There Is Nothing to Forgive
Written on December 22, 2009 by Tom Stine
This article is one of five articles on forgiveness posted today by several different writers. At the end of this article is a list of links to the others. Forgiveness is an excellent topic for the holidays as, to me, Jesus exemplifies forgiveness more than any other spiritual teacher. And while we have no idea when he was actually born, thanks to history, we celebrate his birth in three more days.
I have a somewhat radical perspective with regard to forgiveness. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard someone say, “I can forgive, but I’ll never forget.” Well, I’m sorry, but that isn’t even within a hundred miles of forgiveness. As long as there is any perception of wrong doing, any perception of injury, any perception of being hurt by another, then you have not only not forgiven, but you, yourself, are trapped by your own inability or unwillingness to forgive. Even worse, the only person who is suffering from your unforgiveness is you!
Why is this so? Why would my unforgiveness be a cause of my suffering? The cause of my suffering is what the other person did to me! That certainly sounds reasonable. After all, one would argue, if the other person hadn’t hit me, yelled at me, abused me, raped me, left me, abandoned me (and on and on), then I would not be suffering. I think it would be hard to find 5 people that would disagree with that position. It is simply how the vast majority of the world thinks.
But let’s look at this situation for a moment. At the moment the incident took place, you were experiencing pain. I grant you that. There is no question that in the moment, really, honest pain, anguish and hurt occurred. I do not mean to imply that this is not the case. Pain is a hard thing to endure, and it is often difficult to get through. But as soon as the incident is over, what is happening now? Well, something different. Something without the pain. As always is the case, life moves on to something new.
So, where is the painful incident now? In memory. It is now a thought. It is also a feeling attached to the thought. More than likely these thoughts and feelings will form beliefs, such as “I must be a terrible person for such a thing to have happened to me.” And as these thoughts are repeated, as the feelings are regenerated, as the experience gets ground into the psychological-mental-emotional system, a whole complex of suffering gets built around the memories of the experience. But please notice, because this part is very important, all of it is now 100% in your mind. The incident may have occurred in the seemingly real world, but now that it is over, it is gone and exists only in the mind.
This state of affairs is both a curse and a blessing. It is a curse because an event that happened once in the past is now replaying in your awareness over and over and over again. It is traumatic in every sense of the word. But it is a blessing because you can now let it all go since it exists only in the mind. It won’t be easy, and recovery from memories that are traumatic are some of the toughest to let go of, but you can let it go. And letting it go, completely letting it go, is forgiveness. True forgiveness. The kind of forgiveness that matters.
Believe it or not, you can let go of a traumatic memory and all the emotion and beliefs attached to it to such a amazing extent that you will have a hard time even remembering that the event took place. It will feel as if it was a movie that you watched once upon a time and are now recalling. There will be nothing really left of it. It won’t be repressed, supressed, denied, or any of a dozen other psychological methods to try to get it out of your mind. As a matter of fact, almost surely you will have to re-experience a major portion of the traumatic event, even to the point of feeling all your anger, shame, guilt, fear, horror, etc., again. It can be brutal and rough. But on the other side is a freedom like nothing you’ve ever seen or felt. Believe me, I know from my own experience.
And that is why I can make the bold claim that I did in the title of this argument: “There is nothing to forgive.” EVER!! When you truly forgive, when you finally let go of something to the extent I’m describing, you will see in no uncertain terms that there is nothing to forgive, and, more shockingly, there never was!! You are healed in a way that is absolutely miraculous. The past is past, gone, never to return. It was only in your mind and now is gone! You are truly free.
Can there be any doubt that those strange words of Jesus, while hanging on the cross, came from a man who knew, really and truly knew, that there is nothing to forgive?
Forgive them for they know not what they do.
How true! How perfect! Jesus could look at his tormenters and have nothing in his heart but true forgiveness, a forgiveness that sees nothing to forgive, ever. To have that utter openness of heart is the greatest blessing by far.
If you want to read more about this somewhat radical view of forgiveness, I would suggest A Course in Miracles. The main theme of The Course is not miracles, as the title would suggest, but forgiveness. The Course says that true forgiveness as I’ve defined it above is the key to freedom, awakening and, ultimately, miracles.
The Other Forgiveness Articles
- Daphne Lim: The Gift of Forgiveness
- Albert Foong (The Urbanmonk): Our Innate Innocence – Reflections on Forgiveness
- Takuin Minamoto: The Wound of Forgiveness
- Davidya: Deep Forgiveness
Beyond the Known
And last but not least, my good friend Takuin has produced an amazing e-book, “Beyond the Known.” It is a delightful, easy to read and stunningly beautiful book. And it has a great price: free. Please head over to takuin.com to download a copy.
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