Confessions of Carelessness

During my recent move, I discovered a stash of unmarked, recordable CD’s. Of the four, three had nothing on them at all. The fourth had twenty songs on it. What fun! It’s like finding a roll of film (back when “on film” was how we took pictures) and wondering which slice of life they would have captured. I couldn’t wait to hear this CD and think, “Oh! I remember that! I remember making that, and what I was thinking, and where I was.” I put the CD in my player and went about my daily chores, glad to reminisce.

But the first song was one I couldn’t remember ever hearing. The second song was only vaguely familiar. As it turned out, most of the songs were completely foreign to me, and I had definitely never heard them in this order, on this CD. Somewhere after the fourth song, I realized: I hadn’t burned these songs to a CD, myself. Someone made this CD for me. And whenever that had happened, I had never listened to it.

Sometimes I am struck by how careless we are with each other. This was one of those times. After all, someone who must have known how much I love music was sharing something with me. Someone had intentionally selected songs he thought I might like and compiled them onto a CD, and I never even bothered to listen to it. Not only do I not remember the songs, I don’t remember who gave them to me.

I have been through heartbreak. I have gone through the all the phases: the self pity, “Will I ever be loved?" The anger, “He’s an idiot! [Forget] him!” The resolution, “I learned, I loved, and I’m better for it.” I wonder, now, if the person who gave me this CD thought he loved me. I wonder if he went through those stages. Clearly, I was so clueless or wrapped-up in myself at the time that I hadn’t noticed. Ugh.

And, at this moment, all of the people who have ever broken my heart are forgiven. I understand. We don’t mean to be careless with each other, any more than I meant to be careless with the CD giver. But how many times has someone else’s carelessness taken our joy? In fact, there are those of us who make entire life decisions based on our experience of someone else’s carelessness: “[Whatever] happened, and now I’ll never love that deeply, or care that easily, or trust someone that completely…”

What if, right now, we think about those who have been careless with our hearts and we forgive them?  What if we acknowledge that people are not intentionally cruel and that wherever they were in their world when we met them, however unavailable or unkind they appeared, whatever circumstance intervened and made it look as though our feelings did not matter, had nothing to do with us? Would acknowledging that simple fact make it easier for us to actually live our lives to the fullest?  

I think so.

To the CD giver: I’m sorry I was careless with you. The music is wonderful. Thank you.

Living in Joy Challenge: (The toughest one, yet…) Think of the person for whom you harbor the most anger, the most resentment, the most disappointment. Realize that you were not their target. You were not tricked or singled out for torture. This person, for that time, for whatever reason, was careless. Call them careless. Acknowledge their foolishness for not seeing you as wonderful. But recognize that this was not as much an integral part of your journey as it was part of theirs…and  forgive them.