Confessions! Let it go.

Today's question is what do you know you have to do, but just can't do?

I'm just going to pick one thing because this could be a loooong list.

I need to let it go.

I need to stop feeling like I have to protect people who don't need protecting.

All my life I've had a keen (razor-sharp) sense of "fairness" and "justice".

I've had a Tigress attitude toward anyone trying to hurt someone I love.

I can forgive anything done to me, but I will fight to the death for someone I love.

And when somebody hurts someone I love, it eats me.

I hate them.

My toes curl and blood pressure goes up and I am ready to fight.

If somebody insulted me, I would cry, stumble, feel embarrassed and retreat.

If somebody insulted my friend or family member I turn into an amazon woman.

I am a warrior who takes no prisoners. Seriously, you want me on your side. :)

And long after the person who was hurt or insulted is feeling fine, I am still boiling.

I am staring at the ceiling late at night.

I am wondering what I can do to make things right.

And there's the rub.

I can't make it right. I can't fix those wrongs. No matter how I twist my brain or pool my resources I cannot change how one human being treats another.

And I have to learn to love the people I love, without hating the people who hurt them.

I have to learn to be a safe place where they can retreat instead of a warrior on the hunt.

And that is really hard.

Because when you love, as any mother knows, you feel the pain of the person you love more than they do. You multiply it. You enhance it. You refine it. You magnify it.

Until discomfort is agony, and sadness is anguish. And it doesn't really help anyone.

So I have to learn to let people hurt a little. Without hating a lot. Without fighting the world.

I have to let the pain go.

And not the person.

But when they are all tied up together, it is a hard skill to master.

When I lay my burdens of revenge and indignation and anger at the feet of the Lord, I have to learn to leave them there.

Because I have a habit of showing him all my smelly garbage, and then packing it back up and taking it with me.

And He keeps raising His eyebrows and waiting for me to figure it out.

I'm so grateful He is patient.