"Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much."

- Oscar Wilde

What makes us do bad things in this life as we hurt others, or commit selfish acts that are inconsiderate of those around us we should care about? I can’t really answer this. I am guilty of such things. I know we can resolve our sins; we can move on and be forgiven. In AA there is a Step where we go to all those we have hurt in our alcoholism and make amends. I drink, sometimes I drink too much and sometimes I don’t drink at all. Mostly I manage my drinking just fine. But years ago when I was fresh out of the hospital, and had recently run a red light due to a hallucination while experiencing some psychosis, I was pulled over with an alcohol level of .08 in my system, the legal limit. I was drinking responsibly, I thought, but still blew the legal limit and was charged with a DUI that later got reduced to a negligent driving ticket and a pending DUI that was resolved in five years due to good behavior. I quit drinking for a year and decided to go to AA when I was out of the Hospital for a psychotic break that had lasted several months and resulted in blind rage. I attended two AA meetings a week and got a sponsor, not because I was an alcoholic, but because I needed the support. Folks were friendly, and as long as I labeled myself as an alcoholic, I was welcome at meetings to tell my struggles with Bipolar Disorder. I wasn’t entirely sure that I wasn’t an alcoholic, and was abstaining from drinking. I earned my year coin and worked through several of the steps. I became familiar with the program, though this was a segment of my life at the end of my last Seattle stay, before I moved to Lopez Island. I attended a few meetings here, but then decided to move on from the endeavor of AA. I don’t think of this as entirely dishonest, and I will say that the program was beneficial to me, and has always reminded me of the possibility of not drinking or of drinking less, as well as having learned of some folks' life stories where they overcame great odds.

The reason I bring this up is because we all can benefit from making peace and restitution with our sins and errs of the past. It is not always easy and many of us are not brave enough to actually absolve ourselves to the faces of those we have harmed. Forgiveness is a large and beckoning word. Perhaps there are those out there that have done little wrong to others in their lives and don’t feel they owe anyone an apology. Perhaps our apologies are strewn with harmful things and wrongs that have been done to us over the years. Perhaps we can focus on forgiveness in a greater sphere of simply forgiving all and ourselves in an abstract and all-encompassing way. Perhaps fine tuning our wrongs to exact events, culprits and victims is not really necessary. Perhaps it is so in some circumstances like AA. For me, the wrong I have done due to my Bipolar Disorder is not that much different than the wrong doings of an alcoholic. I must still take responsibility for my actions but they are largely due to an illness, and an ailment that was beyond all control. That being said, I ask forgiveness to those out there I have wronged in this life, and I grant full forgiveness to those who have hurt me. I will also forgive myself; I will continue to strive towards this full and utter forgiveness of all things.