Miley Cyrus Told Me To Forgive You (So I’m Going To Try)

If you had told me Miley Cyrus would be the one to encourage me to finally move forward and forgive you, I would have laugh-snorted you out of the room. You know the one. It’s the sound you always made fun of, but told me you wished could be bottled up. Recorded. Something to lull you to sleep when life feels like too much.

Miley Cyrus told me to move on. And that sounds like the kind of shit you dream up and people shake heads at in unison. Seems so unrealistic. Silly. But I guess plenty of things in life don’t make sense. We’re so obsessed with seeking logic and reason in everything. We want a formula, some easily followed calculation to explain how we ended up here.

But that’s not how things pan out.

So here I am, listening to a song titled (and I’m 100% serious) “I Forgive Yiew” by Miley Cyrus and crying and deciding maybe I finally should. Maybe I really should forgive yiew. Sorry, you.

I’m trying to forgive you tonight because I’m not sure I ever really did. I was too busy trying to rewrite history. I was too busy letting you off the hook. I never wanted you to hurt for what transpired. I blamed myself, that I saw it all coming so I had to be the one at fault. I decided you shouldn’t hurt for any of it. I would take on the burden. I could handle the pain.

But turns out, I can’t. I couldn’t. And it keeps coming out in moments it shouldn’t.

This tendency of mine to let people off the hook when they hurt me isn’t helping anyone. And even if it is, it’s breaking me.

I’ve spent so long wanting everyone to like me. I want to lead with my kindness, my heart, my irrational instinct to always give second chances. I never want people to be hurt, even if they’ve spent years throwing rocks at me.

It turns out, that kind of mentality becomes a secret pain. It boils, bubbles, ends up oozing out when no one is expecting it.

You hurt me. And I’m mad at you for it.

I can’t keep pretending it was fine. I can’t keep telling you it’s okay and rubbing your back to make sure you don’t feel guilty. You are guilty. You did something wrong.

But I can still forgive you.

The thing about forgiveness is it can’t be achieved until you admit to yourself something needed to be forgiven. You can’t get there until you realize this person you loved so much messed up. You can’t forgive someone if you’re not willing to be realistic about how they shattered your trust.

Right now, I’m mad at you. I’m mad at what you put me through. I’m mad at how safe you let me think I was and how quickly you pulled the rug out from beneath me.

But because of all that, I can finally forgive you. I can forgive me. I can forgive it all.

I can finally be free.