Hold onto your hats for this one!
In high school there was a girl who was a couple of grades younger than I, who was also LDS and I never got along with her, she had a brother who was my age and just as nice as can be. I always felt like she was mean to me and just didn't like me. If you know me its kind of a big deal when I think people don't like me, it makes me sad! Plus, I'm an extremely sensitive person to begin with so with this and that put together I was kind a wreck in high school.
To give you an idea of what kinds of things she did I'll give you a couple of examples...
1.We were driving to school from seminary and the person she was riding with had just passed my big old van that I was stuck with driving and out of the blue she leans out of the car she was in and threw stuff at my car, I think it was candy or a bunch of somethings plastic. I know that it sounds trival but when you are just driving down the road doing nothing to provoke this, I was hurt by it. I had done nothing, that I was aware of, for this to happen to. She apologized after I asked her why she did it but in my heart I couldn't and didn't know how to forgive her.
2. My Senior year, you're supposed to be SOO happy right and excited and having a good time cause you're almost done with the torture, right?! Well--one day I was sitting in the cafeteria eating lunch when these younger people came up to me and asked me if I was Alyse Ladle and I said yes and one of them said that their friend had recieved a note from "me" saying that she needed to stay away from her boyfriend because he was mine. Well I thought it was just a big mix up but after thinking about it they said my last name and well I was the only Alyse Ladle in the whole school. My goal was to clear my name from the madness because it wasn't me who wrote the note and I just wanted to talk to this younger girl. At the time it seemed like a BIG deal-this girl who had wronged me before was the ONLY connection to the letter recipient and myself. Who else would do it, and to this day I don't know who exactly wrote the letter but in my mind it was always her. I remember getting home that day and when my mom asked me how my day was I just burst out in tears because I, again, had done nothing to her or anyone to deserve this. So a couple of days later after Seminary my mom, myself, her mom and herself "talked" and she said she didn't have anything to do with it, and because I just wanted it to be over with I said okay and tried to let it go. Try as I might to forgive, I just couldn't do it. I knew just as I know the sky is blue that it was her just trying to play a cruel joke on me.
Anyways, fast forward 11 years...yea I held on to it for that long. This year's YSA conference was coming up and I had mentioned to my dad, who is the counselor over the YSAs, that I would like to help out and he told the high council member working with the YSA reps that I could help and it turns out that this girl was basically kind of running the show. My dad asked me if I would be okay working with her and I told him it would be fine. Well the other person who was supposed to be running the conference with her was not there pretty much the whole time and despite being sick the whole weekend, I was there and was able to spend a little time with her helping her set up and whatnot. After it was all said and done, I was driving home and I called my mom and was talking to her and I told her that Heavenly Father knew that I needed to let it go and so He put us together and had us working together. I don't know if she will ever know that I really held a grudge against her for all those years but I did and it felt like a huge burden had been lifted off my shoulders when I could say out loud "she's been forgiven" and truly know it in my heart. I don't know why it took so long, probably pride but I am grateful that the Atonement helps us heal and realize that things in the past are just that, in the past.
"Forgivness is a gife you give to yourself" Suzanna Somers
Up next: If you could live anywhere where would it be and why.
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