Forgiveness

The more I study the 4th chakra, the energy of our heart, the more I find how it affects every aspect of our truest nature and how we show up in our lives.   So, I want to spend another week of inquiry on the most powerful energy of all…love.  How can we use this power to create peace and serenity in our lives?  Forgiveness. Forgiveness is the path to the empowered heart.  More than releasing the blame associated with emotional and physical trauma, forgiveness means releasing the power and control they have over our spirit.
This is the moment in our recovery where we move from fear to love. We no longer stay sober based on fear of the past. We stay sober out of love for life. We forgive so that we are no longer attached to the pain of our wounds and we practice compassion, a spiritual energy of the heart chakra, to regain power in our lives.  Healing is simple, but not easy.
We evaluate what we need to do to forgive others and ourselves in the 4th Step. We search our conscience for resentments and face them. None of us can progress in our recovery while holding onto resentments, old angers, and hatreds. When we hold them, we protect dark corners of our souls from the renewal we need. Nothing can be held back. We must be willing to surrender all.  When we are willing to be honest, to be humble, accept and grow, we fill up with the divine power of love.
Think love.  Live in appreciation and gratitude. Invite change into your life. Everything in and about our lives runs off the fuel of our hearts.  We all have experiences meant to “break our hearts”, not in half, but wide open.  However your heart is broken, your choice is always the same.  What will you do with your pain? Will you use it as fuel for fear to have more power over you, or release the hold it has on you in an act of forgiveness?  
When we practice yoga and meditation we find the key to happiness that we so often think comes from an outside source, but is truly and only found within. Yoga releases the pain and suffering in the physical body and meditation allows us to create ease in our continuing thoughts.  Both allow space to breathe and connect to our body, mind and spirit in truth.