Forgiveness
“Learn the path of forgiving and heal yourself.” ~ Archbishop Desmond Tutu
Forgiveness is not easy. It is painful, complex, messy and at times it feels like a rollercoaster ride. In dealing with the trauma of racial oppression, there is no magic therapy to make it go away. For many people born into a life of racial oppression, the coping mechanism vary. From developing a lifelong racial radar to struggling with self-esteem and much more complexities. When working on healing through forgiveness, therapy must be a secure place where oppression is examined, in depth, and where the focus isn’t simply to look at ways to reduce and suppress the memories.
It’s not a solution to place a ‘wonder woman’, new age band-aid, on a deep wound that requires careful stitching.
What helps my healing is to walk through my pain and talk about it, even repeatedly. This must be seen and accepted as a survival response to an oppressive world.
If clinicians find that exhausting or too much work, imagine how the oppressed feel! In my experience of therapy, the focus is always to suppress the emotion by deep breathing or refocusing and finding a happy place.
Where in this maze can I find a happy place when I’m still wandering in the wilderness. Help me to retrace my footsteps and perhaps to take off my shoes, shake out the sand, and retie my shoelaces so that the sand won’t fill it again and again.
But in most cases, therapists have one hour to delve into a complex issue to find ways of changing our behaviour or thought patterns. Their eye is always on the clocks that are strategically placed in their line of sight. The easiest and quickest solution is to tell you to recite affirmations, take deep breaths, hold it and exhale slowly.
Heavens above, listen, understand, empathise and work on a connection to our wounds. There is no easy solution like swallowing a pill to forget. But there is something like delving into the origin and working outwards from there. It’s a start.
When I read motivational quotes like ‘the weak can never forgive – forgiveness is the attribute of the strong’ my response to that is – forgiveness cannot be forced. It is a process that starts with the intention to forgive. And that commitment is a powerful step in our healing process.
‘When healing from trauma, it’s OK to take your time, but never give up, just keep on healing.’
~ Denise Marie
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