This Is What I Learned When I Transformed My Anger Into Forgiveness

Though it’s not always my outward personality, anger has always been the easiest emotion for me to reach.

I consider it my baseline emotion, the quickest thing for me to pull on when I need to feel something. It tends to propel me toward change, but sometimes it can cause me to remain stuck and unable to move on from a situation.

As of late, I have had an insanely good reason to be and to stay angry. Someone caused a big hurt, and I wanted to be mad and stay there. I wanted to burn in it; I wanted them to feel what I felt. For some reason, though, this is the first time that hasn’t happened.

As I’ve grown up, I’ve realized that while anger makes us cold when it leaves, forgiveness is the heat that warms us back up. Forgiveness, oddly enough, is the fuel to a warmer and brighter flame. There is certainly a point in allowing your anger to run its course, but there’s also no point to letting it continue past its time.

Anger is fulfilling in the sense that it makes you feel validated, makes you feel as if your reaction to whatever happened to you is correct. Sometimes, that is the case. However, if it remains your only fuel source for too long, it becomes who you are. It distorts your good intentions and falsifies your character to the point where you become someone different.

Though leaning on anger for me has always been easier, as of late, forgiveness is what I’ve had to move my heart toward. Forgiveness has to be what drives who I am now because it is the only thing that will make me better.

What is the point in hating someone when it won’t change a damn thing about your current situation?

What will change your current situation is forgiving someone who isn’t saying sorry. What will happen due to that is something spectacular.

I’ve learned that allowing forgiveness to seep into your soul daily (because it is a choice you must make every day) is like that first step into spring after a long winter. It’s reminding your insides that you are capable of more than you think, that moving on and letting go is always an option.

It’s allowing yourself the space to be hurt but to also not have to live in that.

When you let your anger fall away, when you allow forgiveness to enter in, you’re cleansing yourself in the purest way a human can. You’re saying “I’m giving this to you because it’s the right thing to do” instead of holding it over someone’s head as something they have to earn.

It’s not an insane notion; in fact, it’s pretty widely acknowledged that forgiveness is good and important and right. But actually implementing that is an incredibly powerful thing that can positively alter the trajectory of your life.

For me, though sometimes anger wins out, forgiveness is the new goal. Every day I have to wake up and think about choosing it. I have to think about what that means for me, what that can do for others, and how that can positively affect those around me.

If you’re like me and anger is quick and easy, I encourage you to explore the ‘why’ behind that, and if it is always the course you should choose.

Forgiveness, as cliché and basic as it sounds, truly is the only way out. It can allow you to let go, to move on, and even to get a clearer view of things.

And truly, allowing yourself to forgive is as much for you as for anybody else. Give yourself that gift every single day and see what happens.