Let's give our mother a precious gift
Dear friend,
Let us walk along the water
and speak of things that matter.
Like our mother.
I hope your Mom’s still living.
If she’s not,
I hope she’s living in your heart:
“Wherever you are
I think of you, Mom,
and I know you’re glad
I do.”
I think of mine a lot.
She died in ‘88.
I still feel her loving pride
in me.
I talk to her about my life
just as I always did.
She’s not forgotten.
Honor thy mother
When we remember our mother
with tenderness
we honor her.
Honor thy father and thy mother:
that thy days may be long upon the land
which the Lord thy God giveth thee.
When we honor our Mom
we are blessed
whether we are a Christian
a Jew
a Muslim
have another faith
or no faith
we are blessed
because the commandment
is for us all.
Our mother gave us life.
As we honor her
our soul is filled with life.
Our gift to her
It’s Christmas time.
Let’s give our mother a gift!
Let’s give her a spiritual gift
that we can give her in our heart
even if she has passed away.
It’s the gift she needs the most:
to be forgiven.
How I became able to forgive my mother
I celebrated my birthday a few months ago.
As I do every year,
I thanked my mother
for giving birth to me.
Back then
she and my Daddy
and my two brothers
were living in a little rented house
down on the beach of Lake Erie.
I imagined Mom and Daddy
climbing up those long steps
to the road.
My mother in labor
my father clambering up in his leg brace
(his left leg was paralyzed from polio)
and him driving her to the hospital
without a license.
She had read the groundbreaking book
on natural childbirth
Childbirth Without Fear by Grantley Dick-Read
and I was the first baby
born in that hospital without anesthetic.
She was always forging new paths.
I chose the words on her gravestone:
Our Pioneer Mother.
She was a great mother.
But when I was 14 she became psychotic.
Totally delusional with paranoid schizophrenia.
The resulting pain, chaos and conflict
and my rebellion against her control
broke us apart.
I never reconciled with her for ten years
until after I had married
had two children
had gone into psychoanalysis
and had become a Christian.
Through my inner growth
I was able to forgive myself
and to forgive her
and I became able to love her again.
What needs to be forgiven?
We need to forgive our mother
for any ways that she hurt us
or failed us
regardless of how justified
we may feel
in our anger and resentment.
She may indeed
have been cruel to us.
She may indeed
have criticized us constantly.
She may indeed
have failed to comfort us
and failed to be there for us
when we needed her.
She may indeed
have betrayed our trust.
If she did these things
she had serious problems.
She may have been ill
with depression, personality disorder,
alcoholism, drug addiction, psychosis.
Or she may have been repeating
wrongs that were done to her as a child.
No matter the cause
and no matter the degree of our pain
we still have to honor her.
And the only way
we will be able to honor her
is to forgive her.
A psychological necessity
Forgiving our mother
is the most precious gift
we could possibly give her.
It is also the most valuable gift
we could possibly give ourselves.
Forgiveness is a fundamental necessity
for our psychological health.
Giving and receiving forgiveness
is psychologically necessary
for self preservation.
Being unforgiving
does us serious harm.
Whatever we cannot forgive
we are doomed to repeat.
Freud discovered this unconscious mechanism.
He called it the repetition compulsion.
We are unconsciously compelled
to inflict upon others
whatever pain has been inflicted upon us.
The child who is repeatedly criticized
grows up to repeatedly criticize his own children
even if he has vowed
”I will never be critical like my parents!”
The child who is beaten
grows up to beat his own children
even if he has vowed
”I will never be cruel like my parents!”
Forgiveness is the antidote
to this painful repetition.
When we forgive
both our mother and ourselves
we end the cycle.
Words of forgiveness
How do we give this gift
to our mother?
We give it
inside our own heart.
We speak words of mercy
that convey our inner growth.
Allow me to offer
some words of forgiveness
to try on.
If these don’t feel right
write ones that do.
But do speak them
to yourself
when you are ready…
“Mom,
one day I may have a child.
(Or: I am a parent now.)
I know I will make mistakes.
I know that weaknesses and failings of mine
will cause my child pain.
I know I will do things I later regret.
I am human.
I only hope
that one day
my child will forgive me.
In that spirit, Mom,
knowing you and I are both
just human beings
trying to do our best in this world…
today I want you to know
I forgive you
for any pain you ever caused me.
I forgive you and I love you
the way I hope my child
will forgive me and love me.
Today I am letting go
of any anger, hurt or resentment
I have kept inside me
all these years.
I am letting it go.
Going forward
let’s do our best
to prevent painful words or actions
between us.
Let’s take good care
of our relationship.
Let’s get whatever help we may need
to be able to do this.
As Dolly Parton sings
I will always love you,
I sing I will always forgive you.
It’s my Christmas gift for you.”
Forgiving is hard. Forgetting is harder. Nobody said growing was easy.
Forgiveness is a boomerang gift because it always comes back to you!