No hardfeelings

26/11/08. Mumbai terror attacks. The worst that happened to India. And the last thing I can do about this is to pay my heartfelt condolences to all those who lost their loved ones. It was gruesome and a heartless act. Such events are a norm in India. Every other attack (inter or intra) only becomes just another attack. And it would soon become history, and people forget them as if it were just another day. But India needed something to this intensity to awaken! Anyways, having said that, how easy is it to forgive the sinner, forget what happened and move on? Anyone who has been victimized has no middle ground to what he decides to do about it. He either decides to forgive or hold on to the anger/grudge/bitterness.

Life is not fair most of the times. Let the situation be what eva. We always ask, why me? Why is life so unfair to me? Many incidents in life teaches us a good lesson but with a price that of pain. Have we ever been thankful for what happened? For awful lot of people it is difficult to forgive. You end up hearing something like “I haven’t been forgiven. Why should I?”. So, with hardened hearts and stiff lips, they say, “I’ll never forgive”. And the sad thing is that in wishing to send someone to hell they end up sending themselves there as well. Trust me, when you are angry, your big mouth can do a lot of irreparable harm and get you to trouble. Doesn’t that hit us hard and let us take some time off to think? According to the law of karma, what goes around will definitely come around.

Develop the attitude of gratitude. The art of forgiving. Well, I understand when I say this that it’s easier to say than do it. True. But you can’t carry the bitterness all your life. In year’s to come, you’ll only turn to be a potful of venom. Now, none of us wanna be that. Sure? Remember, vengeance is not the solution. It neither can heal you. Well forgiveness is not reconciliation. It is a larger process of which forgiveness is but one part. Forgiving does not mean that you have to let then\m go off the hook legally either. But the energy that keeps the grudge will just drain the strength in you.

The beauty of forgiveness lies in giving it even before you are asked for it. So remember that if anyone has ever hurt you, you don’t find forgiveness, you give it. Forgiveness is the act of untying yourself from thoughts and feelings that bind you to the offense committed against you. And it is purely emotional. YOU have to do it and you can’t be forced to do it. And more often than not, ego, self-esteem et al shall raise their hoods and stop you from doing so. But have you ever realized the sense of satisfaction you get when you do forgive? How much you heal yourself and just everyone and everything around you? You free yourself of your greatest burden: hatred. Care less about how much the other person values your attitude of forgiving. Everything comes with a cost. But a word of caution – do not become a person of whom people can take advantage of. It’s often a notion when you smile back at the person who hurt you is that, you are weak. They take you for granted and just do not mind hurting you again, and again, and again. Just be firm and strong. And yet, forgive and forget. And mind you, no ongoing references to the events of the past. Practice to perfect it. At the most you can do when you are hurt is to do nothing at all. It’s only the strong who can forgive and not the weak! To err is human but to forgive is divine. Be willing to be brave. Brave enough for love.

Oscar Wilde quote: “Always forgive your enemies – nothing annoys them most”. How do you like that?

At the end, hold to the thought that you too are human and you can be at the receiving end some day. Standing there, to be forgiven. Jus slip into that moment and think about how you would feel if you are denied forgiveness while you are begging for it heart in heart. And when you are truly sorry about just what eva you did, you can even feel like killing yourself. Would you like to be punished? When you think something is not good for you, it just cannot be good for others either. Right?