Forgiveness – self-forgiveness and I can’t beat myself up

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And she'd just ask me again,
"You should really think about

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how does forgiveness relate
to your story?"

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And right away I thought of these
people who were really brave

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and who showed me kindness
in spite of my hostility.

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And it dawned on me

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very clearly
that in order to do that

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they had to forgive me
on the spot.

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I was openly hostile.

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I had a shaved head.
I had swastikas all over me,

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horrible tattoos.

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I was just like this person
who radiated hate and violence.

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And for them to be able
to treat me with kindness

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they had to go through
a forgiveness process right there.

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And so without that

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the course of my life may not
have been changed.

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And so in that aspect

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forgiveness is absolutely
central to my story.

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And exploring it further

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and really I think the deeper
aspect of forgiveness for me

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is the sense of self forgiveness

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where I've done horrible
things to innocent people.

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And I committed a lot of
violence with my bare hands

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and I incited other pissed off white
kids to commit violence as well.

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The music that I made back
then is literally me screaming

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at people to kill each other
because of the color of their skin.

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And that music is still out there

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no matter what I'm doing.

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So I have,

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I feel a huge responsibility
to not only atone for my past

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but ideally to make
a positive impact to

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counteract the harm
that I've done.

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And in order to do that,
I need to forgive myself.

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If I'm beating myself up mentally,
spiritually, emotionally,

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it diminishes my ability
to truly help people.

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And if I'm at a school

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and I'm talking to kids
about self forgiveness

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and I'm talking about compassion

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but I'm not really
walking that walk,

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it's going to be really obvious

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and the message
isn't going to get through.

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So I remind myself even though
there is this part of me

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and I think going back this
is the part of me as a child

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who was hurt
by my parents fighting

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and hurt by the suffering
caused by that

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that I think was the reason why
I got involved in hate groups

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is because I hated myself.

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And I was afraid to show
my vulnerability

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and to say like hey this
hurts me I need help.

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If I'm still letting that part of me

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dictate how I interact
with the world

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as far as like beating
myself up goes

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then I can't really help
other young people

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avoid falling in that same trap.

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So I look at it as like
a tactical thing in that

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if I want to be
the best Arno I can be

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I can't be beating myself up.