No matter how “mature” you are, when someone shoves you out of line in grocery, or butts ahead of you, you’ll get angry. Your territory has been invaded. It’s an instinct.

Are you justified in getting disgusted at an unsanitary and smelly toilet? Are you justified in getting angry when someone butts in line in front of you?

Our emotions are always justified; if not to others, we can rationalize them to ourselves. However, what we think about it doesn’t matter. Our emotions just are. THEY don’t care if they’re “right” or “wrong.” Until we learn to accept them, live with them, and not necessarily act on them or even verbalize them, we will be in conflict this way.

Now we come to forgiveness. Most of us have one or more things lurking around we can’t forgive someone for doing to us. In some cases it could go way back, like a mother who favored another sibling, or a father who committed incest. It could also have just happened – a neighbor who was rude to you on phone, or a manager who gave you a bad performance review.

You are angry. You say things like, “How could they do this to me?” and “How could she talk to me that way?” and “What he did was not just wrong, but egregiously wrong, and I cannot forgive him. Ever.” (egregious = conspicuous, beyond pale, apart from herd, flagrant).

And you’re absolutely right to be angry. What was done may be inexcusable. But in last analysis, it isn’t whether they deserve to be forgiven, it’s whether you want to go on living with that knot in your stomach, or ulcers, or fibromyalgia, or compromised immune system, or lashing out at others over small things.

Forgiving someone else is something you do for yourself. Forgiving or not forgiving them will not make one iota of difference in what occurred, or what might happen in future, but it will free up tremendous energy and allow you to get on with your life.

If that louse you were married to did awful things, why would you allow this to live in your head for years, poisoning your other relationships, draining you and making you bitter and hostile, so no one wants to be around you and you can’t stand yourself either? Why would you do this to yourself, after he did that to you?

Be good to yourself, even when others aren’t. Especially when others aren’t. Be totally selfish about being good to yourself. As Doc Chidre said, “Forgiving releases you from punishment of a self-made prison where you are both inmate and jailer.”

“You can’t hold a man down without staying down with him,” wrote Booker T. Washington, and you can’t hate someone, or hold a grudge, without staying right there with it, living it every minute just as if it were still going on.

Forgive! It’s emotionally intelligent thing to do. If you have trouble with this concept, call an EQ coach. You deserve it.

If we get so busy with work that we ignore our health, we're in trouble. If hobbies take us away from friends and family, we're in trouble. Of course life has more than two ends to balance. We might be unable to get back in balance without a helping hand. It's okay to ask for help. Sometimes we can't achieve balance alone.

Losing balance from time to time means that we're human - it doesn't mean that we're failures. It could mean we needed a rest - it doesn't mean we have to stay there and fall.

A frequent balance check can prevent slipping too far to one end. We can choose to place sufficient weight on important areas: Family, career, finances, health, relationships, personal growth, spiritual, and play.

Identifying important areas in our lives can help us continue to enjoy all of life's most brilliant, dramatic, and memorable moments!