"Betrayal is a truly awful thing.

I’ve faced it more than once and

I’m sure you can say the same.

It will leave you broken like few things can.

It will leave a gaping wound,

that will change you.

Sometimes, the grief of being betrayed

will cast a shadow over every relationship

You have had, or will have.

You often lose the benefits of that easy trust, that sweet security, that fine faithfulness.

I once talked to a woman in her eighties.

She had survived her husband’s adultery.

But she was quick to say that no matter how much she fought the emotions, and had forgiven him, and they stayed together, it was still always in the back of your mind. Always.

At least for her.

Others have told me they took that betrayal and pinned it to a hundred other people

after, who probably didn’t deserve it.

These are people who have become

victims of betrayal.

Before we judge it harshly, know it’s so

is easy to do. Truly.

And…the more intimate the relationship,

the deeper the wounding.

Still….it’s not nearly as profitable as

healing and growing and letting go,

so that you can let others in.

Most of our feelings about betrayal are

things we have thought about for too

long and too hard.

We can not choose our feelings or what someone else did to us, but we can choose what feelings we keep, coddle, and what we do to others. How we grow through betrayal

makes us a victim or a victor, who does

not let feeling dominate.

Many find themselves immersed in the obsession of pain in betrayal.

Maybe because it’s more than one thing.

As a young man pointed out to me, after his father left the family, It’s not just lying, it’s stealing, it’s cheating, it’s the fear, the shame, unfaithfulness, degradation, the pain of the

unforgivable. It’s hurts!

Maybe because it’s usually done to us by someone we love, respect, honor and truly wanted in our lives.

So, the mixed emotions cloud every

beautiful shining one, that seems to try

and get through.

But as long as we choose to be a victim,

we cannot live joyfully as a victor.

We will keep betraying our own selves the joy of becoming more than our betrayal.

And we are so much more!

Keeping betrayal alive and doing its

damage in our lives, does not victory bring.

Instead it brings more destruction.

Today, while you likely can not go to the person who betrayed you and set it all

back into the way you think it ought to be,

you can go to God.

You can let Him carry your pain.

You can train yourself to live beyond betrayal.

Betrayal defaults to hate.

The heart was not designed to hold

hatred and unforgiveness.

It will affect your whole health

if you cling to it for too long.

When you can’t change it, you can change how you use it in your life.

Determine to let that betrayal become a lesson, but not a life long sentence.

Let it be a discernment for trusting, but

not a wall to keep out goodness.

You are too precious to stay locked

in your own victimization.

Train yourself to walk free, to help another prisoner of pain, to grasp the beautiful

healing that can be yours.

Maybe today is the day to restore

your heart’s hope.

Only you .....choose to be a victim."

~AnnStewartPorter