Lesson 62: Forgiveness is my function as the light of the world.
Years ago, I wrote a piece for the Huffington Post where I talked about forgiving a past landlord for what I felt was an outrageous slight after he sued me and then-girlfriend for some alleged damage we had inflicted to the apartment we had rented. I wrote about how every time I drove by his house (which was often, since it was on my way to work) I would give him the one-finger salute, which was even more satisfying if he was out working in his yard at the time.
This was during the time I have mentioned before when I was a very, very angry and cynical person. This landlord had simply confirmed all of my suspicions about people – that they were bad, out for themselves and would take advantage of you if you let your guard down.
In the article, I talked about the process I had used to forgive him because I realized – much as the unforgiveness for my father had done – my anger and disgust at him was doing harm to exactly one person – me. You would have thought that I had asked people to give up breathing or eating. The outrage in the comments was overwhelming. People recounted terrible things that others had done to them and asked, pointedly, if they should just let that go, too.
The answer is, well: “Yes.” Our function in this world is to forgive, today’s lesson tells us. The ego is all over it, loudly protesting what those commenters said: “If we just forgive everyone then we’ll just be doormats and taken advantage of by every Tom, Dick and grifter on the planet.”
The ego is very concerned about this, of course, because it wants to keep the truth from us: Everything we see in this world is a projection of our own thoughts. All I saw were angry, mean and greedy people around me because of my own angry, mean and greedy thoughts. When I projected those out into the world, could it be any surprise that those kinds of people constantly showed up? It was like a Bat-signal for angry, mean and greedy people!
When the Course talks about forgiveness, it’s not talking about making some offense real and then overlooking it so we can look more spiritually mature than others. “Oh, honey, you did me wrong but I’m so spiritual, so I forgive you. Bless your heart.”
No, that’s not forgiveness in Course language. We need forgiveness in this world of perception so we create “a happy kind of fiction” as the Course calls it in the Clarification of Terms section. But, true forgiveness is when we realize that nothing anyone does to us, says about us or thinks about us can harm who we truly are. Our ego can be offended – and it LOVES to be offended. But that true, divine Self is never harmed by anything because it has no idea what it means to be offended.
This, again, is a call to remember our magnificence as the light of the world. It is, as Hafiz says, a call to take off our heavy winter coat of ego.
Names have started to admit their inabilities
I am glad they are being honest
Labels shield one from the truth;
they are like a winter coat in a way –
who wants to wear one in this summer
we can spend with Honesty and the sun
playing with you?
Photo by Daria Shevtsova from Pexels