, you know
There's therapy is is rampant enough and people have a better understanding of the way
People work for the most part. So you understand that this is somebody that's hurt, you know
The the phrase hurt people hurt people
So you understand that if somebody lies to you if somebody hurts you if somebody does something horrible to you
That requires forgiveness
Then you know that they're coming from a place of pain. They're coming from a place of insecurity. They're coming from a place of
And that allows you understanding that allows you to kind of
Put them down a peg in your life. It gives you true understanding
You can then say I see why you did that. I see why you've done this
You are not
a healed healthy person
You hurt me
because
You know, maybe you didn't even know you were doing it. Maybe you had no idea and
That allows you, you know, once you have that perspective that allows you to give yourself the gift of
a better understanding you you
Forgive so that you can feel
as if
You know you I hate to say it that way. I don't want to say it that way
You forgive so that you can move on with your life. You don't have to leave them behind
You just have to understand their place in your life has changed
Does that make sense? I hope it does
Another quote that I found that I really really love
Is by a psychologist named Thomas Saz
He's actually very well known. So if you know anything about psychology and the history of it, you would know the name
He has
He has a lot he said a lot
but one of his one of his quotes that I just absolutely love on this topic is
The stupid neither forgive nor forget
the naive
Forgive and forget
the naive forgive and forget
the wise
Forgive but do not forget
and I really really wanted to make sure I got this in here because
It's important to understand that this episode is about forgiveness. It's not about being an idiot
It is really really important to understand and then the reason why I followed this quote after the Maya Angelou quote is it's really important to understand
Once again, forgiveness is a gift for yourself
It is it is not a selfish act, but it is a gift for yourself
You are doing it to allow yourself to move on to allow yourself true understanding of a situation to
to almost force a perspective for yourself
and because of that
You cannot forget what these people have done to you what this person has how this person has hurt you you cannot forget that
You must understand
The people that come into your life and cause this kind of pain
because that's how you learn and that's how you grow pain is a teaching tool and
That's just the way of the world. We learn through failure and pain and because of that
When someone deceives you when someone hurts you
You must then never forget what they've done. You can forgive them. You can move past it
You can say you know what don't worry about it, but you should always be wary of it
And not only that but it it allows you it opens up the door for you to then and this is important
Especially for the podcast. Um, it allows you then to
Adore to say okay. Well, why did you do that? And how can we make it? So you're not like that anymore?
How can we make it so that this is a wound that is healed?
How can we do how can we look at this and say, you know what?
You did this because of whatever, you know underlying issues. So let's work on those issues so that
You and I don't have to have this anymore. I don't I can then begin to trust you again
But until that happens
That trust can't be there right? You can't forget what they've done
for forgiving and forgetting while
They often are said together
Like that quote says the stupid neither forgive nor forget and the naive forgive and forget
It is it is asinine to hold on to
pain and anguish and anger and hatred
When
It's only poisoning yourself
There's just no reason to do that
But it's also really really really damn dumb
To forgive somebody and just allow them to continue to hurt you
Because you've for forgiven and forgotten
You cannot do that. You must remember and you must act accordingly
Forgiveness doesn't mean being a dipshit
it means
Understanding why and that's why I said perspective is so important
A lot of times when you hear people talk about forgiveness, they tend to leave out the fact that
Perspective is so important. You know, you really must understand
How somebody arrives at the ability to hurt someone?
I I see on social media all the time. I see people say, you know
there's
It makes you better when you understand, you know
When somebody hurts you and things like that, it makes you better because you know
That you could never do that to someone and that's fine. That's true. That's absolutely true
It does put you in a position where you can't do that
Absolutely true. It does put you in a position where you not not in a not so that you can say well
I'm better than you but you can say well I make
I wouldn't I wouldn't hurt somebody like that
And a lot of us can say that a lot of us can say I would never do these things to somebody
I would never hurt somebody like that. I would never lie to somebody or I would never
and that puts you in a position where there is a bit of
I don't want to say I don't use the word superiority. But yeah, I mean
We are defined by our choices. We are defined by the things we do and to a lesser degree the things we say
and if you
Live your life where you're not hurting people and you're not lying to people and you're you you don't have to seek forgiveness often
Then yeah, you are living a better life. You are living a as a better person
And you should you should be treated thusly and you should be
And and when I say treated thusly, I mean by yourself
You know you are you are
You are approaching life and and making decisions from a better place
A more whole and healed and healthy and loving place
Does that mean that you should sit in judgment of other people? Absolutely not
But it means that you certainly can say I see this
I see the truth of this. I understand the positioning of it. I understand the perspectives involved and because of that
I can then help somebody through it
I think that that's really important. I think that
forgiveness
leads to
An understanding that allows you to help somebody heal
Which leads to my next quote and you'll often hear me quote Bruce Lee because this is
He's one of my most influential people
in my life, but
Bruce Lee once said mistakes are always forgivable if one has the courage to admit them
And that's that's why I said that leads to this is because forgiveness is
Only something that can be done with a certain level of contrition
People have to admit that they made a mistake people have to understand that
There was wrongdoing people have to know that
It was you know, it their actions caused pain and then they have to say I didn't want to cause pain
How can I you know, how can I correct that and then you can offer forgiveness?
It's difficult to offer forgiveness
When you know that somebody hurts you on purpose
That is the most difficult form of forgiveness and one that I honestly don't know how you do that
I wish I could tell you in this podcast
I don't know I don't know how you move past a conscious decision to hurt somebody
I really don't
But let me be clear
It's
We'll use a we'll use a hypothetical for this because I don't really know anybody in this position, but
Let's say a husband cheats on a wife
Um, let's say a husband cheats on a wife, uh, and you know, it's a full cheating
Not just an emotional thing, uh, like it's a full, you know, he goes and has an affair with
Maybe he does it multiple times
It's important to understand that while
What he has done is horrible and wrong and has caused hurt and pain
It is it is feasible for for that man to then say I I didn't mean to hurt you
And and the reason why that's feasible even though obviously there's multiple things that he did along the way the lies the the actual act of the cheating
Like everything that goes with it every single moment was a choice that he made to do that
He cheated
Hundreds of times to just to do the one like actual cheating
You know just
So it's important to understand that like he had all of these opportunities to kind of change his ways if you will
And he he didn't but he obviously wasn't in his right mind
Now that's not to say that you know, i'm not saying that I'm not defending him and i'm not but it is easy to understand
Where forgiveness could come from there?
You know he could say you know and you'll hear this a lot in like couples counseling and stuff you'll hear
One partner or the other say well, I wasn't getting fulfilled. I wasn't getting this
I wasn't I needed to find this and you weren't giving it to me
You weren't giving it to me. And so then you get into that situation where
Okay
Now that we now that it's on the table because we lacked the communication necessary to work through this before it's on the table now
Do you feel bad for what you've done?
If the person says no
Then it's over. There's nothing more to do
There's you can't you can't work with that anymore
They are
They are unrepentant
And therefore they need to move on
But if someone says I yes, i'm sorry. I did not I did not mean to hurt you
I was desperate I needed I needed to feel love. I needed to feel comfort
I needed to feel whatever it may be and I didn't know how to ask you for it. So I went somewhere else
It's easy to understand where forgiveness could come there. It would be hard
It would it's supposed to be hard and and it's not something that comes easily, but it starts with
Having the courage to admit that you were wrong
It starts with
Understanding that there's going to be a certain amount of contrition that comes with
That forgiveness that's the price you pay for the gift that is given
And you know people say well, it's a gift. You don't pay for it. But unfortunately, that's just not the way that works
There is a price to be paid for some gifts and and in this case
Forgiveness is one of the ultimate gifts you can give
Not just for the for yourself, but for them as well
It allows relationships to move forward it allows and that's any relationship not just a romantic one
Friendships are allowed to move forward through forgiveness
Parents and children move forward through forgiveness
And that's important. That's an important one and
What makes it important is it also leads to I think my last quote for the least for this segment
is by oscar wild
by oscar wild
And he
This one this is where i'm going to start to get a little emotional. So forgive me
He said
Children begin by loving their parents
After a time they judge them
Rarely if ever
Do they forgive them?
That one hits
really really hard
That one is is crushing for me. And like I said, this is where i'm going to start to get emotional
This this quote is stunningly accurate in a way that
Uh a poet maybe
Only a poet could really could have really hit it on the head like this
Children begin by loving their parents
After a time they judge them
Rarely if ever do they forgive them? Well, if you've been paying attention to
Any of these then you'll know that you know, I have
issues with my father
And that's that's really the personal thing that I wanted to talk about here
I have a couple other instances of forgiveness that I could talk about and those that know me or that have listened to my
Uh tiktoks or other episodes they know that there's you know situations where I I have forgiveness to offer or
I have offered to people and I could talk about those but I think that my dad is is one that
uh, I can touch on
and
um
It's not
It's not as emotional not because I don't it's not like I don't care. It's just not
Um as fresh of a wound and uh, so it's easier for me to talk about
So if you don't know i'm gonna give a quick update or I guess rundown not update. There's no update. Um
A quick rundown of what exactly happened between me and my father
I'm not gonna go into too much detail because I want to just get through this but
uh, basically at one point in time
my father and I had a
Had a bit of a misunderstanding
Um, I had asked him for some help. Um
financial help with um
A store with the store that I ran, uh, we were we were failing pretty
pretty successfully we were successfully failing and um
We I needed help I needed help to pay rent and things like that and and my dad at the time was was doing pretty well
He had some money and and I knew that asking him for it was difficult. He never enjoyed
You know being asked for money, but I didn't have much of a choice. I was I was desperate to keep my my business open
and so
I asked him
and he
Very disrespectfully declined and told me that he didn't ever really believe that I should have
Done this and that I shouldn't have been in business and that I should have I should have cashed in a long time ago
I shouldn't have been there. I shouldn't have gone into business with my friend
I shouldn't have there's all sorts of there was you know, a laundry list of things that I had done wrong
and he just felt the need in that moment my moment of
need to unload that on me and so my
My initial response was not to him necessarily but in my own mind was
Wow, that really sucks. That really hurts like that's
That's not right like to feel I shouldn't feel like
like I've been given up on by my own father and
I'm sure there's you know
Everybody has that feeling at some point in time where they feel like their father doesn't support them or their mother
doesn't support them, but this was like a
This was like a confirmation of that lack of support
and so I
Started to think about the pain that I was in and this this happened years and years ago. Like we're talking it's been
I don't know close to 15 years now. Well, probably 12 years now
But I started to think about the pain that
I was going through at that point in time the pain that I felt
Reading his words and understanding
That's the other thing this was through emails. So
I
Felt that pain, you know reading his words and trying to wrap my head around how somebody could say that
How could how could he choose that point to?
to drop all of that on me and so I
in that moment, I
You know, I returned
an email to him that
basically just said
You know you he he's someone who and this is I'm not basically
And this is I'm not being inaccurate in saying this. He's someone who's kind of gone through his life just hurting people
He's been very selfish throughout his life and
He has made a lot of decisions that hurt
people in my family my mother
and you know, my dad my dad had girlfriends and things like that and
He hurt them too
and
In doing so he hurt
Like my children he hurt me and so when thinking about that, I I
The email that I returned to him basically said look you've done this and I I didn't obviously name everything that he'd done
But I I gave him a list of things that he had done that
That had hurt people
That I knew about
And I just said to him, you know, you've gone through life
You've got your entire existence on this planet. You've just kind of barreled through life
Hurting people left and right and I've never heard you apologize. I've never heard you take accountability for any of it
and
Until you're ready to apologize
We don't have anything else to say to each other
And then I never heard from my father again
He never spoke to me again. He never sent me another email
and from what I understand he
Blames me for it because I asked him to apologize
so
I
Understanding that backstory
um
It took me a while
It took me a long while
to try to understand it to try to
Make sense of it all I I couldn't I I didn't
I didn't understand how he had arrived at
The decisions that he had I could never have done that now
You know there if if it were me as a father and my son came and asked me for money
I it would be easy for me to say I don't have that money. I can't help you if that was the truth
But that would be the only way and even if that was the case
I would say like let's do a bake sale, you know, like let's go
I'll help whatever you need me to do. Let me help you
But
I didn't get that from him. And so it hurt it hurt a lot and I
I had to really
come to grips with the fact that
Not only was my father incapable of apologizing which is not a commendable trait
but
He refused
all accountability
And so I knew at that point in time that forgiveness was going to be an extremely difficult battle for me
And I didn't really want it. I didn't want to forgive him. I wanted to hold on to it for a while
and so I did
and it wasn't until I saw that
He had
His actions hadn't just affected me
immensely, but
My children had seen what he had done, you know
They were firsthand observers of the way that he I let them read the emails they they know
what he did they know the decisions he made and
It was then
some years later when I saw the way that
My you know, he had kind of
He had hurt them
Immensely and and I was beginning to understand through their words and their eyes really
uh, just how deep that hurt
was
And that's when I realized that
I couldn't hold on to it anymore
For my kids I had to show them what it means to let go of that
that anger and that disappointment
And so I started to work on how I could forgive him
I I spent a lot of time reading and trying to understand
Different ways of like religious ways of looking at it, and I'm not a religious man
So it didn't none of that really made sense to me. I didn't I didn't find any answers there
and it wasn't until
I I reached a point of kind of just shrugging
That I
I guess you could say I realized or I I had a moment
Where I just I just didn't care anymore. I it just didn't hurt anymore
Um, I had thought about it. I had ruminated on it. I had spent you know, I'd cried over it
I had spent hours and hours of my life
hours and hours of my life
Going through the emotions and the pain
And I just reached the point where I just didn't care not that I didn't care about my father. I love my father. I do
But it was it was an understanding of
And we're going to go back to this of his perspective of the whole thing
That I think really did it. It took me a long time to understand his perspective. It took me a long time
I couldn't do it and when I finally started to understand his perspective, I was like, okay, I get it
you know he
his way of
his way of showing
His love for me was to try to get me away from the thing that he saw was causing me pain
It was it was hurting me to
Have my business fail. It was hurting me to
struggle every month and it was hurting me to
Surround myself with people
That probably weren't very good for me just in an effort to try to keep this thing open
And I'm sure he saw some of that. I'm sure he did and he
His way of handling it his way of dealing with it his way of talking to me. They were all wrong
but I think that his
He just wanted me to move on from it. He just he just didn't see a positive future in it and he just
In his own way was trying to be protective
He went about it in entirely the wrong way and ended up causing way more damage than he did
Good, but I think that it's easy to understand why a father or or mother really could say no
This is hurting you. I'm taking it away. You know, they do that when when when you're a kid
When they see that you're hurting somebody or somebody or you're hurting yourself with something
They just take it away
You know if you have a toy that keeps snapping your finger in it or something
they take that toy away because they don't want to hear you cry and because
It's not good for you to sit there and hurt yourself over and over again just to play with that toy
And it sucks and it hurts and you cry and you know, whatever but they did the right thing
They took that thing that was hurting you away. And I really do believe that's what my father was doing
Once I made that realization
I was like, okay, I can
I can forgive him now. I understand it. I don't agree with it. I couldn't do it
I would never have behaved the way he did
But I forgive him
but I forgive him and
I understand his perspective
now
Moving forward. Well, people will ask well since you forgave him. Why aren't you talking to him?
Why don't you guys have a relationship? The reality is is that I forgave him and I
Then had perspective to say well
I am I'm a person who is trying to live by a certain principles. I'm a principled man and I'm trying to
Live a life where I'm positive and loving and kind and considerate
And I am capable of practicing forgiveness
And
The way that he behaved towards me the what the choices that he made and the words that he used are
Not
Emblematic of that way of living or that way of thinking
I can't I can't very well support somebody that
Is willing to move through life hurting people
I just can't do it
And so, you know the the bridge had already was already basically gone
You know, there was no bridge left to burn and so it just seemed
Better at that point in time to just let it go
Even though I have forgiven him to just let it lie where it's at
If my father ever reaches out to me if he ever goes through and you know, really does want to apologize and
Even ask for forgiveness if he if he could be so bold, which I doubt he would
Then
I I'm I'm more than willing. I'm more than capable of forgiving him
Then I I'm I'm more than willing. I'm more than capable of moving beyond all of the pain that has been caused
But because I am a principled man and I can't support somebody who willingly hurts others
I'm not
I'm not in a rush to try to
Mend that bridge. I'm not I'm not in a rush to
Bring somebody like that back into the fold in my life or my children's life or
You know anyone it just doesn't make sense to me
And so the point I guess of this story and the reason why I'm getting you know, I'm telling this personal story is
I wanted to show everybody that it is very much
a conscious decision
and
Forgiveness doesn't have a timeline
Sometimes it'll take you
30 minutes
Sometimes it'll take you 30 years
But as long as you are moving towards that
It's it is
It is something that will allow you to be free it frees you of the burdens that people place on you
Now
Here's the thing about forgiveness and this is something that I really want to make sure that's clear
for many people
forgiveness
to a certain degree has a
Physical attribute to it that a lot of people don't tend to think about
You know when you're when you're hurt and you're you're you're angry or whatever
Maybe you feel that physically it does affect you some people feel that in their throat
Some people feel it in their chest some people feel it, you know, you'll get headaches whatever but you do feel it
Forgiveness kind of works the same way for me especially and and most people when I when I've read these studies and things like that
It works the same way
forgiveness
true forgiveness
starts
In your heart when you say to somebody or you say to yourself, I forgive them
You have to you have to feel it
Before you can rationalize it it starts in your heart
You say i'm gonna feel this way from now on i'm not gonna i'm i'm not gonna let this anger and this pain
Seep into my everyday life because of what you've done. I'm not gonna give you that power anymore. I forgive you
I forgive you for me
not
Not for you necessarily you can take it if you'd like but for me
And then from that point in time it really does become a matter of reinforcing that because anybody can say that
once anybody can you know, kind of
Give it lip service if you will
But to then live your life
every day understanding that forgiveness
You have to rationalize it. You have to make it make sense. Why do you forgive them?
Why does it matter and sometimes you can even go so far as to be selfish with it?
I forgive you because it makes my everyday life better
I'm able to get through life without thinking about you anymore and worrying about it
and you know
Letting you hurt me
but
also
You you want to be able to reinforce it and say
Rationally and consciously
I forgive you because of this
Because I understand where you're coming from. I forgive you because of you know, and as long as you're feeling it
And you're not letting that that that anger
And that pain seep into you too much
You will reach true forgiveness
Reinhold Neiber said I can't I say his name night neighbor neighbor
Said forgiveness is the final form of love love
Love
I'm still stuck on his name Reinhold Neiber Neiber. He's German
Um forgiveness is the final form of love
and
I
I believe that is true. I believe that
When you truly love someone
with all of your heart
that
You have to be able to forgive them
I love my father
I have lots of very good memories of my father
and
I know that to a certain degree he did his best throughout my childhood and things like that
And that's why I'm able to forgive him because that is truly the the ultimate show of my love
And that goes for other people in my life as well people that
Very recently and the ones that you know, these stories that you hear me allude to and things like that
These are people that have come into my life and I love them very very much dearly
and the pain that they've inflicted the
the hurt that I feel is fresh and visceral and
Haunts me every day even while I'm recording this i'm thinking about it
And it hurts that's why I've had to re-record the episode so many times because I can't get through it thinking about the pain
but
I'm working on
understanding the perspectives i'm working on
I'm working on understanding the perspectives i'm working on
Trying to grab my my mind and say no. No, this is how it is. This is and and really getting it in a position where
That forgiveness is is cemented
I feel it now. I've i've let go of a lot of it
And
Let me tell you this is maybe this is
not
What I should say here, but i'm going to anyway. Um, I
I do believe that forgiveness is more difficult for men than it is for women women
Women spurned, you know as the as the phrase goes
um
Hell hath no fury scorned I should say not spurned uh scorned
Uh, that's true. I mean we all know that's true. You don't once you hurt a woman like that. It's you know game over
But women it takes a little bit more for them to feel that
scorn for them to feel
Like they they're much more resilient
Uh, they're able to handle the emotional damage probably because that's just the world that we grow up in right?
Like that's the world we live in is women
Women get
Are just dealt a hand where they have to deal with more
Um
That said men
Men are dealt a hand where they deal with
The pain but they do it alone
Even when they do it with people they're alone
Men don't share that and so
Where women kind of can mitigate the damage a little bit and therefore have a higher tolerance
Men
Men don't have that and because of that men
Don't forgive
easily
Men have a really hard time forgiving
it is
It is incredibly difficult for a man that feels wronged
To let that go
um
And they for the most part men will never forget at all ever
so
It it is a mark of the fact
I'm you know, I have all these quotes and it is a true mark of of how great some of our historical
Figures are that you see all of these men
With these quotes about forgiveness and that should tell you something
these
These people throughout history
This is what they've struggled with
This is the thing you know when you go and you look up love there's it's like equal parts women men when you go and you look up
Honesty, it's equal parts women but for for men
forgiveness
is
elusive
and
extremely extremely difficult
and
That's why as I sit here and tell you about you know, my father and things like that
Uh as I as I said earlier in the episode
It's it being able to forgive makes me feel better
This is my father
He is he is someone who I should be able to look up to even now at my
ripe old age of 48 I should be able to look up at to my father as someone who's
Doing and saying things that are noble and that I appreciate
But I can't do that
He's not that person
But I am
In spite of what he's taught me
I am a noble man. I am somebody who can be trusted and I am somebody who
believes in these concepts of
compassion and love and honesty and forgiveness
And so I do hold a place in my mind that's a little bit higher than my father now
Because he doesn't have the ability to do those things or at least he hasn't shown that ability
Someday I hope that he is able to level up as they say
I hope that he's able to do that and he's getting older and you know time doesn't stop for anyone but
When it comes to forgiveness and the ability to forgive
If you're listening to this, I want you to understand that if you can forgive
That makes you strong
It it makes you
Well
Here i'll just use another quote
Gandhi said
The weak can never forgive
Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong
It is so important to understand that when you forgive it makes you stronger it makes you better
And that is quantifiable at a certain level the ability to forgive and to move past and to
Really truly understand perspective to understand emotion
That makes you stronger that makes you better that makes you more capable
That makes you able to move through this world in a way that even when you make mistakes
Even when you do cause that pain
You understand
First of all
The the price of what you've done. Like I said the contrition that you must go through
You'll often at that point in time be the first one to say i'm so sorry. What kind of person is this?
You'll often at that point in time be the first one to say i'm so sorry. What can I do to make it up to you?
What can I do to make this right?
You'll be able to give true honest heartfelt apologies because you'll understand what forgiveness takes
It makes you a better person and it's something that we all should be striving for at every
Every time someone wrongs you you should immediately begin processing the pain
Understanding the hurt and then working towards forgiveness. It will not come easily
It will not be something that you can do quickly. It is something that takes time
and concerted effort
And understanding
I think we're gonna wrap it up here. I think we're we're just about done and
honestly
I'm surprised I was able to somewhat hold it together through that but I made it so that's why we're gonna we're gonna
We're gonna wrap it up
um
I want to say one more thing about forgiveness before we do
And that is this
So, please listen carefully
I forgive you
Whoever's listening to this
whoever
Happens upon it a year from now two years from now
I
Forgive you. I don't know what you've done. Maybe I do know what you've done. Maybe you're somebody extremely close to me
Maybe you're just some person out there in Amsterdam listening to a podcast randomly
But I forgive you
I have that capability inside of me. I know what it takes. I know how hard it is and I know that
Sometimes
to forgive
We need to be forgiven
and so
Understand that that's what i'm giving you right now
I'm giving you my forgiveness for whatever it is. You've done even if you didn't wrong me personally
and i'm doing that because
I'm feeling love in my heart
And that love translates
into forgiveness
If you've hurt other people
if you're
You know lonely and sad and hurt and the world seems
Like it's always out to get you
Understand that your actions your words they they have caused harm and they will hurt more people
You need to understand what you're doing
And you need to begin to feel
grace
and forgiveness
And so I want to tell you this
I forgive you
I don't care who you are
I don't know if that means anything
And maybe it doesn't
But I think that if we all can get in the habit of saying it to each other
The world may actually be a better place at some point in time
As we finish up this episode, I just wanted to give a little bit of news i'm going to make a uh,
A tik tok video about this as well
I think that starting now with this episode. This is episode 12
I think that what we're going to do is we're going to do a new episode every two weeks instead of every week
And the reasons for that are twofold one. I don't have a large following here
We are only getting a couple dozen listens
every week so
We're not the the podcast is moving slower than the tik tok channel is
And I want to be able to focus on branching out into the other social media
It's going to take a little bit of work on my part and I I want to be able to work on that
I want to get instagram and youtube going and I want to get a bigger community
I want more people to find the podcast
And I don't want to burn through topics
For a handful of people to listen to I want I want people to be able to find
the the podcast and kind of
Grow with it
um, and so we're gonna we're gonna tap the brakes a little bit about over
You know the the the quantity of of episodes and we're gonna work on quality. I'm gonna
really focus on making sure that the topics are well fleshed out and that
I'm able to like I said, I'd really like to get to where I'm able to record the episodes live
and um
Get to where uh
I can I can do kind of like I did this one. I actually only stopped recording
Three times three times in this episode and that was just to clear my throat. So um
I didn't want to do that into the microphone. So um
I i'm pretty proud. I I know that this I kind of am rambling a little bit on this episode
And i'm sorry for that
I will get better
But I really want to get to the point where I can just kind of record it all the way through so that people understand that i'm
You know, it's not this ultra polished thing. It's it's really just me
bearing my soul
And talking about these topics that I think are important for
Growth
Individually and as you know communities and things like that
So we're gonna wrap it up there with that little bit of news
Um, I hope everybody understands. I I know that there's like I said, there's only a handful of people that listen to every episode
So we'll we'll see
If you have anything to say you can always catch me on tiktok
There's also comments sections underneath most of the places that I'm going to be talking about
The places that you find the podcast. So if you want to comment there you can
um
I'm gonna leave with one more quote because like I said before this this topic is one that is full of people
Uh, and and their their outlook on it, but this one was just one that I found
I'd actually heard i've actually heard him say this live
And uh, it was just as funny then as it is now
When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle
Then I realized that the lord doesn't work that way. So I stole one and asked him to forgive me
And that was emo phillips who is hilarious
Thank you everybody for listening. Uh, this was a very difficult episode and um
I know that I didn't go into a lot of detail about the
Science aspects of it and things like that, but that's because it was it's just too much. Uh, emotionally
And I wanted to make sure I got through it
So we might do a forgiveness part two to get into some of the other aspects of the concept
And really what happens on a neurological and physiological level because there's a lot there
But I don't want to have a two-hour podcast of just me rambling. So
Thank you again. I will talk to you very very soon and I appreciate you all take care
So
You