The last day of part two. What a doozy. Busy, long day and today’s lesson was one that needed added attention. It was about forgiveness again. Oh how I wasn’t in the mood to think about forgiveness… again.

Day Twenty

Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. ~ Colossians 3:13 (NIV)

I’ve studied forgiveness before. I’ve heard countless sermons on it. I’ve even made huge strides in this area. I am no where near the “list keeper” I used to be… still, after today’s lesson, I had to admit there were still things I was holding onto. I suppose it could be classified as an unwillingness to forgive, but I know my heart’s desire is to forgive… so perhaps it isn’t unwillingness, but rather difficulty.

I liked the author’s explanation of what forgiveness is and isn’t. Then we were asked to do a forgiveness phrase exercise. I decided not to do this exercise in the book. I started a “forgiveness notebook” in which to write my forgiveness phrases. I have ten more days remaining in this study and my plan is to do this exercise daily through the end. Once I feel “released” from a phrase, I’ll stop writing/stating it. Just after doing the exercise I felt a weight lift off of me. I’ve been begging God to take the burden, but I haven’t been actively choosing to release my death grip on them.

Observations and Corrections

Today, I started writing a number in the first and last “key blanks” on the chart. I decided this was a much more accurate representation of what was going on and would help keep me from seeing it as “all or nothing”. I was viewing those first and last check marks as “pass or fail”… or extremes. This way it is just a number.

I was quite tired when I got home this afternoon. So the last thing I cared about was whether I was distracted while eating or not. Still, this was an improvement over sofa eating of the past. Progress is being made.

Oh, and the husband and I started running again this morning. This is really slow going, but I’m really tired of being on the sidelines. Yesterday I did about half of a walking video (Leslie Sansone) and my knee was hurting so badly afterward I was a little hesitant to try jogging this morning. It went ok though.