Forgiveness and Joy, and more thoughts on life, ha!

It's not lost on me that sometimes I'm nieve, or that maybe I should be less open with these blog posts. I just have learned over my 45 years that its worse to keep things inside than to air them out. You still have to be careful how you do it - because sometimes its not forgiven by those around you. That's super hard to believe and accept, but there is so much unforgiveness in this world. Too much.

I woke up this morning to Matthew 6:14 as the verse of the day: "For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you." NKJV

Wow, what a coincidence, huh? Yesterday, I was posting about some hard truths that I realized over the weekend, then I posted some about forgiveness on my Instagram and Facebook stories, and now this morning God gently reminds me of this. Oh, He's good. No matter how much you are hurt, no matter the emotions, no matter anything, we are to forgive each other. Jesus died so we'd all be forgiven all of our transgressions. All of them. The worst, most heinous of them. No joke. Truly, every single sin.

Woah. Big Truth there. But I am human. I'm not going to say we because though that is true of everyone, I can only share myself. I do not know even my best friends or parents or siblings inner struggles/thoughts. But I do sure know mine! There are days I'm disgusted with myself. There are days that I have no idea where a bad thought comes from...but I let it visit for too long. It's a guest too long in this house. A guest that I should kick out, or never even open the door to. But I do, because I'm human.

And those are the hardest days. The days when I know I need to let something go but I hold onto it because its comfortable, because I'm used to it, and I know how to "feel better" from it - though I also know that "feel better" is a surface thing and does not help me move forward. It just delays the inevitable. 

As I mentioned in the previous days post, I have learned that some people who come into our life are not meant to be in our inner circle forever, or at all. There's a phrase for it and it goes something like this: people are in our life for a reason, for a season, or for a lifetime. The hardest ones are when we are learning that some people we thought were a lifetime, were really supposed to be on for a reason or for a season, not a lifetime. We bond too much to someone who is not edifying to us.

But be very careful with that, too. Sometimes there are people in our lives that we are meant to be bonded to for a lifetime but through our own hurts and previous experiences, we cut them off. We protect ourselves from, and we don't work through our issues in a positive way - we just hurt so much. But those are the people we are meant to do the hard stuff with - that if we don't, at the end of our life, we will regret it - especially if they are not with us any longer. I've seen this happen to others, and it started happening to me until I got help earlier in my life. That's something that I won't share openly. It's only between me and that person. 

That's important to remember, too. Some things are truly private. I'm so guilty of this in lots of ways. I'm trying to be better at it. I know my issue is that I held certain things in life inside so long that it ate at me until I had to do something about it or uncharacteristically fall apart around everyone who loved me - and none of them would've known why! It is so hard to realize and accept but sometimes we're the problem - not the people around us, not the bad person we met, not the situation, not the people we work with. Us. Our person. And why? Because we decided at some point to excuse our behavior in response to a hurt, to keep our anger raging, to let the hurt fester, to keep a checklist of how someone has hurt us, and so on. We never learned to deal with conflict or to properly go into healing a situation with grace - why? Because our anger, hurt, etc., is valid. And it is, but not forever. At some point, we have to let it go. And sometimes, somethings, some people we never do. We never let them off the hook - and we're just as flawed as them.

Life is truly hard. When we can release these things, when we really know that we are okay and that others around us are okay and just as flawed as we are, I see that we are happier but more importantly, more joyful. And joy is truly what we should strive for. Happy is a great word and great to feel, but it is so much more to be JOYFUL. True Joy does not come from celebrating someone's failures over your own. True JOY comes from celebrating all the good around us and in us. That's the kind of JOY I want to have in my life daily. 

I did not feel that yesterday. Happy, content, maybe. But it was established that I didn't want to go to work because I had so much going on my head. Then I went to work, and that all changed. Today, I'm starting to feel more towards being joyful. I'm hoping by Friday, I'll feel intense joy - simply because I didn't let my mind take over completely, and I followed through on something good. And yes, it can be as simple as going to work when you just want to think about things.

I joke that I'm 45 now but have been fighting a mid-life crisis for the past few years. It's really not a joke. If I let myself think too much about certain life things - or let those around me tell me that I should have or be certain things by now - I'd so easily be in a mid-life crisis mode. Instead, I'm fighting it with what I have to daily to keep it at bay. Yesterday, it was opening up and releasing unfortunate feelings I'm struggling with about a friends treatment, and my anxiousness about my 2nd Covid-19 vaccine shot and the symptoms. Today, I'm talking about FORGIVENESS and JOY. Both in a blog post. Tomorrow? I'm not sure how I'll handle whatever is thrown at me today; or whatever is celebrated today. 

But I do know that I am a flawed, lovely human being that is loved greatly by those around me - even when I think I'm unlovable or not worth the love. There may even be people out there that love me but never tell me - whether a friendship, agape love or just how they love my sense of humor, or how I inspire them. And there are friendships and relationships that will be full of love in the future with people I haven't even met yet! And that is a thought I have sometimes that warms me, and brings me utter JOY!

So in ending this so I can finish getting ready for work, I hope today you FORGIVE something or someone you need to, or you find JOY in something (not just happiness). Better yet, I hope you make FORGIVING and JOY a life goal. But at the end of the day, all of this is up to you. The decisions we make daily are our choice and no one else's. But that's a blog for another time.

Have a great day, everyone!

Lots of Love,

Tiffany 💋