We have all been hurt by someone, felt angry, and found ourselves unable to let it go. Rather than seeking revenge, forgiveness and letting go may be a choice that suits us better. But forgiving someone is no easy thing, and today I would like to talk with everyone about why forgiveness is a good thing, and how we can set down our anger and resentment.
Why forgive others?
When it comes to the benefits of forgiveness, the first thing most people think of is perhaps that it can untie the knots in our own hearts and make our own future a little more comfortable. Psychological research has found that forgiveness can improve a person's mental health and overall sense of wellbeing. Fred Luskin, a psychologist who specialises in the study of forgiving behaviour (and the author of Forgive for Good), points out that forgiveness can ease a person's depression, stress and anger, while at the same time raising hope, self-confidence and compassion.
When we are troubled over whether to forgive, it may be because the person who hurt us is a friend or someone we love. The truth is that friction arises in every relationship, and these disputes very often stem from misunderstandings between people. Forgiving the other person can not only mend the relationship but also deepen the understanding between both sides, and we ourselves can go on to view other interpersonal relationships with greater maturity.
When we discuss forgiveness, we naturally assume that we will be forgiving other people — yet in fact the object of forgiveness can also be ourselves. We may pin our own failures and setbacks, or our shortcomings in caring for others, on our own mistakes, and conclude that we are not worthy of being loved. We blame ourselves harshly for our faults and doubt our own self-worth. We need to forgive the mistakes we once made, so that we can truly be kind to ourselves.
How can we practise forgiving others
Forgiveness and letting go are very difficult things to do. On the one hand, we are caught up in strong emotions, feeling that the hurt we have suffered is unfair and wishing for the other person to be punished; on the other hand, we do not know how to put this abstract concept of forgiveness into practice in our lives. To know how we can forgive others, we must first understand what forgiveness actually is.
Although every culture and every individual defines forgiveness differently, the concept of forgiveness contains three elements (Khoddam, 2014):
1) Understanding the event and the offender objectively and rationally
2) Reducing the negative emotions towards the offender, and even coming to understand them
3) Giving up the opportunity to punish the offender, or the hope of rebuilding the relationship
Another psychologist who specialises in the study of forgiveness, Robert Enright, divides the process of forgiveness into four steps:
1) Recognising your own anger
2) Making the decision to forgive the person
3) Trying to understand the offender's motives or the external factors involved
4) Releasing your negative emotions and reflecting on how you have grown through the process
On the question of how we can forgive others, mindfulness teacher Shauna Shapiro (author of Rewire your brain: Discover the science + practice of mindfulness) offers five techniques to help us forgive others.
Acceptance
Acceptance is not merely passively accepting that all manner of hardship has happened. Acceptance is not silently enduring the occurrence of a problem, but rather actively accepting that the facts exist, recognising that what went wrong in the past has already happened. We need not distort reality; instead, we should accept reality, so that we can settle ourselves and change the future.
Emotion Regulation
In the process of forgiving, we struggle amid anger, resentment and grief. We should be aware that strong negative emotions bring a powerful influence to bear on our rational judgement and our behaviour. So before we can properly re-understand the situation and the person who hurt us, and then go on to release our resentment, we need first to deal with our own emotional reactions. Simply suppressing our feelings is not workable; practising mindfulness can be one of the methods. Mindfulness allows us to notice our emotions and thoughts more easily, and from there to settle down and work through our emotions, so that our thinking is not swept into the vortex of negative emotions.
Shifting Perspectives
The process of forgiving others asks us to shift from a state of anger and resentment to one in which we are able to accept reality and understand the person who hurt us. If we do not actively change our perspective, we will continue to frame the situation in a way that makes it hard for us to move on, hard to detach from, and hard to re-understand the event.
Empathy and Compassion
To forgive someone, we need to understand the other person's feelings — perhaps understanding their original motives and inner struggles, or perhaps understanding that they have already borne certain consequences afterwards. Empathy lets us try to step into their role and see that they may have had other considerations that led to the hurt occurring; compassion, meanwhile, lets us help to ease their pain alongside them, and summon the courage to make the decision to forgive them.
Radical Responsibility
Radical responsibility does not mean blaming ourselves for what happened as if it were our own problem, but rather recognising that we need to take responsibility for our own lives. Faced with hurt that has already happened, and with lasting resentment or a fractured relationship, what we can do is not only to passively avoid it, but to act actively — to forgive the other person from our own side. If excessive anger has burdened our emotions or our relationships, then perhaps we should all take on the responsibility for ourselves, recognising that it is for us to take the initiative in solving the problem.
Closing words: Never Forgive Never Forget
Forgiveness and letting go certainly have their benefits, but this does not mean that all anger and resentment are wrong. Anger and resentment can unite a people and give them the strength to stand against tyranny. Whether one should forgive a particular person has no definitive answer; beyond the purely measurable psychological effects, the matter also belongs to our own judgement of values. Towards the friends and family we hold dear, perhaps we should all try to release ourselves from our emotions and mend the relationship. In the face of brutality, Hong Kong people will seek justice; we will not forgive, and we will not forget.
References:
Sutton, J. (2020). Psychology of Forgiveness: 10+ Fascinating Research Findings. PositivePsychology.com. https://positivepsychology.com/psychology-of-forgiveness
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