This really got to me. I was never close to my father growing up so I know exactly how Jim feels. Based on Logan’s song, Forgiven and Forgotten(a very powerful song about forgiving a dead beat dad, you can stream below), Jim LaPierre of Recovery Rocks wrote this piece on overcoming the pain he had to endure due by his father’s absence in his life. Who taught you how to be a man?
If I could add just one thing to this world it would be good dads. Everyone has a father. Only the lucky ones got to have a dad. Too many of us raised ourselves. Too many of us know the love of a strong single mother who raised us herself. Too many of us live with a hole in our hearts because somebody walked away from us.
I hated men for a long time. Older authority figures were the worst because every one of them symbolically represented my father. I could only relate to them at the extremes. I could shut them out or I could kill myself trying to earn their approval. One robbed me of guidance and the other got me exploited. When you don’t know how to be, your options are limited. Try to fake it. Don’t let anyone see how scared you are. All you know is you feel like you gotta prove yourself to the world. -Read the rest of the article HERE
There’s a great lesson in Jim’s piece: forgiveness frees you from the pain and allows you to truly move on.