"rain falling so hard you can't see while you're standing in the biggest crowd of people you've ever been in
and you forgot where you parked your car.
This is what forgiveness feels like.
All the guilt and grief is illuminated within her eyes and his eyes and their eyes and you're seeing it all for yourself four or five times a day and you don't know whether to hurt or to heal.
When you get a package in the mail of all the things you shared with one another and you sit down and cry for three hours over the words you exchanged and the memories that have been thrown away.
this is what forgiveness feels like.
resisting the urge to walk into the ocean and never coming back out and letting yourself hear that song one more time without caring that it was her favorite. it's kissing new people and caring about yourself in the process of looking around for hands you want to hold, because they are just so soft and warm, and hers were always cold and motionless; you couldn't fix her, you couldn't fix her.
it is repeating this over and over again,
understanding that expectations are cruel and you weren't a band-aid to depression, to brokenness, to some tragedy that failed you -
you were a human who needed love and it just didn't work out that way, this is what forgiveness feels like.
it is saying i love you to someone else and not thinking, "i love you second" it is knowing that nothing could have changed to make this better,
to make this last longer, that you did all you could to keep the fire alive until it eventually, inevitably had to die. this is what forgiveness feels like. bury those skeletons in your closet, cast away the demons that haunt you,
and the ghost of everyone who has hurt you in the past - it is time to forgive, it is time to let go.
love was never meant to linger when we walked away - you couldn't fix her, you couldn't fix her.
you made the right choice.
this is what forgiveness feels like.
"
- Amanda Helm. This is what forgiveness feels like
