Poison Drink

Someone shared a special nugget of truth with me today that said, "Resentment is the poison we drink expecting someone else to die."

I've been mulling it over all day and can't find an ounce of untruth in it. I'd go so far as to add "unforgiving spirit" to the dose of resentment because I think they are toxic together. Do I have that mastered? No. Do I ever drink the poison? Almost every day.

I wish that I could say otherwise but it's true. So often in life we skip over conversations that could be awkward or painful because we don't want to go through the work of it all and then we end up hanging on to resentments for months or years.

There are so many areas of my life that I wish I'd set boundaries or had hard conversations years ago. There are people I've allowed to take up too much space in my head because I didn't have the courage or the maturity to take a stand either towards or against.

To put it on paper (or screen) makes the process seem so much simpler than it truly is. Forgiveness is tough and does not come naturally for mankind. It's a choice I have to make every single day and one that I can only do with the help of God. Some days I'm more open to his grace than others. Some days I fail miserable and I swallow a shot of poison willingly.

So how do I move forward with less poison? I think I need a lot of Jesus and good friends who will speak truth to me when I'm being hard. I need to surround myself with truth-speakers who will put their hands over my mouth when they see me raising a shot of resentment to my lips. I need to bow before God daily and beg to be reminded of the grace he has blanketed me with so that I can offer it to others. I also think I need to value myself as a precious creation made in the image of God and demand that I be treated accordingly. I can make a choice to not allow myself to be  a door mat. I can make a choice to be treated with respect. It all goes hand in hand in the walk towards health.