Forgiveness

Forgiveness would rate as one of the hardest things I have ever done. Admittedly I had some "big ticket" items to forgive. My childhood was the scene and battleground for my parents in their battle for dominance in their marriage. A war in which, not surpisingly, no one came out the "winner". Everyone lost.
I also manifestly failed to bond with my father. I think there were two reasons for this: the first is that he didn't want the job of being a parent and the second is my recently diagnosed Aspergers. I was never a "normal" kid. I had an active disinterest in all things mechanical and active interest in everything that my father considered both alien and wrong, which is to say Asia and Asians. I was also a sensitive kid. I cried when my mother drowned unwanted puppies from her breeding dogs. And lived very much inside my head as a form of escape from the domestic violence.
I ended up with a world class anger. My first wife to her eternal credit encouraged me to meditate. Thus began a fifteen year long war. Metta isn't the antidote to anger. Forgiveness is. And Forgiveness can be a war in and of itself. We must challenge anger with the absolute necessity to Forgive and then engage in Forgiveness as the pain surges inside us and at times batters our very will to live.
When people spoke so easily of Forgiveness I was often left wondering why they had the kitten and I was riding a dragon. The mental image is from the movie Avatar when the hero jumps Toruk nakto and the implied stuggle.
Forgiveness was an act of war for me. I was out to kill the anger before it killed me and the life I wanted. Forgiveness continues.
Forgiveness is true power.