S 2 Episode 1.3: Shundria Riddick and Wynter Pitts Discuss Forgiveness and "Re-Deciding"

Okay, one of the things I wanted to talk to you girls about was forgiveness. There's a reason for that. One, because Shandria, you and I, as I mentioned before, we did that podcast episode 163. We talked about emotions, and I got a lot of questions about forgiveness and the practical working out of forgiveness. And that I would hope, Winter, that you could speak to maybe an example of forgiveness in your own life and what that's, what that's looked like for you. Because people, like, we know we're supposed to forgive. We got that. We know we're supposed to move on. We know you're supposed to not harbor resentment. We got it. But then women are having to still figure out at the moment when something rises up, what to do. What do I do? And I thought I dealt with this, but it's rising up. So what What does that mean? What does it mean to practically forgive?

Um, every time you think about it.

What does it mean?

When I think about it, it just means you have to remind yourself that I forgive them of that too. I mean, every time you think about it, every time it comes up, you know, we're told 40 times 7 in a day, right? But it's every time you think about it. So it's over and over and over and over again. Tell yourself, okay, it's still okay.

So I rise up and I just say, I'm forgiven.

No, you rise up and say, yes, it hurts. And you're disappointed about that. But forgiveness doesn't mean you're going to have a great feeling of this, you know, everything's restored and I have some kind of resolution to the issue. It means it hurt. It hurt.

And it may still hurt.

But I'm okay. And it may still hurt. But I'm okay. And I have to let that go. And it takes over and over and over and over again. It just doesn't happen. There's no feeling that rains down on top of you that says, okay, now you're better now. And now you can be in their presence and it didn't hurt. And it's okay. No, it just means it hurt and I'm okay, and I can't continue to carry this and live my life through the hurt.

But forgiveness is letting something go.

Mm-hmm.

Okay, does that mean letting that thing go but letting that person— how do you know when, particularly if you're having to forgive someone that hurt you, when that means you forgive them but they still get to be in your space, and when you forgive them but you need to set a boundary.

Well, that doesn't mean the person that did anything to you needs to be in your space.

But how do you know? Like, one of the questions I get all the time is knowing when you need to set a boundary versus I just need to forgive them, they didn't know, and you move on with that person in your life.

If they keep doing it.

You know what I mean?

That wasn't your counselor, Antae.

That was your Chrystal Hurst. They just keep doing it.

If you have someone in your life that hurts you over and over and over and over, so there's a pattern of behavior, there's a pattern of behavior, you know, there, there you need to set the boundary because at some point you're participating in it. So you put—

you're letting them—

because you're letting them continue to hurt you, so you're giving them permission to do that. So you're not establishing your boundary to say, no, you can't hurt me anymore, and limit interactions, limit phone calls, whatever that looks like in your life. You don't have to have that person in your life. But you could still feel the wrath of it. Yeah.

And say, but I let it go.

I let it go. And I can't allow that. And I tell clients all the time, sometimes when you live your life through hurt and you're allowing that person to hurt you that day, they're gone on with their life, you know, it's over and you're still carrying them with you every day. And so whatever they did 10 years ago, you wake up and you carry it. They do it to you again today. Right? So you have to get to a place where you have to say, okay, today I'm not gonna let that hurt me. Today it's over, it's done, they're not here, and I'm okay, and my life is okay.

Mm-hmm.

And I don't have to keep carrying it around with me.

Okay, so I want to give you an example, and then I want to ask what you do in these circumstances. So my husband and I— I mean, I'm a— how can I say that? I'm a fairly judgmental person, and I'm a fairly I'm a box checker, black and white. I like things to fit. So, and I've realized that there are triggers. So my husband is a really great person, but that doesn't mean that there aren't triggers where he does a certain thing or he says a certain thing a certain way and it just immediately, you know, and so I literally have learned and have to remember how to talk myself off a ledge and forgiveness may be a word for it, but sometimes it's just calming myself down. Because he did this one thing. It reminds me because he always does this thing this certain way and I have to— so I literally like, um, so you know, here recently been in the hospital, been in the hospital. My husband has been great. He's been doing a lot of things that are not a part of his norm. But one of the things that I remember that, you know, he's been feeding the kids, cleaning up the kitchen because I couldn't get up, couldn't walk around. But one night he left the kitchen dirty. Now that's not normally something he does, but all these weeks he's been really trying hard to do it and, um, got up and looked in the kitchen and realized, cause I got up to go to bed, that the kitchen was still dirty. And that triggered for me, uh, you know, why does things, why do things always have to be left for me to do? Well, they are not always left to me to do. In fact, all these weeks, you know, Jesse's been doing more and all these things. So in that moment I had to tell myself, to your point about telling yourself, a) always or never are usually words we shouldn't use. So, This is not always the case. B, flip your focus. This has happened tonight. It's not the end of the world, but look at all the things that have been going right the last few weeks. And then C, I literally forced myself the next time we had an interaction to say thank you for cleaning up the kitchen. I know it's been really hard and I know tonight you were really tired, but it just made me think of all the things you've done. And for me, That's my ABC process of catching myself, right? So give me an example when you have felt that rising, whether it's a family member or coworker or a friend, and you have had to catch yourself and talk yourself down off of a ledge, whether it's forgiveness or just backing yourself down from a reaction.

I think for me it's usually in marriage. You know, I've been married for a long time. Cause you old.

Cause I'm old.

How long y'all been married? 21 years. Yes. So there aren't that—

you first had gotten married. That's how I know how long we've been friends, because y'all had just gotten married.

Yes.

Oh my God, I'm so old.

But, um, I think in marriage, um, my husband does things, and like many people, that drive me nuts. It makes me crazy. But, um, I think the thing I have to remind myself a lot of times is that when he does those things, he's not doing something to you. If that's how— it's not intentional. And sometimes Sometimes I have to adjust myself maybe to sometimes his patterns of behavior. Everything does not have to be adjusted to my expectations. So some things that he enjoy doing that may bother me, that I have to kind of say, well, that's just kind of how it is. I remember when we first got married, it was he would take a glass out of the cabinet and the door would stay open.

You know, you sound a little OCD.

No, but no, just like—

No, I'm with you there.

Yeah, yeah. Or he'll pour the— drink in the cup and just a little spill on the— and just leave it, right? And leave the thing on the jug of water or whatever it is on the thing, right? And so, but I, newly married, thought, you know, I'm creating a home and it's so clean and you're being disrespectful, you know, of my—

you used to scrub the tile, the grouts in between in her bathroom. What you doing, Shandria, today? I'm cleaning the bathroom, girl. Yeah, I got to get between these, these, these tiles and clean this grout with a toothbrush. Oh my gosh.

Well, after 3 children, I was like, you do what? No, no, no, that is no longer the expectation.

I tried though. I just want you to know, after you told me that, I tried to do it.

Yeah, I got that from your mama. Yeah. So I thought the things he was doing was disrespectful, and then I had to kind of step back and say, well, No, he's not doing it to you.

Right.

Right? And so I had to kind of talk myself out of what are my expectations? What am I asking him to do? And am I trying to hold him to my standard instead of me trying to figure out, okay, how are we going to work this out? And how do I need to have this conversation to say, hey, you know, can we put this stuff back in the refrigerator? And I also realized that once I said it to him and said, hey, can you just put it back? You leave it out.

He was like, okay.

He was like, okay, yeah, that's fine. Yeah.

Yeah.

That's so, like, why do I have to remind you to clothe?

Right.

I know.

I went through that too.

If you don't do it, basically you're expecting somebody else to do it and that I'm the only other person.

Right. Well, your kids are getting older now, so now they can do it.

All of them.

Forgiveness for you, letting things go.

Yeah.

For me, um, the, for me it's the bigger, like family member, like fatherless, like all that forgiveness stuff. And so for me it was, because for years I thought like, I'm okay, right? And that meant forgiveness, like out of sight, just kind of like, I'm okay. So it was really a, I can tell that I've really forgiven when I can pray for that person. Because ultimately, like, I want to, I want to see them in heaven, you know? And so just that deeper, like, so not necessarily my husband, because I can forgive him. I'm like, we're gonna be all right. But just the deeper, like, not holding on to that and really being able to pray for them as a soul, like a person that—

You grazed over it though. Give me a little more.

Well, because I didn't know how deep we wanted to—

Go ahead. We won't hang out there, but explain it so people know what you're talking about.

Yeah.

So I feel like I say it all the time now, but so my father was not in the home because he was addicted to drugs. And just in my mind growing up, he chose drugs over over you, raising us, like over being with us. Um, and just all the everything like that we— I'm like, we ended up living just poverty and single parent, all that stuff because of his addiction. And so he's never present. And so for me, a long time it was just, I forgive him because I'm not around him and I don't think about it and I turned out and I'm okay. Like, so I'm not holding on to this constantly, like, I can't believe he did that. Like, you know, for a little while it was that, but then after a while it was like, I'm fine, he's fine, I don't need him, it's okay. And, um, really it just convicted of like, that's not forgiveness. Like, ignoring is not forgiveness. But really being able to pray, like, despite the things that he did that I felt like, um, were done to me, you know, his choices, like, but rather than that, just seeing him as still a child of God that like God wants to restore. And I want to be able to stand next to him in heaven.

Like, just so when you see him when you see him, if and when there are feelings that bubble up, what is your practice? What are you doing in your head to talk yourself down?

Um, one, there's a, a gratefulness, um, because despite— like, I really don't see it as a he did, but just what the enemy was up to. Like, so just a gratefulness that, like, thank you, God, that you still, you know, created goodness, like, in this situation. Um, so really seeing that, like, as a thankfulness, and then not seeing him as my father that left, that wasn't there, but more just like a person that needs to be shown grace and love. Like really just seeing, like really processing through seeing that and not just like seeing him as this man that wasn't, you know, like you made terrible choices and they affected my life, but more you've made terrible choices and I still want you to be restored. Like just But this, like, literally, like, I can say that out loud, but like when I see him, I have to think those, like, that's what I have to think.

I think it's good to say that though. I think because like, um, verbally, verbally, yeah, you have to say it because I think the misconception is, is that when you see him, there's all these good feelings, this gushy, whatever feelings, you know, and people think, well, if you forgave them, now you should have these, you're saying gratefulness, that you're grateful and all this, and expect.

I'm still have this, you know, I'm still not like running to him when I see him and being like, yeah, see, that's real. That's— but you know, but just not— I'm also not looking at him like it's all your fault. Um, and that's the difference, I think. So there's still a keep, you know, like I'll check on him every once in a while, and I still don't— I'm not calling him every day or calling him every— but if I see him or when I— when he crosses my mind or I think about it, instead of sitting in this place of like, this is all the things that happened, his fault, I think about it instead of let me pray for him. Like, he just crossed my mind. Like, I'm not going to sit in anger or hurt over that, but rather just like, let me pray for him.

That's good. Because I think what we don't do a lot of times is re-decide.

So she just turned to me like she was getting ready to go in.

I didn't want to say it. I know she went straight. No, I'm just kidding. It was so cute. I was like, wait a minute. I thought I forgot.

I don't know. No, because we, you know, it made me think about how most of us don't re-decide about the events in our life. So when something happens to us as children, we decide about life, we decide about relationships, we decide about who we are, we decide about how things are supposed to happen, and we never change the decision. So we may not get married, or we may, you know, not have kids because I don't want to have a, you know, I want to have a husband who may not be there for my kid, you know. So we don't redecide about those things. So we just kind of go through life on autopilot, making decisions based on a 9-year-old decision. When my dad left, you know, at 9 or whatever, then I thought marriage didn't work, all men leave. So at 35, I think all men leave and marriage doesn't work, because I never went back to make another decision based on wisdom, the Word of God, and just as an adult looking at how life works. I never made another decision. Right? So if I base it on truth and I base it on just experiences, and maybe I've run into people who've had a successful marriage and have a great, you know, intact family, that if I go back and say, okay, well, that's not necessarily true. All men don't leave. All dads don't do drugs. Then I have to kind of look at life a little differently. But a lot of us miss it because we never do that. We never go back and question that.

I was— my husband and I were just having a conversation with someone, and they talked to us a couple of years ago., and we were just talking about some decisions that we need to make financially. And at the time they talked to us, I was, uh, I hadn't written She's Still There and we were talking about, and I was just overwhelmed. I was overwhelmed at the numbers. Everything was just not, and, um, we just recently talked to them and they said, what's changed? Cause your countenance is so very different. And I said, you know, I think, and these were the words that came out of my mouth. I said, I think I decided to believe that I'm capable. I'm capable of making ends meet. I'm capable. We're capable of meeting some goals. Like, but it meant that I had to say, okay, we got married. It was supposed to be X, Y, and Z. This is how his job was supposed to go. This is what I was going to do. And I had sat in the role of I'm home and I had the kids and I'm not really worried about those things. And then Jesse got sick. And then it's like everything flipped. And for the first time we met with them, I was still there. This is my expectation. My expectation is this is how it's supposed to go. So if it's not going to go that way, I'm lost. Wow. And then it became, oh wait, I get to make another decision. I get to decide that, um, I'm educated and I have a college degree and I'm talented and I'm gifted. And these are the things I'm going to do to work on building on those things to change the dynamic. And in changing the dynamic and deciding to use what I could, it changed my countenance. It changed the way I looked at life, looked at him, looked at them, everything. So I love that terminology, re-decide. Just because you made one decision, if that decision is not working, make another one. And you may have to work to, you know, it's kind of like the, the way your brain works. There are these pathways that you can create new pathways. And the Bible talks about that, Romans 12:2, renewing your mind. You can create new pathways and think differently, whether that's about forgiving someone or about the way you see yourself. You can change it. You're not stuck. I love that.

Yeah, that's good.

That's really good.

The counselor within.