Read this story..about letting go of the past (reproduced from a article)

Sometimes it seems that only animals know we’re actually here to be happy. So let’s please think about releasing old baggage. Let’s let go of the past. And I know that sometimes people do things that seem terrible and totally unacceptable. There are some incredible things that go on in our society, cruelty and thoughtlessness, and I’m not suggesting it’s easy. I’m saying it’s necessary if we want to be happy and empowered people. We clean up the past because an unfinished past leads to an unfinished future. What follows is a powerful story of just what I am saying here, in action. It’s not an easy story to read by any stretch of the imagination, but I pray it inspires you.
Sunday afternoons down in rural Kentucky, Tommy Pigage goes to church with a couple who could almost be considered step-parents, Frank and Elizabeth Morris. He’s like an adopted son to them. And after church they go out to eat. They go roller-skating on Thursday, and on the weekends they bowl together. Tommy’s around a lot, even though he doesn’t live with them. And not too long ago they had a beautiful luau for lots of friends at their Kentucky home, and Tommy spent a lot of time helping them prepare it.
They have a very unusual relationship. He’s not their real son; as I said, he’s kind of an adopted son. Their real son, Ted Morris, two nights before Christmas, 1982, was on his way home while Tommy Pigage was at a party, drunk, making a fool of himself. His drinking had gotten out of control. He left the party stone-drunk and blacked out at the wheel and hit 18-year-old Ted Morris head-on. And he killed the only child of Frank and Elizabeth Morris.
They had never heard the name Tommy Pigage until a couple of days later at the police station when they got the report. And they dug out a yearbook; they wanted to see what he looked like. They wanted to see everything about him. Frank Morris said, “I saw him. He had long hair and he looked like a punk. I hated the sight of him. Of course there was no way I was going to like him.” He took away their only son. Ted was the opposite of Tommy. Ted was a bright, polite, clean-cut kid who was a scholarship student. Tommy was a drifter and a drunk from a broken home.
Two weeks after the accident at the court hearing, Elizabeth saw him for the first time. Her legs were trembling, and she felt rage when she saw the boy who killed their only son. He got a 10-year sentence, which was suspended, and he was on probation for two years. He had to attend counseling, and he had to spend every other weekend in jail. He also had to submit to an alcoholism test, and if he was found to be drunk again, he would go back to jail. And Elizabeth admitted that she wanted to see him dead, in the grave, just like her boy.
Several months later Tommy Pigage was speaking at a MADD meeting, Mothers Against Drunk Driving. And unbeknownst to Tommy, Elizabeth was in the back of the room, and she was waiting to hear what his story was going to be, still enraged, still hating him, wanting to see him dead. And Tommy got up there, and he admitted that he had killed Ted Morris. He admitted that his alcoholism was out of control. He said that he felt horrible for the anguish that he had caused them. He said he cried all the time, day and night. And Elizabeth was not prepared for that at all. She began to feel empathy for him. It was difficult.
When the meeting was over, she walked up to him and she reached out, and he thought she was going to slap him. She put her hand on his arm and said, “Tommy, I want to acknowledge that it took a lot of courage to stand up here and say what you said.” And as she left, he started to cry. Days later, she couldn’t get him out of her mind. She found out that he was from a broken home and he had nobody to love him and he had no direction and he had problems all of his life.
A short time later he was drunk again, and so he went to jail for three months. His most frequent visitor in jail was Elizabeth. She started to look upon him like a son. She started to feel nurturing toward this boy because she realized he was a human being who’d made a terrible mistake and she wanted to be someone who would love him. Her husband Frank would not hear of it. Her husband Frank thought she was crazy because he hated that boy and he wanted that boy to get his due and he wanted that boy dead. And I think any of us could understand that.
Well, over a period of time she developed a bond with Tommy. And then she brought Frank in. And little by little they started to connect. Tommy started to read the Bible. He wanted to change his life. And one day he said, “I would like to be baptized.” And Frank said, “All right, we’ll go with you.” And they were there when he was baptized. After the ceremony, Tommy, with tears in his eyes, looked at Frank and said, “Do you forgive me?” What seemed like an eternity passed. And Frank said, “Yes. I forgive you, Tommy.” And after that, they kind of adopted him. He calls them every day between four and five. Elizabeth said she would miss it if Tommy didn’t call. He’s become like step-son.
Now, he doesn’t replace their son Ted, their only child who died. His bedroom remains exactly the way it was the night that he died. He blew up a beach ball that night, and the beach ball 11 years later still sits on the bed. Elizabeth won’t let anybody touch the room. So he’s not a replacement for her son, and nothing would ever bring her son back, but they’ve developed a loving bond.
Now I know it is not easy to let go of the grudge, of the resentment, of the anger for what somebody did. But you might want to think about the payoff. When Elizabeth was interviewed, incredibly, she said, “The hatred was eating at me like a cancer. Now I can be happy and I can really live.” And that’s what made such an impact on me. It’s not a right or wrong issue; it’s the law of cause and effect. When I talk about being a happy, empowered person, many times forgiveness is the bottom line. It may be the single most challenging thing to do, but it’s the most necessary, and it just opens up your world.
Many people have been through the long dark night of the soul. Have you known some dark moments? There’s a beautiful Chinese proverb that says, “Don’t curse the darkness. Light a candle.” Why don’t you be big enough to stand up and reach out to that other person? Why don’t you be big enough to stand up and forgive? It takes a lot of courage to do it. It’s an incredible gift we give to ourselves because it releases our personal power and it literally sets us free.
Dale Carnegie once said, “If half a century of living has taught me anything at all, it’s taught me that nothing can bring you peace but yourself.” There’s no peace in the world. There’s no peace that just “fixes” people. It’s tough to change. It’s especially tough to change dramatically. People are creatures of habit at a very deep level. Peace is inside of us, and as we create peace inside of us in a very beautiful way, our life becomes peaceful and love and support comes back to us. I can not explain how it happens but I’ve experienced it, and I’ve seen it lives of other people. We release all that beautiful, powerful living when we forgive.
Charles Dickens once said, “We forge the chains we wear in life.” And if you want to let go of your chains, then you want to let go of your judgments and your anger and your resentments. Regardless of what others did, it’s too expensive to you.
Forgiveness isn’t always easy, but it is essential. It sets us free; it opens up whole new possibilities. Extraordinary and wonderful things can happen when we forgive and make peace with our past. I’d like to give you some action steps that you can use if you feel as if you need to forgive, if this has touched you in a way that you know something like this needs to be done to release your own personal power.
Number one, make a forgiveness list of all the people who’ve harmed you, and write down the specific thing the person did. I forgive my mother for being critical. I forgive the coach or the teacher at school, and tell what that person did. And keep writing them and writing them until you feel the peace. It might be a couple of days, a couple of weeks, even a couple of months. It’s essential, however long it might take.
Number two, write a letter to them and get all of your feelings out. Write a letter to your mom or your dad, your former spouse, your former spouse’s attorney. And write down your anger and resentment and what hurt you and what was awful and swear and rant and rave and do everything you need and then, most importantly, don’t mail the letter! You read correctly; don’t mail the letter! This isn’t about getting back at them; it’s for you. Forgiveness is not for them; it’s getting the baggage out of your life.
And then number three, totally forgive yourself for anything you ever did or neglected to do. Start writing forgiveness statements for yourself and let yourself off the hook. Like everybody else, we did the best we could with the awareness and the self-esteem we had. It’s time to take ourselves off the hook. That’s every bit as much as hating somebody else or resenting somebody else. So, please forgive yourself.
And then if there’s anybody that you have a hard time forgiving, send a blessing of love to them. Say out loud, “I send a blessing of love to you.” And the payoff is freedom. The payoff is real personal power. The payoff is a wonderful life.
There are no solutions in the outer world, only inside of us. I have found that acts of forgiveness and the act of dropping the judgments and the blames and the anger is simply life-changing. And I do it along the way whenever it becomes necessary. A.J. Muste once said, “There is no way to peace. Peace is the way.” Let’s go out there and let’s do whatever it takes to be at peace so that we can release our personal power and have the wonderful and glorious lives we so richly deserve.