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Welcome to the Buddhist Boot Camp Podcast. Our intention is to awaken, enlighten, enrich,

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and inspire a simple and uncomplicated life. 

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Discover the benefits of mindful living with your host, Timber Hawkeye.

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When we think about forgiveness, we automatically think about something 

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that someone has done TO us. And I think right there is one of the first problems: is that 

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we victimize ourselves; we give somebody else the power to do something to us,

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to change our internal peace. And when we look at the situations in our lives, in our past,

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as things that have happened FOR us, not TO us, but FOR us, for us to learn from,

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grow from, and move on from, perhaps most importantly, then we're no longer victims.

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Then we look at what's happened and go, even the situation, as terrible as it might be,

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we can look at it as an opportunity for us to grow, and we can be grateful

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 for what that person did FOR us, not TO us.

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And if there are instances where we need to forgive, where we need to let go,

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then it's really imperative to just realize that we don't need to wait 

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for the other person to apologize to us in order for us to forgive them. In fact, they 

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don't even have to be sorry. Forgiveness is a gift that you give yourself. And so by 

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deciding to let that go, you're liberating yourself. There's an old, Buddhist saying 

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about staying angry with someone is like holding a hot coal with the intention of  

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throwing it at someone else, but you're the one who ends up getting burned.

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And the beauty of forgiveness is you are no longer caught up in that story that 

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they deserve any kind of animosity from you. That's why people

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tell me they hang onto anger. They are like, "They deserve it!"

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But you're not harming THEM, you're harming yourself when you're angry.

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That is toxic energy within you, and the most incredible feeling in the world is to let that go.

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I can only feel like comparing it to paying off debt: it's just so liberating to write 

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that last check and be debt-free and think, "I don't have to carry this around anymore."

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And so, I talk a lot in the book about everything that's happened in my childhood

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and the relationship with my mother, and someone asked me, "When did 

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"you forgive her? How long did it take you?" And in all honesty, the moment that I decided

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to let it go is the moment that the forgiveness just came and it just no longer mattered.

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I'm actually grateful for all the experiences in my life because they brought me

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to where I am today, and I couldn't be happier.

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Timber Hawkeye is the bestselling author of Faithfully Religionless

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and Buddhist Boot Camp.

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For additional information, please visit BuddhistBootCamp.com,

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where you can order autographed books to support the Prison Library Project, 

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watch Timber's inspiring TED Talk, and join our monthly mailing list.

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We hope you have enjoyed this episode 

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and invite you to subscribe for more thought-provoking discussions.

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Thank you for being a Soldier of Peace in the Army of Love. 🙏