Forgiveness.
It's a word everyone has heard, but do we really know what forgiveness looks like and how it or the lack of it affects our lives?
I realized this week that there are many facets of forgiveness, and I didn't know as much about it as I thought I did.
Myself and at least 30 others gathered Tuesday evening at the Greenwood-Leflore County Chamber of Commerce to hear author and therapist Jacqui Bishop share insight on the subject.
She is author of the book “How to Forgive When You Don't Know How.”
I can relate to the situation well. When I was a young adult, my lifelong friend hurt me more than she probably will ever know. I had a difficult time dealing with the unforgiveness and finally the forgiveness.
Sometimes when people we love the most hurt us, we tend to pull away from other similar relationships and build a wall around ourselves that is hard to break through.
Unforgiveness can hurt us not only emotionally but physically and mentally as well.
I know my situation caused me not to trust people as much, and I was hesitant to let another friend get as close.
Unfortunately, I harbored those feelings for far too long before letting go. But eventually, for our own good, we have to release that anger and hurt and resentment and all those other emotions and forgive.
Bishop described unforgiveness as “continuing to pour energy into a toxic situation.” It can be a tug of war or a power struggle we have no control over.
Unforgiveness can actually take over our lives if we choose to let it.
We all can relate to this. When we are angry or feel like we have been wronged by a friend or co-worker, we dwell on it, lose sleep over it and let it eat away at us, which is very unhealthy.
We have to learn that forgiveness is not for them, Bishop said. It's for us. It simply means letting something go.
And what a liberating feeling. Carrying around all that hurt and anger is a heavy load, and forgiveness brings freedom.
Now trusting someone again once he or she has hurt us is another matter altogether, Bishop said.
“Trust once lost has to be earned back,” she said.
Bishop recommends that when someone hurts us or offends us, we leap to forgiveness as soon as we think we can.
But that's something many of us have a hard time doing. If we could step back and see the big picture and how it is affecting our lives, we would be much more willing to forgive right away.
Most of us have heard the old saying about forgiving and forgetting, and that was a problem many of the ladies at the workshop said was hard to do. It's hard to erase our memories.
But forgetting is separate from forgiving, Bishop said. Although it is not healthy to continue to dwell on what happened to us, Bishop said we might not want to forget because “unforgiveness carries a valuable lesson. You paid for it.”
It is left up to us how long we dwell on it, she said.
For relationships to grow, Bishop said we must tell the truth faster and deeper, which requires us over and over again to take that leap of faith off the cliff. And that's hard to do for some of us who have been deeply hurt before.
For me personally, I have forgiven my best friend, but because of what happened, our friendship is not the same, and I am not sure it ever will be again.
We still do things together. Her son thinks of me as his aunt, and our families are still close.
But just because we forgive, it doesn't mean we always go back to the way things were. Sometimes we have to move on or renegotiate the terms of our friendship.
I chose to renegotiate that friendship. After a lifelong investment, I thought there was something there to salvage.
But each incident is different, and we have to deal with them individually.
So I hope each of you will think about the costs of unforgiveness and choose to let those hurts go. We are all healthier and happier people when we choose to forgive.
