OFF wth Their Heads

Trying to be authentic amidst the insanity of this election.  Watching friends show their backsides on Facebook is an interesting twist -  especially professionals who ought to know better.  We all have strong opinions and can back them up with our own logic and reason.   Why, for some, it comes out as bitter prattle is beyond me.

And yet as I write those words I know where bitterness comes from as I saw some of my own arise as of late. Damn, it’s a nuisance and total waste of energy. One can’t do anything to change the past - no matter how hard one tries. But there it is…

Bitterness is a tricky wicket.  It’s Hurt. Painful hurt that is locked up in the closet hiding under the washcloths. You know it’s in your house somewhere as you smell it rotting but can’t quite put your finger on it as you walk by it every day.  You can feel it too.  The slow burn in your craw that won’t go away – and it’s giving you a headache – but for the life of you, you paint your make-up on every morning pretending that everything is just fine. Then you snap at the dog who only wanted a cookie. Yup – it’s a festering hidden mess.

Hurt happens. None of us get out of this life unscathed and, if we are brutally honest with ourselves, most of us have walked dangerously close to the edge on more than one occasion. And if you haven’t’ been there yet, hold on – statistically speaking your turn is coming. I pray for you it’s not as bad as mine once was. Ten years of living hell, losing just about everything I had cherished. Set up hospice 5 times in 4 years and lost them all – including both parents and my closest friend. My sons near fatal car accident was tossed in there also just to test my sanity.

I write these events so glibly now, and yet know that 10 full years of my life were spent silently screaming.  I survived. Found Jim and a new happy place and I wasn’t bitter for enduring the decade long nightmare – or so I thought…

Last week came time to clean out the closet. There was a lot of unknown hurt still crammed under those washcloths.  Didn’t really know how much until I dared to look. It was stinky too. I didn’t go to the closet of my own free will mind you.  Most of us don’t.  I was pushed in there by Facebook.

You see, I hurt someone’s feelings accidently with a snarky post. More details in a later blog but it shall suffice to say I felt bad. I didn’t know her well, and because of her misinterpretation of my ‘off the cuff’ comment, I probably never will as she unfriended me. I did apologize but she didn’t strike me as the kind of person who was keen on forgiveness, so I just asked the Holy Spirit to do His stuff for the both of us.  I deeply suspected however that if she ever saw me again, she would only see my sin walking towards her instead of seeing me; the nice kind person I try hard to be. It truly is a goal… most days.

But the incidence got me thinking…. Bitterness is anger kept inside caused from others hurting you.  Criticalness is anger kept inside when you don’t love and accept yourself -  a vain unconscious attempt to justify your own perceived incompetence. They are keen bedfellows and often hang out together in the closet – under the washcloths. Anyway, they both were stinking up my hallway so I knew I had to uncover the mess before the smell took over my whole house.

I mean, I had been terribly hurt for many years but thought all was put to rest. The biggest culprit I had forgiven long before Karma caught up with him. I was working on forgiving myself thanks to a blessed therapist, and even forgave God for not being Santa Claus.  I mean, I thought I had been a very good girl and all - not one deserving of such devastation. Isn’t that how it worked? God blessed the good people and thwacked the bad ones? Did I mention growing up in the process? 

No, there were still a few lingering people out there that had hurt me.  Whether their intentions were Intentional, subconscious acting out, or just plain being mean – it didn’t matter.  They truly hurt me by their actions which I decried as despicable crimes against my sensitive heart. My response was swift.  I promptly dismissed them with Alice in Wonderland’s Queen of Hearts famous rant; “Off with their heads!” and slammed shut the closet door.

After my Facebook blunder however, I felt I had to revisit my critical assessment of those who wronged me. Turned out, I was not seeing these people clearly. I just saw their sins cloaked around them as they walked around doing their jobs and living their lives. The cloak of my pain kept me from seeing the true good people others knew them to be.  It was a hard revelation. They screwed up – just like I did.  Dang. I saw my own sin glaring me straight in the face and knew it was time for true forgiveness. The forgetting and forgiving kind that dissipates into space forever. The Lord’s Prayer kinda slapped me in the face one Sunday – the do unto others part – God’s kind of forgiveness part.

Forgiveness does not mean getting in line with the same folks to do it all over again and get the same treatment.  Some people are honestly mean, and/or crazy.  Stay away from them -  truly. But the people that hurt me weren’t bad people. Granted they were insensitive, insecure and uninformed, but not bad. Not that I’ve ever had those kind of moments…

Whether intentional or not, it was time to totally let it all go. I opened the closet and cleared out the stinky hurtful under

the washcloths. And with that one simple act of internal housekeeping, the bitterness left along with its critical sidekick. Don’t get me wrong, there are still some little stinkers lurking in there and some issues I have yet to resolve. But such is life - a daily journey seeking redemption. I will say however, it was easy to smile again at those people who had once been held hostage in my closet. And good to see others without their sin cloaks on as I pray others will always see me.