Forgiveness

Forgiveness
Forgiveness as a healing gift to oneself, and as
radical acceptance of the human condition.
© Gary Powell, 2008.
April 2008
Not for commercial use.

Acknowledgments
• I am indebted to the following people for the position I have
reached, both in my thinking and in my personal development, with
regard to the transformational power of forgiveness, and this
presentation is profoundly informed by their work:
• Dr Robert D. Enright, Dept of Educational Psychology, University
of Wisconsin-Madison;
• Dr Steven Hayes, Dept of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno;
and
• Dr Joram Graf Haber, Dept of Philosophy and Religion, Bergen
Community College, 1989-2002.
© Gary Powell, 2008. Not
for commercial use.

The definition of forgiveness
• Forgiveness is a non-verbal concept that cannot be adequately
captured in words.
• We can best know what forgiveness is when we experience
forgiving.
• Words can help to point in the right direction, though, and in
particular clarify what forgiveness is not. Metaphors can also have a
helpful function in providing understanding where words fail.
• It involves a process of dissolving feelings of anger, resentment
and/or hatred towards an individual who is perceived to have
selfishly or maliciously done one deliberate harm, by means of the
cultivation of some degree of compassion towards the offender,
and/or the acceptance of such positive feelings should they happen
to evolve naturally in the victim’s experience.
© Gary Powell, 2008. Not for
commercial use.

The experience of ‘unforgiveness’
• Imagine you have (or someone else has) suffered an injustice. It is
something that violates your/their rights and dignity.
• As a result, you feel angry and resentful toward the offender(s).
• Anger, resentment and hatred are painful emotions.
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Suffering anger and resentment
• The more serious the injustice and hurt, the more intense and
protracted the anger and resentment may be.
• You may feel anger and resentment for years and years.
• The person you feel angry towards may not know or care how you
feel, or may be dead.
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A metaphor
• The psychologist Steven Hayes suggests a helpful metaphor.
• If you are in unforgiveness, then you are in a sense on a giant
metaphorical hook.
• Next to you, on the hook, is the person who has hurt you. They got
‘hooked’ after you, and are closest to the barb.
• The hook is very painful. Wherever you go, the hook goes, and so
does the offender.
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A metaphor
• The only way you can get off the hook is if you allow the offender
to get off the hook first.
• The cost of not allowing the offender off the hook is perhaps a
lifetime of misery for the person in unforgiveness.
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Forgiving ourselves
• The person you won’t let off the hook may be another human being.
• However, it may also be yourself.
• This is even more painful, as the anger and resentment may be
replaced/compounded by feelings of GUILT.
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The effects of unforgiveness
• Recent years have seen a developing psychotherapeutic interest in
the power of forgiveness as a means to healing.
• The psychologist Robert Enright has devised a therapeutic technique
that focuses on leading people through a process of forgiveness.
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The effects of unforgiveness
• He finds that people who feel incapable of or unwilling to forgive
past hurts experience greater levels of anxiety and depression.
• They are also at a higher risk of cardiovascular disease and cancer.
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The value of anger as a response
to offence
• The process of forgiveness is a complex and subtle business.
• It may not be a good thing to forgive too soon:
• There is perhaps much to be said for anger as an appropriate initial
response to violations of one’s own, or another’s, rights and dignity.
• It carries two valuable messages:
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Anger says: I am worth more than
that.
• The first message is that the victim of the injustice has had their
rights violated. They deserve to have been treated better.
• That anger honours the serious moral infraction that has taken
place.
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Acceptance of anger
• Anger is a painful emotion, and blocks the opportunity to have more
pleasant experiences.
• In our culture, we are encouraged to learn that we must avoid our
painful feelings.
• Trying to forgive prematurely as an attempt to avoid the pain of
anger is unfruitful. The feeling of anger as an initial response to
injustice can be evaluated as perfectly appropriate and healthy.
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How can anger be good?
• It carries a message that is good for our self-esteem. It says ‘I
deserve/the victim deserves to be treated better than that.’
• It also carries a message that says the perpetrator has acted in a
way that is beneath their dignity as a moral and human agent. It is
therefore an affirmation of the worth of the offender. You expected
better from them; what they did is beneath their value as a human
being.
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Hooking ourselves up.
• If you are unwilling to forgive other people, you are probably going
to be unwilling to forgive yourself.
• The rule: ‘I must never forgo contempt and resentment towards
people who commit Behaviour X’ is problematic ...
• ... because YOU are a person as well.
• People who are unforgiving towards others tend to give themselves
a hard time as well.
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Summary of the value of
forgiveness ...
• Forgiveness can liberate a person from intense and protracted
suffering, (i.e. anger, resentment, hatred). The person can let go of
the hurt and move on.
• It enables a person to transcend their perspective and find a secure
and more optimistic place from which to view their personal history
and the human condition.
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Summary of the value of
forgiveness ...
• Forgiving others enables people to forgive themselves more easily,
leading to a life less snarled up by negative and self-attacking
thoughts and futile struggle with a past that cannot be changed.
• Self-forgiveness, as well as forgiveness of others, promotes higher
self-esteem, physical health, vitality and a happier life.
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How to forgive .... forgetting?
• Forgiveness is not forgetting. It is possible to forget hurts in the
course of time, whether or not they have been forgiven. Forgiving
involves a deep transcendental transformation of the person doing
the forgiving.
• It is possible to forgive and not to forget. There is no need to forget
an injustice.
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How to forgive .... excusing?
• Forgiveness is not excusing. Excusing involves letting the person off
the hook because there are circumstances that remove the moral
offence, e.g. feeling resentment and anger because a friend has not
bothered turning up for an important arrangement ... only to
discover later that they were in an accident and taken to hospital.
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How to forgive .... saying ‘what you
did was o.k.’?
• Forgiveness does not involve telling yourself or the offender that
what they did really was not that bad, and that it was o.k. for them
to behave as they did.
• If you forgive someone, it must be with a clear consciousness that
what they did was NOT o.k. Your forgiveness does not ever, and
should not ever, remove the fact that they behaved badly.
• If you decide their behaviour was not morally wrong after all, then
you are excusing them, not forgiving them – as there is no moral
offence to forgive.
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How to forgive .... pardoning?
• Forgiving another person does not have to include pardoning them.
Sometimes it probably should not. Pardoning involves sparing the
offender the appropriate negative consequences of their actions.
• Forgiving involves a wish to replace hatred and resentment with
more generous feelings of benevolence.
• If the moral offence they have committed is grievous, then
realistically any feelings of benevolence you can expect to cultivate
might be difficult to nurture, and remain fairly slight at first. But
what you eventually cultivate might be enough to release you from
the intense pain of chronic hatred.
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How to forgive .... pardoning?
• Imagine you are mugged in the street.
• If the perpetrator is arrested and sentenced by the courts, you
might feel it is appropriate for them to receive their punishment,
whilst being prepared eventually to forgive them, (i.e. perhaps to
wish them well in their journey through life and feel compassion
towards them for their own human suffering, and hope they will in
the course of time develop enough compassion and insight to set
them on a different path.)
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How to forgive .... reconciliation?
• Forgiveness of others need not involve reconciliation – a restoration
of the relationship to how it was before the injury happened.
• In some cases, (e.g. where domestic violence has occurred,) if you
agree to a reconciliation, you might just be giving the offender a
chance to offend again.
• The offender might have died, anyway. If forgiveness had to involve
reconciliation, practical circumstances such as this would prevent
forgiveness in many cases. So forgiveness does not necessarily
entail reconciliation.
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How to forgive .... waiting for an
apology?
• Forgiveness cannot be dependent on whether the offender shows
remorse for their actions. The victim of the hurt could be forever on
the hook if this were the case.
• It is certainly easier to forgive if the offender expresses remorse.
• However, it is possible, and often necessary, to forgive
REGARDLESS OF whether the offender shows remorse or
apologises. Forgiveness is a commitment to engage in the tricky and
sometimes long-term project of letting go of resentment and/or
hatred towards someone.
• This is a difficult process, but it is also empowering for the forgiver:
the power for enabling forgiveness to happen is thus taken away
from the offender.
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How to forgive .... telling the
offender ‘I forgive you’?
• Forgiveness does not have to involve telling the
offender, ‘I forgive you’. You may never meet the person
who has injured you, or see them again – or they may
have died. They do not need to know you forgive them.
Forgiveness is your own private experience: you do not
need to share it with or express it to the offender, unless
you want to.
• Telling someone ‘I forgive you’ is often used by people
as a means of hurting them – by shoving the perception
of moral superiority in the face of the offender. Doing
this can be a symptom of unforgiveness.
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How to forgive .... reconciliation
with oneself?
• Forgiving oneself, however, MUST include pardoning oneself and
reconciliation with oneself. Perhaps the pardon can be attached to
making amends. You can’t separate yourself from yourself in the
same way as you can separate yourself from another person.
• Forgiving oneself involves a radical but critical acceptance of one’s
behaviour in the past, a commitment to be a better person in the
future and to learn from moral mistakes, and a commitment to treat
oneself with love and kindness.
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How to forgive .... radical
acceptance of the human
condition?
• Forgiveness involves a willingness to ACCEPT the injustice one has
suffered as a fact.
• It involves giving the world permission to be as it is, because that is
what the world is like, and struggling to deny that reality will just
increase suffering.
• This does not mean WANTING the world to be as it is: a
compassionate being will always strive to make it better.
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How to forgive .... recognising our
own need for forgiveness?
• We have all violated the moral rights and dignity of other people,
and all continue to do so, perhaps largely by the good to others that
we fail to do in a very needy world.
• The world religions, for all their serious flaws, all reflect the wisdom
of this insight. They all, too, recognise the great value of
forgiveness.
• Committing to forgiveness to others reflects the paradigm by which
we may ourselves wish to be treated for the wrongs we commit
against others.
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How to forgive .... repressing our
anger and resentment?
Struggling directly against painful emotions in order to remove them
is unsuccessful.
• It is likely to result in secondary suffering caused by the futile
struggle against the primary pain.
• PSYCHOLOGICAL PAIN + UNWILLINGNESS TO EXPERIENCE PAIN =
ORIGINAL PAIN + EXTRA SUFFERING
• Struggle also tends to make the pain stay around longer, locking it
in place.
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How can we forgive if we can’t
control our resentment?
• We can’t just switch our resentment and anger off like a light.
• Forgiveness is an action, but a tricky one.
• It is an action of loving kindness towards the deepest, spiritual,
transcendent part of the person who has harmed us.
• It is a gift to the offender, freely given, that they do not deserve.
• The gift has a wonderful bidirectional quality, and turns into a gift to
ourselves, where we are released from the chronic pain of
resentment, anger and hatred.
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Forgiveness – the tricky stuff ...
• Forgiving too soon, especially where the offence is major
and the offender shows no remorse, is inappropriate.
• Anger carries valuable messages: it is a flag saying both
that the victim has suffered injustice, and that the
perpetrator has acted in a way that is far beneath the
moral demands of their own humanity. Things go well
when we are willing to experience anger, if the
alternative is getting rid of it imprudently. We don’t have
to act on anger (and often probably shouldn’t act in the
way our impulses prompt us to).
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• If we are willing to experience our anger, without
defence, we will not do anything rash to get rid of it that
could have disastrous consequences for us and others.
• Sometimes, our anger can motivate us to carry out
actions that are useful in the service of justice ... But a
willingness to experience anger allows us to choose
whether an action is appropriate or not, and refrain from
damaging actions.
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• When the time seems to be right, you may be able to take a
different perspective.
• The person who hurt you might deeply regret it in a few years, or
sooner. They may well have changed.
• All human beings suffer – a lot. This is a fact that is often
overlooked in our ‘feel-good,’ media-dominated culture. The
offender is also vulnerable to suffering. They may one day
experience a similar injustice to the one they have committed,
which may transform their understanding of it. People can change.
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Willingness to let go of anger …
• Releasing oneself from unforgiveness, with its chronic resentment,
anger or even hatred, can be a difficult business. We get very
attached to these feelings in response to a perceived moral hurt,
and can feel very reluctant to let the perpetrator ‘off the hook’ by
letting go of these feelings.
• Anger can have a positive function initially; it can be a marker than
a moral wrong has taken place, and an affirmation of human and
moral dignity. There seems to be something inappropriate with not
getting angry about violations of moral rights.
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• Anger can also motivate people to bring about positive changes that
will call perpetrators to account, bring an end to unjust situations,
or discourage people from acting unjustly in the future.
• Harnessed properly, it can be a highly constructive energy.
• Yet the chronic anger and resentment of unforgiveness are
generally likely to cause more suffering to the victims of injustice
themselves, than to the perpetrators.
• They perpetrators may not know or care that people are angry with
them: and if they do know, they might be delighted that they have
caused the pain of chronic anger and frustration. They might even
be dead.
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• In the process of forgiving, it might help to try first to make some
space for the possibility that a certain element – perhaps a large
one – of the perpetrator’s behaviour, requires excusing rather than
forgiveness.
• Given their parenting, the culture in which they have grown up, all
their other life experiences, their genetic inheritance, and even a big
dollop of self-deception, they may have such a narrow perspective
that they see their behaviour as appropriate.
• The person who has caused harm may even be suffering from a
psychological illness that has played a large part in their actions.
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• Is it possible that, had you been born in the place of that individual,
you too would have been inclined, as a result of your experiences
and genes, to behave in the same way as they did?
• Is it possible that some people are less developed in moral and
spiritual wisdom, perhaps in part as a result of their life
circumstances? That they have not yet had the kind of experiences
that would enable them to develop a higher degree of moral
wisdom – or have had life experiences that have hampered their
normal ethical development?
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• In many cases, we will know nothing, or very little, about the genes
or life history of the person who behaves unjustly towards us.
• Maybe it is helpful, though, to consider whether that person might
have ended up with a different moral conscience under different
existential circumstances.
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• If this is the case, perhaps we can separate out the deepest self of
this person – the transcendental self that would be the same
regardless of the time or place they were born, their genes, their
parents and experiences – from the negative actions of this person.
• Perhaps there are no bad people, (i.e. transcendental selves,) – only
bad actions, which arise largely from moral and spiritual ignorance,
which in turn are largely caused by negative existential
circumstances…
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• By creating a bit of flexibility, a bit of ‘wiggle-room,’ in our thinking
about the person who has hurt us, it might help us to reframe our
understanding of the injustice in a helpful way.
• This flexibility is a space of uncertainty, where we leave some room
for the possibility that the individual acted to some degree in moral
ignorance, because life has not yet taught them enough moral
wisdom. This doubt-space is also supported by the thought that
they might not have done it if they had had our own genes and life
history, and that, similarly, we might have behaved like them if we
had had their experiences ….
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• It might, of course, be the case, that the individual acted selfishly or
maliciously, whilst knowing and feeling they were doing wrong.
This is the element of their action that perhaps deserves the
attention of forgiveness, rather than excusing. Without being
psychic, we cannot know how big this element is. We can still be
willing to preserve our doubt-space, though, and be willing for the
truly immoral element of their action to be as big or as little as it
happens to be.
• Even so far as this element of true moral infraction is concerned …
is it still not possible to have the worrying thought that we too
might have behaved the same way if we had had their life history
instead of ours?
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• Releasing oneself from unforgiveness, with its chronic resentment,
anger or even hatred, can be a difficult business. We get very
attached to these feelings in response to a perceived moral hurt,
and can feel very reluctant to let the perpetrator ‘off the hook’ by
letting go of these feelings.
• Forgiveness is a moral gift to the other, but despite the New
Testament injunction to forgive unconditionally, it could be argued
that the giver of forgiveness is not morally obliged to give it.
However, the benefits of forgiveness can include a deep sense of
relief and liberation from suffering for the person doing the
forgiving. In practical terms, it can have a very positive outcome.
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• It is notoriously difficult to remove or alter the form of painful
feelings by acting on them directly. If you try to get rid of your
painful feelings of anger by trying to suppress them, or trying to
replace them directly with feelings of benevolence, you may well
find that this strategy entangles you in a futile struggle that makes
things even worse.
• A different strategy might work, involving a different type of action.
Robert Enright suggests that giving the person who has caused you
hurt a gift is a helpful stage on the road to forgiveness.
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Forgiveness and hypothetical
universes …
• In order to forgive, I think it is useful to hold onto this idea of giving
the perpetrator a moral gift. Offering a real gift that they know
about and can reject or disparage, such as sending a birthday card,
might make the giver too vulnerable to the possibility of rejection
and add insult to injury.
• One important moral gift I would suggest is to wish that they will
make progress in their journey through life, growing in wisdom,
including moral wisdom, and in compassion for themselves and for
their fellow human beings. We can try to work towards wishing that
their journey will eventually end in fulfilment and happiness for
them.
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universes …
• In practical terms, this can be achieved by using the model of a
hypothetical universe, together with an adaptation of the Buddhist
metta bhavana (cultivation of loving kindness) meditation .
• In this meditation, we direct good will towards the transcendental
part of the offender’s identity – that part of them that is their
deepest self, and that would have been ‘them’ wherever, whenever,
and to whomsoever they were born, and that remains unchanged
despite their experiences.
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universes …
• Whatever character, beliefs, or urges the offender now has, are
impermanent. These can change, and are not a part of their intrinsic
identity. With increasing moral enlightenment, they themselves can
kill off selfish, malicious and morally ignorant aspects of their
character, and emerge with something new.
• So any warmth we want to develop towards them focuses on their
deep self and potential for change, rather than on their current
character.
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universes …
• We all know that some people never seem to improve their
behaviour towards others, despite having a whole lifetime to do so.
• Maybe we only have one lifetime in this universe to make our mark.
But imagine a hypothetical universe, where we are reincarnated:
reborn to new parents every time we die, and have a new life
history. That core, transcendental ‘self’ we have is the same every
time, but because of new experiences, there is always the possibility
of turning out differently.
• Imagine also that, each time we die, we also somehow transfer the
moral wisdom we have accumulated so far into our next existence.
• So in this possible and hypothetical universe, people live a sequence
of different lives, continually adding deposits to their moral wisdom
account.
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universes …
• Remember though that you do not need to believe in reincarnation
for this meditation to be useful. We are only considering a
hypothetical universe.
• The Buddhist metta bhavana meditation aims at the development of
compassion by wishing people well …
• First yourself ... then a good friend ... then an acquaintance ... then
a difficult person or enemy .... then the whole of humanity …
• Each party is wished well in their journey through life. The
meditator wishes that they have good health, that they be happy,
that they be free from suffering, that they grow in wisdom and
compassion …
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How can I wish the person who has
harmed me well, when I hate
them?
• It’s not easy. But the alternative is to stay stuck right next to them
on that hook. That’s not easy either.
• Forgiveness is a difficult process – but a great opportunity for
personal growth.
• We might consider that perhaps there are no bad people – only bad
actions. The transcendental self of the person who has harmed you
has the potential to act differently if and when they develop moral
wisdom and compassion.
• Let’s put that person into our hypothetical, repeated-existence
universe ....
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Putting the offender into a
hypothetical universe ...
• In this hypothetical universe, the person is continually reborn, whilst
developing in moral wisdom and compassion.
• As this universe is hypothetical, we can make anything in it happen
that we want to happen.
• So in our hypothetical universe, let’s make it the case that,
whatever the individual needs to learn in order to develop
compassion and moral wisdom, comes to pass.
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• This might well include the experience of the offender being a victim
of injustice and suffering, just as they have inflicted injustice on
others in the past. They might be able to develop a deeper
understanding of injustice as a result of this, and deeper
identification with the suffering of others. Their own experience of
suffering and injustice might lead to the development of moral
wisdom.
• The offender might need the love and compassion form others that
has always been lacking in their life, in order to make progress as a
moral and human being. Perhaps you can wish them whatever they
need in order to become a much better person – including both
experiences of suffering and injustice, and experiences of being
loved.
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• In our hypothetical universe, as a result of suffering, and of
experiencing injustice, and even of experiencing love and
compassion from others, they might, perhaps, in the course of one
existence, or many existences, come to understand the terrible
effects of cruel and selfish actions, and learn to treat others with
consideration and compassion.
• They might also experience great remorse about the wrong they
have done to other people.
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• In your hypothetical universe, the person becomes compassionate
and develops moral wisdom, as a result of their experiences. They
may deeply regret their past wrongdoings, and work to make
amends. Would you be willing to wish this person happiness at this
point in their development, in view of the lessons they have learned
through suffering, and from experiencing compassion?
• Are you willing to meditate on a hypothetical universe of this kind,
where you wish the person who has hurt you to develop
compassion and achieve happiness, as a result of their own
experiences of suffering, injustice and being treated with
compassion – of them getting whatever they need in order to kill off
the kind of character and mindset they had that caused you so
much pain?
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• During your meditation, can you frame the thought of this future
hypothetical universe, and say ‘If the person who hurt me were to
have these formative experiences in it, and learn compassion and
remorse from them, then I wish them happiness.’?
• Perhaps it is even possible for the person who hurt you to achieve
such a level of development in the real existence of one lifetime –
and the hypothetical universe you wish for is a hypothetical future
in this life.
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• If you are able to do this, then you are on your way to forgiving
them. If you are able to wish them well in a possible future universe
where they have learnt some difficult lessons, and had some more
nurturing experiences, then you have given them a gift.
• This does not necessarily entail pardoning them. The forgiveness
meditation makes it a condition of their happiness that they learn
through experiences, including difficult ones where they are on the
receiving end of injustice, the negative effects of their historical
behaviour on others.
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Giving the offender a gift ...
• You are not going to be able to get rid of the pain of unforgiveness
by struggling against anger and resentment.
• Forgiveness is a CHOICE and an ACTION, but not an action of futile
struggle.
• It is a willingness to acknowledge the possibility of redemption in
the other, and to allow them not to be defined for eternity by their
morally bad actions. It acknowledges that the transcendental self of
the person who has hurt you can act very differently in the future.
In your hypothetical universe, they could even at some future point
be your best friend, or a relative who loves you deeply ….
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• You may find that it takes a very long time to forgive. That is hardly
surprising, given the scale of injustice and suffering some people
have experienced as a result of others’ wrongdoing.
• However, forgiveness, as a choice, involves a COMMITMENT to keep
working at letting go of anger, and developing some compassion.
• There may be days when you feel particularly angry: but this does
not undermine your commitment, which is a choice to continue
where you left off in the process of forgiveness when you lose some
ground.
• You might be willing to practise this metta bhavana meditation
regularly.
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• If you wish the person who hurt you progress and happiness in a
hypothetical universe during your metta bhavana mediation, this will
be a gift you give them, and of course one that they need not know
about. Your wishing them positive development and happiness
would have to be something you are sincere about; it must contain
the thought that, if this hypothetical universe were to come into
being somehow, you would really wish the person eventually to
achieve happiness as a result of their developmental experiences.
• There are other gifts you could make to them in order to aid your
process of forgiveness. For instance, you might decide to suppress a
disparaging remark about them that you are bursting to make
during a conversation where they are not present. That feels like a
safe gift to give.
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Radical acceptance of the world ...
• The universe we are in of course contains immense injustice and
suffering.
• We are not going to be able to remove suffering and injustice from
the world by saying to ourselves ‘ I MUST NOT BE THE VICTIM OF
INJUSTICE’.
• Being a victim of injustice is often something outside our control.
• Even if we were able somehow to avoid being a victim of injustice in
this world, it would not remove the terrible suffering that has
already happened in human history.
• Why should the injustice experienced by other people, either alive
or dead, be less important than the injustice we ourselves
experience as individuals?
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• Trying to live by the rule ‘I MUST NOT BE THE VICTIM OF
INJUSTICE’ has no future.
• It merely draws a person into a futile struggle against something
they simply can’t avoid/change: the human condition.
• This futile struggle compounds their suffering immeasurably.
• Radical acceptance involves being able to say, ‘I am willing to fully
experience suffering and injustice if that is what life brings me.’
• This recognises the unavoidable nature of suffering and injustice in
our universe.
• It is also rational, in that a refusal to be willing will draw one into a
futile struggle that will compound one’s suffering.
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• Being willing to experience suffering and injustice does not mean
wanting to experience them, or resigning oneself to them. Neither
does it mean we should not take steps to avoid or remove them.
However, willingness does mean being prepared to fully take in the
painful experience, and not try to remove it by futile means that will
only increase our suffering, or compromise our values.
• It is not ‘resignation,’ though: it is an active taking in of the
experience, including all the thoughts and emotions associated with
it.
• Radical acceptance means permitting the world to be as it is, rather
than demanding without compromise that it MUST be how you want
it to be.
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• Radical acceptance does not mean fatalistically giving up on trying
to make the world a better place.
• However, it does mean recognising and accepting one’s limitations
in achieving this end, in the service of avoiding unnecessary
suffering.
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The power of forgiveness ....
• It is a gift given to the offender that they do not deserve.
• The offender need not know it has been given. It is a private,
spiritual experience of letting go of anger and resentment and
offering loving kindness to the transcendental, unchanging part of
the offender’s being.
• It is given freely by the person who is doing the forgiving.
Forgiveness means making a commitment to ending the feelings of
anger, resentment or hatred that are harboured towards that
individual.
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• Forgiveness does not necessarily entail excusing or pardoning,
though pardoning can be a very positive action at times, (though
not always).
• If there is a complete excuse for the offender’s behaviour, then he
has done no moral wrong, and therefore nothing requiring
forgiveness.
• Forgiveness does not depend on the offender being sorry, though
the process is helped if he is. The forgiver may choose to pardon as
well as forgive, which might mean sparing them a sanction, or
reconciling in a relationship. It may however be inappropriate to
pardon an individual, but it is still possible to forgive.
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• By letting the offender off the ‘anger’ hook, you can get off it
yourself, and live a happier life. You are no longer attached to the
offender by a hook, and can let them go.
• It is achieved by giving a gift of compassion to the offender, and
seeing their actions as bad, but the person the offender has the
potential to be as good.
• The process of forgiveness can perhaps be helped by a form of
metta bhavana meditation where you wish the person who has hurt
you transformational experiences in a hypothetical universe, where
they learn through difficult experiences the negative effects of their
behaviour, and where, by means of both negative and positive
experiences, they learn compassion.
• It involves a radical acceptance, on some level, of the world as it is,
with all its serious imperfections.
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• The gift of forgiveness transforms itself into a gift to oneself. The
psychological benefits to the forgiver can be immense.
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Forgiveness

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