Response & Reaction

Responding & Reacting. 2 different words which may sound like similar actions, but not in application.
When you react to something that someone says or does, if someone is able to cause havoc on you by doing something, he/she is in control of you at that point of time. Instead when you respond, you remain in control, with options and choices. The difference between reacting and responding is choice. When you are reacting, they are in control, when you respond, you are.

Everyone has a knapsack in life they have to carry. Some larger and heavier than the others, some smaller and more manageable than the rest. Complication comes about when people start to look to others in life to carry their ‘knapsack’ for them. Mutual relationships that spring out of love, will lead both parties to be able to choose freely to do something out of love for that person. Being loved leads to commitment and a will-full decision making relationship. Not the reverse.
People who seek the reverse tend to feel ‘shortchanged’ because the person did not reciprocate the love you first gave. But in the first place, when you do give… don’t give with an unwillingness. Make your ‘Yes’, Yes, and your ‘No’, No. Responsibility to own your own feelings as well as your desires are important elements in life. No one can take responsibility for the way you feel except yourself. No one should bear the brunt of your anger, disappointment or needs until you come to terms with yourself what is it that you want and desire, and then choose how to go from there. Many decisions, many choices. The choice for unforgiveness can sometimes be a prison in itself… it harms you more than anyone else in the world.

When you forgive someone, it means to let him off the hook, or to cancel a ‘debt’ he owes you. When you refuse to forgive that someone, you still want something from that person, and even if its revenge or even just an acknowledgement to admit the ‘wrong’ they have committed, it keeps you tied to him forever. It’s much better to receive the grace from God, who has something to give, than to look to receive the apology from those who have hurt you. This will end your suffering. Because it ends the wish for repayment that will never or might never come in your entire life… It will only make your heart sick, because your hope is deferred (As the bible says in Proverbs 13:12)
If you so choose not to forgive, you are demanding something your offender does not choose to give, and this will continue to tie him to you. Let go… cut it loose, and you will be free. Not because there are people around you to help you out of it, but because you have the power to choose. That being said, true friends around you are the ones that will be committed and help you see the choices you make. We all do need more than our fair share of fair weather friends. So here, as a friend I want to share a word of encouragement that means a lot to me.

Romans 7:19-25 and 8:1
“For what I do is not the good I want to do, no, the evil I do not want to do- this I keep on doing… So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law, but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body o death? Thanks be to God- through Jesus Christ our Lord... Therefore, now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”