Forgiveness
Dear Friends,
Do you know the story about a father and his hot tempered son? It goes something like this:
There was a boy who was always very angry and was short tempered. One day his father called him and handed him a hammer and a bag of nails telling him, “Whenever you get angry and lose your temper, take a nail and nail it into backyard fence. Each time – a nail should be hammered to the fence.”
On the 1st day itself the boy did 30 nails. By the next week he was down to 15, and so on. As time went on the boy grew more aware of his anger and put fewer and fewer nails in the fence. Although he never denied the anger that was there, in time he found it easier to silently experience his anger and still keep his cool, rather than angrily nail the nails into the fence.
He went to tell his father, and after congratulating his son told him, “For each time you do not manage your anger in a responsible way, go and pull one nail from the fence.”
A few days later the boy went to his father, after each hammered nail had been removed from the fence. The father said, “I am proud of you son, and I would like you to look at the holes that you have made in the fence. When things are said in anger, irritation, or frustration, you can put a hole into someone just like you have put a hole in the fence. Although you may retract your words and apologize, the hole can still remain for a long, long time.”
One of the reasons I am so good at helping those I work with is there have been times where I too am spectacular at messing up. The other reason I’m so good at what I do is; I am pretty good at realizing down the road how spectacular I’ve been. On good days, amends can be made, and apologies offered. Things can be smoothed out, and everyone can go on.
Then there are the times when no matter what, there will be no resolution and you get to face the fact you have left some pretty serious holes in your wake. Sadly, at that point all you can do is look to yourself and ask: can there be forgiveness from within? And what am I going to do next time, instead?
To moments of peace,
Kaye
