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Whether the wound is small or large, we all have father-wounds. Parenting leaves some scuff marks, even with the best of parents.
Forgive him. Give him and yourself the finest Father's Day gift and forgive him.
First, let's say clearly what forgiveness is NOT. Forgiveness is not saying that what was hurtful is OK, and it does NOT result in putting oneself in harm's way over and over again. Practicing forgiveness, however, is an opportunity that fundamentally changes the terms with which we encounter the world. It is rigorous and freeing. It is like letting a wound be exposed to the clean air so that it can heal.
Not all of us had fathers where there is an unblemished history of parenting. The key thing is -- what is it that we do with those wounds, especially if they are big?
We have a few choices -- we can live in and out of them, seeing the wound over and over, communicating from The Land of the Wound, looking for others to fill the gaps left by the wound, telling the world about it, letting the wound color our days as sad or angry or chronically disappointed with men. Or we can squash down the pain and try to cork it up with food or sex or alcohol or drugs or jogging or work. The problem is that when we are not doing those things, the old wound reasserts itself, and we are off and running.
I had a few years where I should have carried a sign : "Look at me. I am a mobile Father-wound." Not good years.
Developing and honing the spiritual muscles of forgiveness, I am convinced, has to be a conscious task, a true discipline. Our world reinforces not forgiving at such a level of intensity that we must deliberately focus on forgiveness.
Groups proclaim loudly and arrogantly thatthere are no victims, only volunteers. Equally damaging are those who wear their wound like a medal of pride, using it to distinguish themselves as in some way special. I contend that the truth is between -- that hurtful things have been done, ut that we do not haveto let those hurtful things determine our life or our relationships.
Every time that I mention Fathers who are not ideal on my blog or here, women tumble out lots of pain, and lots of hope. So I hope you will indulge me mentioning fathers and forgiveness once again.
First, if you feel comfortable or hopeful about talking through old issues with your father, please do it. Some moments can really be redemptive, and worth the risk. I'll pray for your success.
Here is a story about my Dad, taken from an old blog entry of mine:
My own father could be nasty and brutish, with a temper that was primitive and terrifying. When I was a little girl, I remember a night he and my Mom were arguing. I was upstairs in my room, but I could hear them downstairs. There was a lot of yelling. Then my father was clumping loudly up the stairs; and then there was a loud almost Olympic shot-putting shout from him, followed immediately by a thunderous noise. It sounded like lightening had hit just hit my room.
My father called my mother upstairs, and told me to get out of my room and into the hall. He showed us what he had done. He had driven his two fists into the hard plaster wall about 4-6 inches in, leaving two deep fist marks in the concave fist-blasted plaster.
He said "I want the two of you to see this." His voice got ominous. " Next time it could be you," and he walked away.
He never hit us, but he refused to let my Mom plaster over those holes for many years. I walked by that grim reminder of my father's lurking rage every time I went to my room for a long time.
A few years before he died, with him in his 80's and me in my 50's, I asked him if he remembered that day. He said, dismissively, "Sure, but that was just rage. Everyone feels that." I calmly told him that actually everyone really does not feel that, and that in some homes it would be entirely foreign.
He looked at me as though I had dropped into his kitchen from Saturn. "Then they are lying to you," he said with utter certainty, and got up and went into the other room.
Conversation over.
Rage was what my father knew. Like
