Kay:
Hello Questers, and welcome, once again, to The Mentorship Quest! We have Episode 140 coming at you, and today is July 17th. We have a quote which is attributed to a lot of different people, and that quote is this, “Forgive others, not because they deserve forgiveness, but because you deserve peace.”
Shi:
So, we’ve heard this quote attributed most often to Jonathan Lockwood Huie, but it’s also been thrown around with Muhammad, Gandhi, and Mark Twain. So…who knows! But, what we do know is, the concept of this quote is gold!
Kay:
Yep! “Forgive others, not because they deserve forgiveness.” I think this line, in this first part of the quote, is probably the one that – if I were first starting out on my personal growth and development journey, and hadn’t been really working hard at this for the last decade or so – would scratch me the most. Because, why would I give something to somebody that they don’t deserve?
Shi:
I feel like we, especially here in the USA, run everything off of this “exchange transaction”. So – if then, then that – kind of thing. And so, for many of us, we’ve been taught that if we work hard, we get rewards! And, if you do bad, bad things happen to you. And so, when someone else does something bad – I know for me, I feel a very deep knee jerk reaction to want to pass judgment, to hold it against them, to maybe even wish them ill (so far as wanting to see them brought to justice over whatever the thing is that I think is wrong). And so, I think that maybe you’re farther along on your personal growth and development journey than I am when it comes to this part, because, “Forgive others, not because they deserve forgiveness” is something I could get stuck on for hours! But, because you deserve peace, that’s what makes it worth it…
Kay:
Exactly! Well, oftentimes, the forgiveness that would happen to that other person, or the “justice” that you’re imagining in your mind that would happen to that other person, isn’t something that’s going to make YOU feel good. Now, in the extreme cases where someone is murdered, or assaulted, or something horrible happens to them – that person deserves their justice, they need to go to jail, and that justice is deserved. But, if somebody makes a slided comment at you or cuts you off on the freeway and you are allowing your emotions to get SO spiraled out of control that you are no longer peaceful, that act of forgiving that person in the moment (those little tiny forgivenesses) will bring you so much more peace in your day to day existence!
Shi:
So many of us fight that though, because we feel this righteous indignation to the fact that we witnessed a wrongdoing. And so, we don’t even really define it as forgiveness being needed, because it’s more about this judgment needing to be passed. And so, realizing that this means we’re withholding forgiveness…(which really means we’re withholding peace from ourselves)…makes us realize that forgiveness is an inside job.
Kay:
Now, one of the things that we had to “inside job” on in these last 18 months, was forgiving a common phenomena that occurs when flying. Shila and I travel a lot, (not so much in the last four months, of course!), but, prior to that, we did a lot of plane travel. And, one thing that we’ve noticed is that there is a certain select group of people that sit in the back of the plane. And, once the plane has stopped and is at the dock, those people like to get up and surge through the middle aisle and beat everybody off the plane as fast as they possibly can. Now, this used to really upset Shi and I – (up to the point where we’ve even audibly talked trash about the surger to the point where we could see on their faces that they felt embarrassed). But, after realizing this, and learning the message of today’s quote, we’ve had the opportunity to encounter this situation several times and find ways to constructively forgive that person in the moment, and create WAY MORE peace for ourselves and our travel journeys!
Shi:
WAY more peace! Because, at the end of the day, who cares if somebody surged from the back of the plane and got two passengers in front of you before you deboarded…But, that amount of indignation that you feel towards the unjust act of that person passing in front of you, really just works to destroy your own peace. It’s like the phrase goes, “Not forgiving someone is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to get sick.” And so, this forgiveness piece is really an inside job, and it is about deserving the peace, and not deserving being “the judge”. And, something that’s also been really helpful for us, that we first heard (surprise, surprise!) at a Tony Robbins conference, was the ancient, Ho’oponopono, Hawaiian prayer – and it’s a forgiveness and reconciliation practice. And, it’s more than a prayer alone. It’s a process of making things right in your relationship with yourself, with others, with your creator, with your ancestors, with mother nature, and with everything in between! This ancient prayer boils down to four phrases that come together to help you find peace, and give yourself that gift of relaxing your judgement. And, those phrases are, “I am sorry. Forgive me. Thank you. (and) I love you.
Kay:
So, today’s quest is a prayer quest, and it is to: Perform the whole Ho’oponopono prayer out loud, to yourself, or to someone else…Maybe you have someone close to you that could use a little forgiveness from you right now, even if it’s just from your car! And so, we’re actually going to give you an opportunity to do it with us, right now. You can say it aloud with us! We’ll leave a little pause on the backend so you guys can join in with us right now for today’s Ho’oponopono, ancient Hawaiian prayer quest. So, say it along with us, “I am sorry. Forgive me. Thank you. I love you….I am sorry. Forgive me. Thank you. I love you.” Are you ready?
Kay & Shi:
Let’s quest!
