The sins of parents are among the most difficult to forgive. We expect the world of them, and we do not wish to lower our expectations. Decade after decade, we hold out the hope, often unconsciously, that they will finally do right by us. We want them to own up to all their misdeeds, to apologize, to make heartfelt pleas for our forgiveness. We want our parents to embrace us, to tell us they know we were good children, to undo the favoritism they’ve shown to a brother or sister, to take back their hurtful criticisms, to give us their praise.
To forgive is not to condone the bad things our parents have done. It’s not to deny their selfishness, their rejections, their meanness, their brutality, or any of the other misdeeds, character flaws, or limitations that may attach to them. It is important to separate from our parents—which is to stop seeing ourselves as children who depend on them for our emotional well-being, to stop being their victims, to recognize that we are adults with some capacity to shape our own lives and the responsibility to do so.
When we do that, we can begin to understand the circumstances and limitations they labored under, recognize the goodness in them that our pain has pushed aside, feel some compassion perhaps, not only for the hard journey they had but also for the pain we have caused them.
Getting to a forgiving place, finding the forgiving self inside us, is a long and complicated journey. We have to be ready to forgive. We have to want to forgive. The deeper the wound, the more difficult the process—which makes forgiving parents especially hard. Along the way, we may have to express our protest, we may have to be angry and resentful, we may even have to punish our parents by holding a grudge. But when we get there, the forgiveness we achieve will be a forgiveness worth achieving! So start your journey it is worth every hole and stumble along the way.
Allow people to evolve and change. And remind yourself that parents are people too. Some parents were horrible at parenting but not so bad as friends to their adult children. So be it. Let that be the redefinition of your relationship. Try not to judge the current reality against the context of the past. Instead, try to accept things as they are today.
Parents don’t come with owner’s manuals. And yet, we are far more complex than any piece of furniture or computer program we have ever had to put together or install. We are also all-too-familiar with the problems that can arise with do-it-yourself projects. Pieces don’t fit. Installations fail. It’s at those moments we are glad there are trouble-shooting instructions or FAQ pages provided. Well, guess what! Your parents’ mistakes are now effectively your trouble-shooting guide and FAQ page. “What happens if I scream and shout at my kids?” you might want to know. “Oh yeah, my parents did that to me. I know exactly what happens!”
Impatient, unkind and punitive parents aren’t impatient, unkind and punitive simply because you were unworthy of their patience, kindness or compassion. They were that way because they are impatient, unkind and punitive people. In other words, how you were treated is all about them, not you.
So, here’s the point I’m trying to make: All our parenting is done out of the context of who we are and what we know. Each one of us is limited in giving love by the limits to our capacity to love. Your parents were likewise limited. That understanding can lead to compassion which can lead to forgiveness.
And while we can always learn and grow, most people seem to live on automatic pilot. So, most of us are something within a stones throw of our parents’ behaviors, attitudes and habits. Likewise, mom and dad are products of their parent’s parenting too. Forgive them of that.
Sometimes we bury our feelings where they fester and decay, and then begin to infect other parts of the psyche as well.
Sometimes, like the body expelling poisons, the soul also needs to vomit emotional toxins. Doing this on paper helps sort out feelings and make sense of things. There can be a cleansing quality to putting pain to paper too. Be as explicit and detailed as you can. Dump everything onto the page. It may take several days to get it all out. That’s okay; take the time.
When you’re done, read it as a solemn recognition of the past. Then light the thing on fire and burn it. Let its ashes float away on the wind or up the vent. As the smoke lifts, feel the emotional baggage float away with it. Feel it rise with the ashes and smoke and disappear and be gone.
And then be done with it. I would suggest this be a one-time expulsion of pent-up emotional poison. Doing this repeatedly can have the unhappy effect of amplifying, rather than muting, the past’s continuing influence as you keep swimming in that polluted pool.
Your parents were not just your parents. They, like all of us, are complex beings with a mixed bag of character strengths and flaws. Perhaps you ended up on the receiving end of their flaws. But they are not likely without redeeming qualities as well. See that in them. And commit to learning from both their strengths and weaknesses. And be grateful for the life-lessons learned.
If you grew up without love, smother your children with it. If you grew up with family secrets, don’t have any. If you grew up with harsh criticism and ridicule and impatience, then be sure to compliment, love, and exercise patience with your children.
Let the example of decency and compassion you share with them be the focus of your emotional healing. But be sure not to commit the sin of overcompensation. Your role here is to love, not spoil.
In a sense, you will be parenting yourself with the love and compassion you wish your parents had shown you as you shower it on your own kids, in some way, making amends for what your parents failed to provide.
In other words, parent yourself vicariously through parenting your own children. Extend to them what your parents failed to extend to you and allow the love flowing from you to your children to heal the wounds from the lack of love flowing to you as a child.
This can be a hard pill to swallow. Still, it’s important to stop blaming your parents for current problems. Did they lay the foundation for the problem? Perhaps. But it’s yours now. That’s the inescapable bottom line of it.
You make the decision every day to hold on or let go. That’s your decision only. Accept that as fact. Own it completely and release your parents from the responsibility you’ve pinned to their shoulders for too long.
Don’t get me wrong, here. I am not suggesting your past is your fault. I’m saying that your present is the result of choices you have made, as you have allowed your past to influence them.
This step is admittedly difficult, but it is empowering and liberating once it’s fully accepted and internalized.
I am who I choose to be. I feel what I choose to feel by choosing what thoughts I choose to harbor and how I choose to think about things. I choose to learn ways to change my thinking and interpretations of life or I choose not to. These are all my choices. And they are yours too.
Final word on this point: Your parents may be responsible for creating the emotional context. You are responsible for keeping that context alive. So stop feeding it and let it wither on the vine.
Instead of constantly peeling away the scabs of life to see how things are healing underneath, decide what you want out of life, what traits are required to obtain what you want, and then act. Work at overcoming emotional obstacles and other personal obstructions without worrying so much about where they came from. Just get on with the work of living well.
The past is the past. Let it die there, and stop unburying the dead and move on. Trying to drag the corpse of yesterday through life will make each moment of today a bit more difficult to manage. So find purpose and passion in life and move forward, looking back only long enough to learn from it.
Sometimes out of a sense that justice must be served, or anger at the unfairness of how we were raised, we keep the pain and anger center court, at arm’s length, always in view. It’s time to stop. It’s time to grow. It’s time to forgive and let go and be free!
Love Vanessa 💓💓
being Vanessa 