Something’s been bothering me lately and I want to explore it here.
The other day I posted “On being a recovery goddess” and got some awesome responses but something really stood out to me. A comment came in from our co-blogger wellroundedtype2 that said, “I think an important part of godliness is grace. Giving self and others room to make mistakes and keep moving on.”
Giving self room to make mistakes and keep moving on. I struggle with this on a daily basis. I used to have a friend who was always saying to me, “give yourself some grace”. At first I didn’t really know what she meant but I quickly realized it meant to forgive myself and to move on.
Forgiveness is a very hard thing for me to wrap my brain and heart around. My background in forgiveness is not a good one. I was raised in a very oppressive church by a very demonstrative father and very meek mother. Judgment was what sustained my father. At some point, God was actually taken out of the equation and was replaced by my father. Pressure to be perfect and to avoid the gates of hell was ever present. My father was my god. My parents believed in hellfire and damnation. My father was my judge, my ruler, my counselor, my abuser, my salvation and my damnation.
I was never enough. I was condemned and damned. I was going to hell.
My father has been dead 9 years now and I still have my days where I cannot (no matter how hard I try) feel like I’m good enough. When my father died I was crushed and thrilled at the same time. I felt the relief of a huge burden being lifted off of me and yet I was so sad for the loss to my life.
I tried going to church for a few years (a different denomination than what I was raised in, and actually the church my husband was raised in) and I was active. I went every Sunday and Wednesday and I sang in the choir. I went on retreats and loved it all. I started feeling like I was worthy of God’s love and my own too when I faltered yet again and had an affair. I won’t go into all the sordid details of that affair but I will say that what little self-respect and self-love I had gained in those few years was smashed to bits because of that affair. (this happened just after my father died in 1999, coincidence? I think not)
I tried to remain in church and tell myself that I had confessed this to my husband and to my God and that I was worthy to keep going. I sang in the choir because I love to sing. I would so look forward to church for the choir. I loved performing in Christmas Cantatas and Easter programs and the socializing. But then, I couldn’t bring myself to go anymore. I couldn’t go to church and I certainly couldn’t be a public hypocrite and sing in the choir on stage, in front of everyone. I don’t sing anymore.
Pictures of my father came flooding back to me, condemning me to hell for what I had done. The voices in my head damning me to hell did not stop haunting me until about 2 years ago.
The singing I used to love and truly enjoy is something in my past. I used to sing at the top of my lungs while driving in the car. I loved singing pop music, oldies, hymns, whatever was the flavor of the day. I don’t sing anymore.
It’s as if I’m punishing myself for my sins by not allowing myself to sing. Where is my forgiveness and grace for ME? I can’t believe that it’s buried so far inside of me that I can’t revive it and give myself another chance. I won’t believe that!
Any insight or encouragement would be greatly appreciated.
~sas
Angry Gray Rainbows 
So, here’s something I learned from a colleague (someone I hope someday to be able to call a friend, but I don’t really know him well enough yet) — can you dedicate singing to someone else? Someone in your life who you want to help or admire or are praying for?
Ideally, you’ll find your joy in singing again, but at first, maybe doing it for someone else will give you a reason to do it.
Another really cheesy suggestion is karaoke — I know it might be painful to listen to all the other “singers” but it might help you get past the initial difficulty and find the joy in it again.
I love to sing, I don’t do it well these days, but I love it.
I hope you are able to find your voice! Maybe you could record it and post it here, for us! Sing “I will survive” or something inspirational (India.Arie’s “Video” comes to mind, too).
People make mistakes, that’s part of life. And what we do after we make those mistakes is pick up the pieces, learn from what we did and move on.
I’m an atheist, and as such I don’t think there is an afterlife. But even if I believed there were, I don’t think I would want to spend one minute of my life keeping myself from being happy. If there is an afterlife I will have all of it to atone for whatever I did in my life that whatever god there is finds unacceptable. In the meant time I’m going to enjoy every minute of every day, because that is why my parents gave me life.
You’ve certainly spent long enough feeling bad. I know how shame can haunt you, believe me, but sometimes you have to fight back. Sometimes you have to stop yourself and say NO to feeling whatever it is your feeling, change your thought process, do something you don’t normally do.
You can dance if you want to. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcOZ6xFxJqg) SING IT!
One thing that helps me is the idea that Jesus said to love others as you love yourself. Not “instead of loving yourself.” Not “more than.” But “as.” In that you are supposed to love yourself, be kind to yourself, and forgive yourself.
For some people, self-love comes really easy and caring for others is hard, but for a lot of people, it’s the reverse.
If you had a friend who’d had an affair, you wouldn’t keep rubbing her face in it for ten years, would you? Or tell her she shouldn’t go to church, didn’t deserve to sing in the choir?
I don’t know enough about your relationship to know if your husband forgave you, but you’re still together, so I’m guessing he has. I can say very confidently that God forgives you. I know being raised by someone abusive and judgmental, especially when that abuse is wrapped in religion, warps and twists that, and makes it really hard to believe you’re forgiven.
If you’re feeling a little bit defiant, maybe it would help to see forgiving yourself as a mental eff-you to your father, if that makes sense. “Nope, sorry, I’m not letting your judgment and hate rule me anymore. I’m going to love myself and forgive myself and YOU CAN’T STOP ME.”
Don’t know if any of that helps, but you have prayers and good thoughts coming your way from my direction, and I hope you will let yourself sing again.
Someone spoke to me once about giving true thought to Jesus’s act of selflessness leading up to and on the cross when struggling with forgiveness. Thinking about the suffering He endured. While I have suffered in life, I never suffered to the extent Jesus did. And I never suffered willingly. They also asked me to think about why He endured that suffering. His statement to God, “father, forgive them they know not what they do”.
My step-mother abused me for 7 long years. I thought I could never bring myself to forgive her, ever. But this wise person that spoke with me about Jesus asked me to understand where the abuse may have come from. At first I was insulted & angry. There is no need to understand why a grown up would harm a child, that’s just cruel. But he prodded me further, making me look at her mental illness that had been left untreated. Her struggle to get through each day with no support of that illness from those around her.
I will never feel she was justified in her actions, but I found a way to forgive her. I don’t have to justify or excuse her actions to forgive her. Mostly I was able to do this because of all the bad, wrong things I’ve done in my life, knowing that no matter how ugly or horrible they were, God has forgiven me – without question or hesitation.
And the abuse that I suffered, as bad as it was, was not as great as Jesus’s suffering on the cross. He suffered so I didn’t have to. He suffered because he deemed me worthy. Me, of all people. Worthy of his love.
You can’t undo the abuse from your father. It happened, there is no taking it away. But understand one of the reasons he did it was because he wasn’t capable to deal with you any other way. It wasn’t because you did not deserve better, it was because of his limitations, his inadequacies. Your amazing worth had nothing to do with it.
Forgive him for not being as strong & loving a person as you are. Forgive him even though he doesn’t deserve it. Forgive him because you are that big & loving.
Celebrate your survival & success. You overcame so much more that you should ever have had to. Forgive yourself for your mistake, knowing that God forgave it the moment you thought it.
Sorry… didn’t mean to ramble…
I think everyone else who has responded has some wonderful things to say. Please try to take to heart KellyK’s beautiful message about self-forgiveness.
We all do make mistakes. Once we’ve finished making them, the best (albeit hardest) thing to do is to learn what we can from the mistakes we made, forgive ourselves, and move on.
In the meantime, have you considered looking into a community chorus? Many cities and towns have them, and it sounds as though it might fill a void you’ve been feeling until you’re ready to sing in church again.
I do hope you’ll raise your voice again. It’s more than worthy to be heard.
The posts above say more about forgiveness than I can so I will just say thanks for your wise words.
As far as your voice, does it help to know why you have silenced yourself? Now that you know why and have learned from that, why not make plans to sing once again. My challenge to you is to come up with a few ideas and a few baby steps toward singing again.
I wanted to just address everyone at one time so here goes:
Thank you everyone! I appreciate all the responses.
I’ve decided to start small. I sang in the car on the way home from work yesterday. I also play music on my computer at work so this morning, when both bosses were away, I turned up my favorite tunes and let it rip! tee hee
My breathing is nowhere near how it used to be but I don’t care. It feels good to sing along with the radio. I may branch out later and do the community or church choir but I’m good with what I’m doing for now.
On the forgiveness issue, I’ve lived with guilt and shame for a very long time. I got this wonderful book that describes both wonderfully. If you’re at all interested, it’s called, “Shame and Guilt: Masters of Disguise”. This book really helped me to see how guilt and shame had influenced my life throughout. Whereas feeling guilty is because you have in fact done something wrong, shame is the feeling that you yourself are bad because of the act…that you have no redeeming qualities and are not worthy of forgiveness. Sound familiar? Yep, me in a nutshell. Now that I have that information I need to figure out how to dig myself out of this pit.
After so many years of living with shame (and guilt), it’s going to take some time to change some things. Thanks for going through this with me. (many cyber hugs)
Yay for baby steps! And for singing in the car. 🙂
I’m learning forgiveness as well.
As I learn to have compassion for me, forgiveness comes easier. I’m trying to exhibit the life of Christ to my own self as well as to others…
I just wanted to comment on your post as I have been going through a similar struggle.
I have sung my whole life nad really tried to make a name for myself singing. I too used to sing in the church choir and ejoy it and I too stopped going as I made a painful personal decision that was not in line with Christs teachings and I couldnt be hypocritical and continue.
Now I feel that there is no point in trying to sing as any efforts to succeed would fail as I do not believe I deserve success.
I turn down any opportunities as I believe everyone knows about me and is disgusted by me and have no direction anymore as singing is all i ever wanted to do.
Its a tough one, but I am glad you have made the decision to get up and fight back! I wish you well. xxxxx
I googled “I don’t sing anymore” because I don’t. There was a time in my life that all I did was sing. I sang any place any time and it felt good. It was as natural to me as breathing. I feel no desire to sing anymore and I’m numb. I’m sad. I just wondered if anyone out there had ever uttered those words before on the world wide web and so far…this is the ony one that I found. I feel the pain of the person who posted this initial story. I hope she can again sing. I “hope” that I can too one day. And soon.