I awoke recently, with a heavy heart and on-guard thoughts, feeling personally attacked by friends, unfriends and passing acquaintances. As I lie there, feeling swamped with hurt, and plotting how to just drop them all out of my life, I was gifted with a blinding flash of the obvious: Theirs is not yours...touch it not.
I realized that the lesson to learn is not in personalizing the incoming negativity I felt; the lesson is in whatever personal negativity there be is not mine, has naught to do with me unless I pick it up by reacting to it...even by my flight from it.
My forward action, then, is to mentally name my attackers as I hug him and kiss her and let them go. From my mind. With love. And remember Rohr's forgiveness is just a religious word for letting go.
Interestingly, the hardest I'm imagining is to "let them go from my mind with love"...mainly, my problem is with the word "love." Because what I want to do is "vent," meaning to talk about it (them) with venom disguised as "seeking to understand."
I am still (forever?) learning how to love spiritually...with no kickback. Which may be the problem. Face it, predetermining "how to love spiritually should feel" is a self-determined objective, plain and simple. Let go and let God is not just a slogan.
What I know from my toenails up is that I need to show up to my mental gunfight...there is no gunfight if we don't start shooting...by gun or by mouth or by negative thoughts. One is as lethal as the other, and none is of God.
Keep your friends close and your enemies closer doesn't have a spiritual ring to it which doesn't mean it isn't good advice. Actually, that may be just another way of saying love your enemy as yourself...only the first way seems more doable.
Learning to live...live and breathe...by spiritual principles is not easy, but it's never boring either...the unboring part is the effort it takes to not take offense. Whoa. I hope that's not just me.
Thank you.
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