Forgiveness Is Free[Ing]

A live talk and heart-felt personal story on the power of forgiveness, how we can and need to compassionately turn towards each other in recognition of our common humanity. Recorded from my weekly class Coming Home to Us in Denver, Colorado.

Please note: This track may include some explicit language.

Transcript

So about three,

Four months ago,

I was DJing a wedding and I got a really nice $100 bill tip from the groom,

Which really warmed my heart.

And as I was driving home,

The thought occurred to me that it would be really beautiful to give that $100 bill to a homeless person.

I decided not to do it.

There are,

Some of this may be superfluous,

But I think that there's wisdom in it that hopefully you will pull and or relate to.

I've really come to feel a tenderness in pulling up to a light and as I came to notice in my first year or so in Denver,

The sense of avoidance and discomfort that I felt within myself over facing the suffering of someone there asking for help.

And I'm sure I'm not the only person who can relate to the sense of wanting to turn away and not knowing how to deal with it.

And what I realized was that that really was coming from my own discomfort,

My own like,

I don't know how to deal with this and I feel a sense of obligation and like I have to do something.

And so I really felt,

And this is compassion in action.

Compassion is a desire to relieve the suffering of others and it's something that we can cultivate and that we do cultivate in mindfulness practices.

First through the self,

Learning to be compassionate to yourself,

To be able to hold yourself tenderly when things are difficult.

But it naturally translates into the way that we see others and our ability to hold the suffering of others and to care and to take action.

It's more than empathy,

Which is I can feel this and perhaps there are some empaths in the room who feel overwhelmed by the pain of others or the emotions of others.

Compassion has this quality of I can really see from a steadiness the pain and suffering of another and I have a desire and innate,

And it's inherent in all of us and something that we reconnect with through these practices,

To help.

And I could feel as I started to really pay attention to within myself this discomfort,

Which required my own self-compassion of like,

Oh,

I can see that I'm uncomfortable with this and that's,

It doesn't feel good,

But it's not really about them.

Anybody relate to this?

You relate and you see someone in pain and it's sad and it's uncomfortable and we're dealing with our own shit and it's like,

How am I supposed to help this person when I'm not even,

You know,

Like I'm trying to fucking get through.

And I could really,

I've come over the past couple of years a really long way with finding a space that feels really equanimous.

This is a heart quality that we talk about in practice and cultivate in Buddhist and mindfulness traditions,

Which is like a centeredness and groundedness of heart.

So it's not like I'm going to go in and be fucking Mother Teresa.

I have my own things that I need to handle and care for myself,

But how can I give back in a small way?

And so I really just made it a practice to turn towards homeless people when I would see them on the street.

And I found it a really simple practice to just order a 30 pack,

A 60 pack of hand warmers,

Just as a little offering to say,

Hey,

I see you and I hope that this helps and I love you and I wish you the best because that's what they need more than anything.

They just need a little care and they want to be seen.

And when you turn away,

That's the disconnection that I'm talking about in the beginning.

And there's no shame to that.

We're overwhelmed.

We're all trying to figure out how to deal with our own shit.

And we come up face to face with some really serious suffering and we're suffering and we're like,

I don't know how to deal with this.

And so step one is really finding that within yourself,

Which is needing nourishment and compassion,

And then creating space from which you can turn towards in such a simple way has been such a gift,

Not just for these people,

But for me to be able to pull up to a light and instead of feeling fear and disconnection and wanting to turn away and constriction,

I can say,

Hey,

Here's this.

I love you.

I see you.

And I wish you the best.

And I mean the fucking smile on their faces is so it's such a beautiful moment.

And so this has been a practice for me over the past couple years.

And so I was driving home from this $100 bill and I was like,

I should give this to a homeless person.

Simultaneously,

I won't go super into this.

There's money,

Belief,

Abundance work that I'm doing.

And I'm like,

You know,

I actually know I need to,

I should receive this.

So I decided not to just kind of compulsively give it away because I'm afraid of receiving.

I drove home.

It's probably like 1130 12.

And I got home,

I parked on my quiet street in Golden,

And I got out of my car.

And I just went for a walk.

I love to walk in my neighborhood.

It's a beautiful,

Quiet,

Dark street.

And I took a couple laps.

When I got back to my car,

I saw this person walking in the middle of the street and they had what looked like a cape on.

And they're kind of walking half like across the street,

Like diagonally.

And I look in my car and my backpack is gone.

And I realized that I left my car unlocked.

And in my backpack is my laptop.

I thought at the time was my phone,

My wallet was in there.

I mean,

The financial I'm sure you can relate to it's not just the financial loss that comes with losing something like that.

You know,

It's the emotional loss of all the writing and the things that are on there that would be gone that since then I've backed up.

So there was an immediate reaction of like,

Oh,

Fuck.

And I immediately intuitively knew that that person walking up the street,

It's a middle of the night,

There's one person there.

I was like,

That's that person has my backpack.

And I just had this sense of like,

Underneath that cape thing is was a hump.

I was like,

That's my backpack.

And my heart start beating my heart starts beating.

And I'm like,

I'm in action mode.

And I'm going and I'm falling.

And there are a few blocks ahead of me.

And I'm really,

I'm scared right now.

And I'm thinking,

And after a few paces,

I realized like,

Okay,

If I come up the middle of the street,

They're gonna see me and then they're gonna run.

So I kind of move myself to the sidewalk and I start,

You know,

Kind of creeping,

But I'm moving quickly.

My heart is racing,

I'm afraid.

And this person's kind of like swinging erratically in and out of houses and into the street.

And as I move closer and closer,

I start to,

You know,

I'm scared.

I'm scared.

I'm like,

I'm going to confront this person.

This person has my backpack.

I'm fucking angry.

I'm also reactive.

I'm kind of,

There's this mix of fear of adrenaline of let's fucking go.

I'm not gonna let my shit get stolen,

Like courage.

And as I'm moving,

I have time and space to be able to realize like,

If I confront this person,

They can have a weapon.

They could attack me,

They could be unstable,

They could run.

So as I'm getting to the end of the block and starting to catch up to them,

They turn the corner.

And it just dawns on me,

I'm like,

The $100 bill is my leverage.

I'm going to offer them the $100 bill instead of being confrontational about it and taking a risk that I don't want to take.

I'm gonna offer something that I can give.

And so I turn the corner and I see them dip into a dark front yard and home porch.

And I kind of swing myself wide into the street.

And I've no idea who I'm getting involved with.

I just say,

If you give me my backpack,

I will give you $100 bill.

And this man comes out and he just immediately takes the backpack off.

He takes his blanket off his back.

He's like,

Is that really he's like,

I will hear take it like I'm so sorry.

I didn't know what I was doing.

I was scared.

I'm home like I'm hurt.

And he gives me my backpack.

And he's just like,

This kind of rattled scatty,

Man.

He's like,

I'm just I'm,

I'm scared,

Man.

Like,

I don't know.

I don't want to hurt people.

He's like,

I'm,

He's like,

Feel my heart.

And I put my hand on his heart and his heart is beating as fast as mine was.

And he's like,

Backpack,

Take this blanket.

I'm like,

I don't want the fucking blanket.

He's like,

Someone gave it to me from from whatever it's called one of the,

You know,

Donation places like I don't want the blanket.

Take the blanket,

Man.

He's like,

I don't,

I was like,

Okay,

Man,

Like,

What do you like in this moment,

There was,

There was a shift from like,

You're my fucking enemy,

To like,

You're a human being I could see and feel and he articulated and he showed me and I could feel it in his heart and his physiology,

That he was just as scared as I was.

And in this moment,

I could really feel this beautiful,

Like soft connection.

And all I wanted to do is help.

You know,

It was like,

I couldn't care less that you had taken my backpack.

Granted,

This story could have gone completely differently if this person ran or this person attacked me.

It's not how it happened.

And there's a reason for that.

I think there's all there's a few lessons that I'll pull at the end here.

And I was like,

What do you like?

Where like,

Where do you where you live,

Man?

Are you okay?

He's like,

I live in the,

I live in the apartment complex,

Like,

You know,

The parking lot across from you.

And he's like,

He's like,

Where do you live?

And I'm like,

I'm gonna tell you where I live.

Like,

I don't trust you right now.

You're just trying to steal my shit.

He's like,

Okay,

That's fair.

And I'm like,

He's like,

Is this $100 bill real?

I'm like,

Yes,

It's a real $100 bill.

And he's like,

Do you have any cigarettes?

And I was like,

No,

I don't have any cigarettes.

Like,

Like,

Do you need?

Do you need food?

Do you need water?

Like,

What do you need?

He's like,

I need cigarettes,

Man.

I'm going to 7-Eleven.

I'm like,

You're gonna take this $100 bill and go get cigarettes from 7-Eleven.

I'm like,

Okay,

That's whatever,

Do whatever you want to do.

And we're kind of walking with each other.

And we're talking.

He's like,

You know,

I do nice things,

Too.

And he's got this little,

You could tell he's mentally ill.

And he's got this little ornament.

And he hangs this little weird ornament on someone's home.

And he's just in this interesting chord kind of,

You know,

I could never relate,

But flow with life.

And he had just in the moment,

Seen an opportunity and scared had had,

You know,

Opened my unlocked car and just grabbed his backpack.

And good luck,

Man.

See you around.

And we parted ways.

I walked home,

I had my backpack.

I cried.

And I just felt this deep.

Yeah,

Just this deep softness and presence that,

You know,

I know that we feel in really special moments in life.

And it's unique and so cherished.

And there are a few lessons that I have pulled out of this,

Since it happened several months ago.

The first is that in between stimulus and response,

Excuse me,

In between stimulants,

Stimulus.

Fuck,

I'm really botching the quote here.

Viktor Frankl,

Who is a famous Austrian psychotherapist who survived the Holocaust and wrote really beautifully about the human resilience to be able to choose their story,

And to survive and forgive,

Wrote about there's a space in between stimulus and response.

And when we cultivate mindfulness,

We're slowing down,

So that instead of reacting,

Which I was when I started racing up that street,

I was afraid.

I had enough time and space,

I had several blocks to gather myself to gather a strategy that was less confrontational and reactive,

And which might cause harm to not just myself,

But to him.

And I'm really grateful for that space so that I could respond instead of react.

Because we're mostly going through daily lives reacting from our really ingenious,

Intelligent,

Primitive wiring,

But which is now dated and ready to be sort of trained and transcended.

And that's what we're doing here is learning,

How can I notice the ways in which I react to life habitually from fear,

From scarcity,

From lack,

From disconnection,

From the illusion of separation,

From he's the enemy,

And I'm going to go fucking get him,

And how dare he.

Okay,

How do I turn into an offer of generosity?

I don't give a shit about this $100.

The universe was like,

You know,

Separate from mindfulness,

The universe perhaps was like,

Yeah,

You should give that away.

You should give that to someone who needs it more than you.

So when we slow down,

We create space.

And meditation is one way to do it.

But there's infinite ways to do it.

We just create so much more room for heart centered choices to arise from more empowered,

Conscious,

Creative choices to arrive,

And we get much better outcomes that way.

And arguably,

You know,

When we're moving fast,

We feel the pain of that.

Secondly,

Forgiveness is free.

Forgiveness is free and forgiveness is freeing for everybody,

You know.

And again,

I know that the story could have gone differently,

And he could have ran away with my backpack,

And it would have been a whole different set of lessons,

Perhaps.

But it happened the way that it happened.

And it really was a visceral experience of the way in which,

You know,

We only paint ourselves by holding resentment.

We only pain each other by holding resentment.

And truly,

The gift of forgiveness is really freeing for everyone involved.

And,

You know,

I think what,

What really plagues us more than anything in this day and age is,

Is the burdens we carry in our hearts,

The people that we feel wronged us and hurt us,

And the pain that we carry with us,

The resentment that we carry with us,

And we suffer,

We suffer a lot because of it.

And it's by no means a process that happens,

I will not under respect the process of forgiveness,

Which can be as complex,

And long and up and down as the process of grief.

And it certainly doesn't happen as simply as it did in this scenario,

Although I think the backdrop in the background of what I had worked towards to be able to get to this moment really informed that.

Truly,

It is something worth aspiring to and cultivating and practicing so that I could walk away freely and more open and so that he could walk away freely and more open.

Yeah,

And finally,

Turning towards compassion.

You know,

I talk about,

I say that self compassion is the secret sauce.

And I really,

I really truly fucking believe it to be and it's what we're cultivating here,

You know,

When I say curiosity,

Like,

Can you be curious,

With that pain in your knee,

Can you be curious with the tension in your chest,

What it's doing is shifting from an energy of criticism of resistance of avoidance that we carry around with us on a daily basis of avoiding the present moment,

Avoiding what's here,

It's,

It's painful to be a human being,

It's beautiful,

And it's tragic,

And it's hard.

And we,

In this very uniquely concocted,

Complex existence that we live in,

Where we can just look at our phones,

And fucking not worry about what's happening in our chest,

We just carry that around,

And we don't look at it.

And when we learn to look at it,

Not from a place of go away,

Which just holds it closer,

We create space for ourselves to really fully exist.

And there's a tenderness,

An opening that we get to feel.

And there's a freedom from that.

That's so beautiful.

And it's that same freedom that gives us the freedom to really truly be with each other and not just the hardest moments,

But also the best moments.

And it's the medicine we need more than anything right now.

And so we need,

I really truly believe in this is such a deep,

Deeply informs the work that I do.

And what's here now in this class and in the story is compassion is so fucking needed right now,

You know,

Can we turn towards each other,

Not with this other ring,

You're the enemy,

And your idea is stupid,

And how could you and can we turn towards and really see each other with understanding.

And that starts with turning towards an understanding ourselves,

And being able to hold,

Hold the difficulty,

The difficulties that we all carry with an increasing softness and generosity and tenderness.

It's not easy.

It's no easy task to sit with yourself.

You know,

As I really see and respect all of you for being here and for wanting to take the time to sit quietly with yourselves and with each other.

It's it's tremendously brave.

It's fucking hard.

It's a gift.