Forgiveness

I'm the same*Luckylegs*. As I get older, Its getting worse. I'm very hard on myself.

I find it almost impossible to forgive myself. Why should I ? After all it was me who made the mistake or whatever .

There are some things from way back in the past that I have moved on from, but find I can't totally forgive .

You have to forgive yourself! You know you've done wrong and feel guilt but you are sorry and won't do it again. It's important to put things behind you and use them to learn. It's a bit early to be coherent but I hope that makes sense... it's the rules I live by anyway. Forgetting is more difficult.

Forgiveness is very empowering and liberating especially when you forgive yourself but also others who have hurt you. I learned this through counselling when I went through a sticky patch a couple of tears ago. It means ypu can let go and move on but also shows you can be the bigger person. All that angst and wasted energy which can now be usefully deployed in doing intersting things and concentrating on what really matters.

Let it go!

If someone has deliberately and continually hurt me then I'd cut them out of my life and out of my mind too. I'd not see them or think of them again except occasionally in passing.

Otherwise best to forgive and forget. Don't sweat the small stuff.

SJP and Anya I agree completely.
Anything else is a waste of our lives.

This conversation has come up at just the right time.
First I don't forgive people who have deliberately hurt me or mine. I just try and keep out of their way.
I'm sitting here beating myself up about the fact that I really lost it with my mum (89) last night. Shouted and got really upset. Tea and cake - I am sorry but I know that I WILL do it again! She can be so nasty. I do try but she has always been like this and I am usually a bit on edge when I'm with her. She lives a long way away and although I still run my own business and look after DGS I try and be supportive, visit and sort out problems etc. long distance.
I should do better.

We are all only human Pamela ! Can't blame you at all.

That's kind, thanks.

I'm not a very forgiving person if someone has wronged me deliberately. I dont plot revenge, or lie awake hating a person. I cut them out of my life and move on.

A sincere and believable sorry, is generally sufficient for me to forgive. ( unless the wrong done was really serious). But without apology - though i might lay aWake worrying about it, for a while at least, i avoid/cut them off. life is too short.

Forgiveness is one of life's continuing learning curves for me. I realised some years ago that like Lucky, the person I'm hardest on is myself. Is that as damaging as always blaming others when things go pear shaped?
All the major faiths have forgiveness at their heart. Feeling resentful and angry towards others, ruminating and beating ourselves up for doing something in a way that may have caused more problems are so common and so exhausting.
One of the Auschwitz survivors of Mengela's twin experiments made a speech about the progress she made towards forgiving Dr M. She went so far as to meet one of the nurses who were involved in experimenting on her and her twin sister. He apologised to her, she forgave him. I know this is an extreme example but I found her inspirational.
We can only do our best!

This is another reference on forgiveness related to wartime:
www.amazon.com/Sunflower-Possibilities-Forgiveness-Expanded-Paperback/dp/0805210601?tag=gransnetforum-21#reader_0805210601
Personally, I can forgive someone if they apologise, but find it hard to forget.
And I hope other people can forgive me, when I apologise.

I dont know why i am writing this now, think i need to get it off my chest. My daughter is at this moment, as of now, having a fourth fairly major operation in hospital in germany. Far away and we cant be there. It has been a terrible year.
Other than one very new friend, who said she was thinking of her and us, we havnt heard from anybody. Feeling a bit disappointed but expect i will forgive....

silverlining48 so sorry to hear your daughter is having more surgery. I hope all goes well. If OH is off his crutches I maybe able to meet up in November.

Thanks sar. Hope oh is recovering well.

I think that the alternative to forgiveness is bitterness that only hurts the one who cannot forgive. It is sometimes not easy to forgive. I write as someone who has had a life made hard by other people's selfishness / recklessness and as a 'nice person' who would not / could not have acted in that way, I could easily descend into self pity / anger. If I couldn't let go and look forward, I think my life would have been paralysed. I am not trying to lay claim to being virtuous - far from it, I just know I have had to let things go so that they don't mar my future. Sometimes, I have felt that it is God's grace and compassion that have enabled me to move on - that forgiveness has been a gift to me. All I know is that I am grateful for it and now it is my life that would have been diminished if I had held onto hurts.

Silverlining so sorry to hear that your daughter still having surgery. I remember about her from earlier.
to the family.

and ps I've found a helpful idea from my religion.
Sorry to sound 'preachy'.
Like Silverlining, if you try to give the person who hurt you the benefit of the doubt, judge favourably, find excuses for them in fact, the pain can be healed quicker.
I know, sometimes there are no excuses.

After a 6 hour operation i have just heard that my daughter is in recovery. She still has a fifth operation to endure whIch we hope will be her last. It has been a long year of continuous and ongoing treatment.
We soldier on.

I'm glad this latest op is over with, silver. X

I don't know the story of your daughter silver but wish her a speedy recovery.?

Positive thoughts for your daughter and her loved ones silverlining.

Thanks for the link TriciaF, I'll send for the book. You say you can forgive if someone apologises but what if they don't, if their view of the issue is a mile away from your own memory? Imperfect's post is what I aim to achieve. I rarely hold grudges because its so diminishing to the holder and doesn't change the person we may feel offended or hurt by. I see forgiveness as separate from grudge holding but am I correct to do this?
A friend who has a strong Catholic faith told me that she leaves it "at the foot of the cross" when she is struggling to forgive. That is, she leaves it to her faith, in the belief that a higher being is the only one who can truly forgive. That introduced another point of view to my struggles with forgiveness and I'm never sure if its the protestant work ethic that has me continuing to believe its my own responsibility and that passing it on to a higher being (or whatever) is a cop out.

I'm a CO and move on person.