Obstacles

Since we were talking about Dads this morning, I thought I would share my Dad story here. I'll make this as concise as possible. My Dad died in September of last year. He was 65 years old. He suffered alot. Without the gory details, his disease was self-inflicted with heavy smoking and drinking. I was not close to him. My Mom packed us kids up and left him when I was in Jr. High. He and my stepmom moved to Topeka from back East several years ago but even then I still didn't see him much. My Grandpa took my Dad's place when my Mom left him. So basically, I did not have a "normal" daughter/Dad relationship with the person who is my Father for about 30 years. Whatever normal is......
But I tell you this so that I can tell you the next thing. Through various encounters, since his death, with friends, my stepmom, and my own introspection, I came to understand that my Dad wanted my forgiveness. I needed to forgive him for not being around, for not being sober. So I did. And what better place to forgive him than in a yoga class during sivasana. It was rather spontaneous. As I was lying there, I started hearing this voice inside saying "please forgive me" over and over again. I would just answer it in my mind "yeah Dad I forgive you" each time I heard the plea until it finally went away.......
The thing is, I was holding onto alot of anger, resentment, disappointment, etc, towards my Dad. And that was only causing me suffering on all levels. My Dad wasn't going to change-definitely not now-He's dead. I had to realign myself. So when I forgave him, even after he is gone, it got that huge monster out of my path and it probably released him to his next gig too. I don't know, maybe he'll be my Dad again someday......
So, on to working on the next obstacle!