"To Forgive is to set someone free,
and to find the prisoner is you"
and to find the prisoner is you"
This very poignant quotation,
written by the renowned American author and theologian Lewis B. Smedes, speaks eloquently on the true effect of forgiving by
the forgiver. The generally held view that the act of forgiving is directed at
the person who committed the transgression is very far from the truth. In fact
the true purpose of seeking to forgive others for any wrong committed is
fundamentally an attempt by the victim to find personal resolution of the
conflicts raging within him, and the hope of restoring his emotional balance.
As the quotation correctly implied, when there is
no resolution we become prisoners of ourselves and end up developing profound
changes in our ability to accommodate ourselves and others. To protect
ourselves from further hurt, we become angry, frustrated, suspicious, and begin
to be distrustful of other people’s intentions. We quickly lose sight of the original cause of the conflict, and continue
to develop ever widening circles of “enemies” in our lives. In short we become
different people with different outlooks and different expectations.
The act of not forgiving
is a disease which if allowed to continue uncorrected, will affect the mind and
body of all those concerned. It damages the environment in the same way that a
rotting fruit, if not removed, will quickly destroy everything around it. If
unresolved, it will adversely color everything we think, believe, expect and do
in our lives and will interfere with our good judgment. While, by the very act
of granting forgiveness, we will allow ourselves to grow in strength,
confidence and maturity. Indeed, to
forgive is not only therapeutic to the victims, but it is a blessing to
everyone concerned.
However, the act of forgiving another, even when he
is at fault, can only begin with the forgiving of oneself. It is impossible to
forgive others of any transgression, if we are not able to deal with our own
internal conflicts. There is fundamental resistance by all of us to admit our
own weakness which forces us to hold on to the feelings of resentment and hurt,
and reinforces our determination to resist any change. Because change means
admission of personal responsibility and this is something most people are
reluctant to do. It is a fundamental failing of human nature that has been in
existence for as long as men have interacted with one another. Jesus Christ, in Mathew 7:4 may well have been alluding to this fact when he drew
attention to it in another context:
“How can you say to a brother take the speck out of
your eye, while there is still a beam in your own eye?”
There are many reasons that may give rise to the difficulty
for someone to easily forgive others. Some people will hold back because they
feel that by forgiving, they are in effect admitting that the original acts
were justified. Others believe that by holding on to the bitterness and the
anger they will in fact be somehow punishing the offenders. There are others
who labor under the misguided impression that by forgiving them they will
suffer greater remorse. So many of the victims are so consumed with their own
self-righteousness, that withholding their forgiveness gives them great
satisfaction even if in doing so they continue to suffer themselves. All of
these arguments are totally false and untenable, for forgiveness comes from a
position of strength not weakness, and requires a range of such personal
characteristics as faith, confidence, love, empathy, trust, openness and
vulnerability to function effectively.
I can think of no one in my lifetime who can truly
deny that he was not guilty of such behavior on many more occasions than they
care to recount. For my own self, I continue to pay the price for something
which happened many decades ago, in which I allowed my misguided
self-righteousness to prevent me from doing the right thing and as a result
caused more unnecessary pain and disappointment to so many. They may have
caused the first wound, but by not forgiving I was just as guilty for
everything that transpired subsequently.
By not forgiving and releasing the hurts, they will
continue to eat you alive. You continue to blame everything on them, but in
fact, you are the one who is inflicting the pain on yourself and on others. In
the end, no one ever gains by holding on to the hurts caused by others and
everyone will gratefuly relish the joys and the relief that comes from
forgiving. There is no doubt that forgiving others has a lot of personal
benefits and deep down most of us believe it is the right thing to do. This is
precisely what an Unknown Author so
very wisely advised in the following quotation:
“You will only begin to heal when you let go of the
past hurts. Forgive those who have wronged you, and learn to forgive yourself
for your mistakes.”
We will all do well to take deep note if this
advice, to place it deeply in our memory banks, and to be sure to fully
implement its intent on every single occasion when we are calked upon to do so.
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