Forgiveness, what does it mean and why is it important? First of all, we do not forgive for the person who hurt us, we do it for our own sanity. Forgiveness is crucial to healing any type of pain. If we do not learn how to forgive and realize that we are all human, and we all have flaws, we will not be happy in this life.
There are many reasons why we harbor resentment. I suffered from this for many years and it was really rough because it was with my own family. We all suffer from depression and anxiety as well as addiction. Addiction took over some of the individuals in my family, including me with an eating disorder.
Give people the benefit of the doubt: We all have made mistakes; we all have our skeletons that we need to deal with. Most of us are hard enough on ourselves, why make it worse? I know it’s easier said than done, but if you try to use this thinking technique it will help. Understand that we all were raised differently, we all have our difference in opinions and sometimes this causes conflict and tension.
Time: Sometimes time is all you need to heal. What is the point of staying angry at someone, especially a family member or a friend? In the end, all we have is each other. My family took almost a 5 year break from each other and now we are healthy and we’re able to deal with our personal issues. It has literally saved our family. We all have clear heads and realize that family is the most important thing in this life.
Communication: There is a difference between giving yourself time, and completely ignoring the situation. We must talk about it and especially with the person that we are harboring these feelings against. It allows you to get your feelings out and tell the person why you are hurt. It also allows the other person to tell their side of how they feel. You may find out some crucial information like the other person was suffering from their own demons at the time and didn’t know how to handle it. Getting the whole picture is a very important step in healing and moving forward.
Forgiveness is one of the bravest things a person can do. It is saying that I do not agree with what you did but I am willing to move forward and learn from it. This is something that I still struggle with from time to time but, thinking and using these tools helps me.
