Forgiveness is Like a AA Battery

When someone wrongs us, pains us or does something to offend us, they are inadvertently granting us power. Whether they intend to or not, what they are bestowing on that person is the choice of forgiveness.  The power - which may have once been in the hands of the offender - is now squarely and solely in the hands of the offended.

If you think about it, our own governing system is setup this way. If you wrong the government (presumably by committing a crime), the power has now been transferred from you to the government. You are now completely at their mercy. The government can now hand down a penalty as harsh as death, or offer a slap on the wrist. In some instances, the government can even go so far as to forgive you for your crime and let you off scott-free.

Naturally - all of this presumes that you “care” what the government (or whomever you may have offender) thinks of you. If you don’t, you can stop reading now.

Ultimately, though,  the act of forgiveness is one of power. It’s a decision that is made from a position of authority. However, once that decision is made, the power is lost. It’s a single-use card that can’t be exploited for further gain. The government can only try you once for a particular crime (considering federal and local different entities, of course). Likewise, once you make the choice to forgive a person and you GRANT that forgiveness, the power that they gave you is gone.

Which leads me to my ultimate point. It is this loss of power when forgiving that has often held me back from forgiving people. When you’ve been badly wronged, you have been given a power that the wronging person had typically had over you. Whether they know it or not, your choice to forgive them is a power they can not take back. It puts you in a position above them. It doesn’t make you better than them, but it does make you a debtor to them. This empowerment is both liberating and poisonous.

I’ve come to realize that the longer I hold onto this forgiveness - the longer I refuse to grant it - the more jaded I become. I even tell lies in the midst of this empowerment by saying that I have indeed forgiven the person when I know that I truly haven’t. Clinging to this power also makes me angry. I often get angry that those whom I hold power over don’t even acknowledge it. I want to hear them beg. I want them to WANT what I now have. In some ways, I want them to EARN it. As if I could ever earn forgiveness for myself…

I grasp onto this power with a grip so tight I could strangle myself to death. I refuse to let go because it makes me vulnerable to that person (or persons) yet again. The irony is that the longer I hold onto this power, the more I lose myself. I’m beginning to understand that power is not meant to be stored or kept - it is to be expended. Even a battery - a container of power - is not intended to hold that power indefinitely. It is designed to expend power. Should it never expend power, it loses its purpose and given time, it will collapse in on itself.

Likewise, humans are not meant to hold onto power - especially the kind that’s given over other people. It is designed to be used - positively, hopefully - and to be done with. Power can be regained, but again, it must eventually be expended. If it’s not, the purpose of that power is lost and the same is true for the carrier of it.

I fear that I’ve been a charged AA battery sitting on the shelf. It’s time for me to release that power…

This entry was posted on October 2, 2007 at 8:33 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.