A man looking through the paper saw an ad he couldn’t believe: “For Sale, almost new Jag, loaded, $200.” Thinking it was a misprint, he nevertheless called the number. Sure enough, the almost brand-new Jaguar was loaded and had only 300 miles on it. The woman verified the price and said the first one to her house would get the car. He got there as quickly as he could, saw the car was in mint condition, and thought there must be something wrong with it.
He asked, “Ma’am, is it really $200?” She paused and then said, “That might be too much. I’ll let you have it for $99.50.” He said, “I’ll take it, but I’d feel guilty if I didn’t tell you it’s worth $50,000. Why would you sell it to me for only $99.50?” She said, “My husband ran away with his secretary last week. He just sent me a telegram from Hawaii telling me to sell the Jag and send him the money, and that is exactly what I’m going to do.” Forgiveness is often difficult because we want revenge.
Forgiveness is crucial to our happiness, especially within our families because they do the same things over and over again. A young groom realized he had married a door-slammer. She got out of the car and slammed the door; she went into a room and slammed the door. He tried to pretend it didn’t bother him, but it was getting to him.
Finally, after a very difficult day at work, he heard her slam the outside door, and then she slammed the den door, and then the kitchen door. He jumped up and loudly said, “If you slam another door, I’ll scream until the blood runs out of my ears!” She fell apart and cried. He apologized; they talked and worked it out. Then she went to the bathroom and slammed the door. Why? Because she was a door-slammer; it was her habit. He was going to have to forgive her many times.
A man told me about his wife who, he believed, had never changed a toilet tissue roll since they were married. He got so upset that he started writing the date and time on every cardboard cylinder he changed. One day he had had enough, and in his frustration he went to the closet and retrieved two large plastic bags full of cardboard cylinders with the date and time on each one. As he was dumping the cardboard cylinders all over the room, he said, “I have proof! I have proof you have never changed the toilet tissue roll.” She looked at the cylinders all over the room and said, “You’re sick!”
He said, “I’ll show you who’s sick. We’re going to see the psychiatrist.” He made an appointment to see the psychiatrist, and he and his wife went, carrying the two plastic bags full of cardboard cylinders. The psychiatrist asked, “What seems to be the problem?” The man said, “The problem is that my wife has never changed the toilet tissue roll, and I have proof,” and he dumped the cardboard cylinders all over the psychiatrist’s desk. The psychiatrist looked at him and said, “You’re sick.”
We are all sick and defective, and our Maker has recalled every one of us. No one will measure up to your expectations; even you don’t measure up to your own expectations. So forgive yourself and forgive others for not being perfect. Be more like children.
I heard about a little boy who was mad at his best friend, Andrew. They got into a fight, and he told his mother, “I hate Andrew, I never want to see him again, and I hope his dog dies.” The next day as he was going out to play, his mother asked, “Where are you going?” He said, “I’m going to play with Andrew.” She said, “I thought you never wanted to see him again and hoped his dog died.” He said, “Yeah, I said that about Andrew, but me and Andrew are good forgetters.”
So chill out! Let’s be good forgetters, and what you can’t forget, forgive. We all carry around our plastic bags full of something, waiting to dump it on the one who has wronged us. Realize that carrying it around does more damage to you than it will do to the person you dump it on. The only way to be laid back is to give up on the payback.