Forgiveness - Part 6

Sibling Rivalry.

There are a lot of things that siblings can argue about when they are young. I believe parents need to guide their children to love each other, to get over the hurdles, and to teach them how to respect each other so that when they grow up they can be friends.

I have a friend who has three siblings. With both parents gone now, they make every effort to spend quality time together, even though they don't live in the same city. That's beautiful to see.

It isn't like that in all families.

I was the youngest of two children. I remember my sister being forced to wear the same design of coat that I had. It was embarrassing for her and I felt sorry for her, even though it wasn't my fault my mother sometimes chose identical clothes. I remember her being given a classical guitar when she wanted an acoustic one. I felt sorry she didn't get what she really wanted. Things seemed to go that way a lot for her, while I seemed to manage more often to get what I wanted.  At least that's how I think she perceived it.

My mother usually blamed her for arguments between us, siting her as the elder who should know better. It wasn't my fault my mother scolded her, but I think she blamed me.

When there is more than one child in a family there is bound to be some sibling rivalry. How that is grappled with is really important. My mother had no siblings so she wasn't very well equipped to teach us how to love each other, though she sorely wanted us to.

We can take our families for granted. We can wish they were different or, as I sometimes did, imagine we were adopted so that one day the reason I didn't fit in would be discovered and my 'real' family would embrace me and I could escape the isolation of the current family.

Instead, those of us who feel like misfits, muddle through childhood, and jump into the garden of freedom as soon as possible, only to discover life, with all it's complicated relationships, isn't so ideal after all.

I wonder if my sister thinks I had it easier than she did. We both had our traumas growing up and our disappointments. I remember observing her struggles, but as I was younger, I didn't know how to show empathy. I wish I could have. That might have made us closer. Instead, I can't help thinking she compared my disappointments with hers, and finding hers the more challenging, concluded life treated her more unfairly.

Forgiveness is realizing the past can't be changed and accepting the circumstances and people of the past for what they were. Although there is a gulf between my sister and me, I forgive myself for anything I did to provoke it and I forgive her for not seeing me for who I am now.

Readers, if you have a sibling (or three), may I encourage you to reach out to them and show them love, grace and acceptance. If they are your friends, that is such a wonderful gift! But if they've hurt you, while you may not want to give your trust away, perhaps you could ask yourself what it is you expect from them that they haven't delivered. You may discover they weren't able to give what you'd hoped for, not out of carelessness, but out of ignorance or innocence. And that recognition will give you room to begin to forgive.

As tomorrow is the calendar day to express love, I'd like to share a heart or two with you, hoping love and forgiveness today will bring you joy and freedom tomorrow.

Heart to Heart by Sarah Tun

Love and God bless to you this week. See you next Thursday... AND:




END NOTE: For those who haven't known me for long, and perhaps for some who have: You might enjoy my other blog:
Life from the Lighthouse -- all about what God shows me when He talks to me and I listen. New posts monthly on the 1st.










My website for the Self Publishing House is www.LarusPress.com where I blog on wholeness, witness, the Word of God and worship & warfare. Larus Press offers Christian-based books, blogs and literature to inspire, encourage, equip and empower your living spirit.
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My "Perfect" Life - Part 4

Sibling rivalry is bound up in disappointment. I was never disappointed by my sibling, so I never felt to rival her.

She was brainy and I admired her for it. I remember her reading one high school course for fun whilst studying another for credit. She read fiction voraciously. And sometimes she would recount to me lots of history I would otherwise never have learned. I learned more about Hitler and Russian and British history from her than from text books. I loved listening to her and I learned a lot. I wish some of those golden moments could have been kept in a bottle, because decades later, I have only memories. Our dysfunctional family has produced a gulf between these two sisters that only a miracle can close. I hope, one day, a miracle will come to pass.

My sister and I used to fight a lot. My mother, herself an only child, didn't seem to have any equipment in her mothering 'toolkit' to help us get along or to 'like' each other. Actually, I adored my sister.  Playing Sound of Music together was a favourite pastime for me - she sang the Maria parts and I played the sixteen year old girl to her Rolf. But I wonder if these play times meant as much to her? While most siblings grow up and get to share their memories and compare their perspectives, we have not.

I was four years her junior and labelled a pest. I liked to hang around when her friends were over, which she didn't like. I couldn't take a hint and was irritating I suppose. But I liked her friends, and admired her. I could have listened to her endlessly. Once I found her journal - she must have been in university by then. I only looked inside briefly but what I found was truly awesome! She wrote prose as though it were poetry; her reflections were intimate and beautifully composed. I only peeked as I knew it was wrong, but if I could have read her work I'd have soaked up every word.

I wouldn't say I lived in her shadow, though I admired her for her brilliance. Instead, by comparison, I was a more outgoing teenager to her quiet, introverted personality -- I dated a fair bit, was a bit sporty, acted in plays. By the time I grew up, I had mostly outgrown my interest in spending time with her. We had little in common except a last name. I would have liked to have been closer, but we were so different, I didn't really know how to befriend her. We were disconnected, but in spite of that, my respect for her never waned. Now, this sad comfort is all I have to offer a sister who wants nothing to do with me.

What do you do when someone you love but don't really know says she wants to live her life without you in it? What can you do? You can pray for change. You can try to reach out. But inevitably, I believe you must respect her wishes. Whatever the reason she may have, it is what she's said she wants. And a relationship without respect is no relationship at all.

Two decades since my sister said she wants me to have no part of her life, every indication suggests she has not budged in her attitude.

When I read stories of twins, who were separated at birth but in middle age are suddenly reunited, I think of my sister and I and wish we could have a happy ending. When I think of foster children forced to be raised in different households, longing for their siblings but remaining alone, I think how ungrateful we have been to have grown so far apart. And I think of my mother who had wanted a sister but had grown up an only child, and how she must have been devastated by the rift between her two daughters. Yet, out of respect, I continue to do nothing, because I want to honour my sister and don't know what else to do but to obey her wishes to stay out of her life.

I am sorry for the rift. I am sorry for my part in it. But I am unable to provoke change.

I'd like to end this excerpt on a cheery note. I can say I've seen my sister at a distance a few times quite unexpectedly, and I'm glad. I'm thankful for the opportunity to have seen her, to see that she is content. I wonder if a birth parent of an adopted child might feel a little as I have - watching without the other person even knowing she's there. I haven't approached my sister because I don't want to upset her; perhaps I give myself too much importance. Or perhaps I failed to recognize when we were young that I was important to her at all.

I wonder too, if she has had similar encounters with me - from a distance, without my awareness. And if so, I hope she is comforted.

Have you experienced a separation from someone you love but from whom you are now estranged? If so, how have you coped?

I'll write again next Thursday, sharing another glimpse into my past, hoping to spark something in you that invites your reflection too.