Change is a way of life—the seasons tell us so. Yet nothing shakes us like change. Though we may expect it and sometimes even want it, more often we dread it. We dread change because we fear it—we do not think change can be for the better.
Things happen that we would never have asked for. We respond by saying, “If only I’d done this” or “If only I hadn’t done that.” We cannot change what has happened, but we can change how we handle it in our own hearts. We may need to forgive ourselves—or we may need to forgive someone else.
If someone needs forgiving, forgive, for heaven’s sake, forgive. To be free and at ease once again, we need desperately to release the baggage we have been dragging around. It is all we can do.
Joyce Sequichie Hifler, A Cherokee Feast of Days
