Prayer
Lord, I have angry friends; we all have angry friends. I’m trying to learn from them so I keep asking You for insight. I don’t presume to know everything but it seems you have guided me to this one idea of admitting our mistakes and imperfections.
Musings
I used to imagine that never admitting nor believing you do some wrong makes you feel happier and more powerful. What could be more powerful than a person that never makes a mistake? Even if it was not true, but it was believed, you should be strong and confident, but I believe there is another aspect of this, less obvious and very painful.
If I believe I did nothing to create my problems I must also believe I can do nothing to fix them and hope is lost.
If I never do anything wrong, every bad thing that happens to me must occur because of some other person's malevolence. This makes me a pure victim, and I have nothing to be contrite about. However, reconciliation always requires both parties to recognize the wrong they each have done and grant forgiveness one to the other. If I am not able to admit any wrongdoing, I can never enter into the reconciliation process and I am completely powerless to bring resolution to my problems. With no ability to improve my situation, I become hopeless, waiting for the "malevolent" person to free me from my prison while the skeleton key is in my pocket. My hopelessness deepens as confirmation bias convinces me of my innocence and the other's malevolence.
Thus the belief that I did nothing wrong, which was to provide me power, virtue, and respect, actually robs me of all hope and puts me in a prison of my own making.
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