Chapter 16: What is forgiveness?

Today while watching Dr. Phil's part 2 exclusive of, "The Man behind the Manti Te’o Girlfriend Hoax Comes Clean", the topic of forgiveness came up a lot. I started reading through blogs on forgiveness & I came upon a letter from a man on death row. His explanation on what forgiveness was to him really resonated with me. His words moved me & I hope they move you too. We all deal with forgiveness in our lives at one point or another—whether it be wanting forgiveness from someone you wronged, wanting to forgive someone who has wronged you, or wanting to forgive yourself. Maybe you don't feel worthy of forgiveness OR you don't want to forgive the person who has hurt & broken you so badly. Whatever your take is on forgiveness, reading this could help you with a past issues, current issue, or future issue.

One of my good friends once told me that it all comes down to your peace of mind.
It's hard to truly say you're at peace if you're harboring ill feelings towards yourself or someone else.
Forgiveness is not about invalidating your pain—it's about recognizing your pain, accepting your troubled past & no longer allowing it the power to dictate your future. When I was in High School I came up with the saying, "Lingering onto the bad only guarantees you to miss out on the good." This is a saying that I always try to live by. It's not easy to remember these types of sayings when we're upset & we will all struggle with it at times,  so it's our responsibility to remind ourselves of these sayings.

Sure, forgiving someone who has wronged you leaves you vulnerable, but isn't that better than being constantly on guard/angry/resentful? Who wants to live that life? It takes more energy to hate than to love. We have the power within ourselves to choose to be at peace. Better said than done, right? No one says forgiveness is easy—it's just a matter of being willing to take the journey to get there. We all have our share of hurts to different degrees & under different circumstances. There's no timeline indicating how long it will take to forgive someone or forgive yourself, but it will be worth it in the end.     You've got nothing to lose [other than pain] & everything to gain [peace & happiness].

Finally... here is the letter from the man on death row. I've bolded some of my favorite lines:
Click here for the original source

"Forgiveness is a form of realism. It doesn't deny, minimize, or justify what others have done to us or the pain that we have suffered. It encourages us to look squarely at those old wounds and see them for what they are. And it allows us to see how much energy we have wasted and how much we have damaged ourselves by not forgiving. 
Forgiveness is an internal process. It can't be forced, and it doesn't come easy. It brings with it great feelings of wellness and freedom. But we experience this only when we want to heal and when we are willing to work for it.
Forgiveness is a sign of positive self-esteem. We no longer identify ourselves by our past injuries and injustices. We are no longer victims. We claim the right to stop hurting when we say, "I'm tired of the pain, and I want to be healed." At that moment, forgiveness becomes a possibility-although it may take time and much hard work before we finally achieve it.
Forgiveness is letting go of the past. It doesn't erase what happened, but it does allow us to lessen and perhaps even eliminate the pain of the past. The pain from our past no longer dictates how we live in the present, and it no longer determines our future. 
It also means that we no longer need resentment and anger as an excuse for our shortcomings. We don't need them as a weapon to punish others nor as a shield to protect ourselves by keeping others away. And most importantly, we don't need these feelings to identify who we are. We become more than merely victims of our past.
Forgiveness is no longer wanting to punish those who hurt us. It is understanding that the anger and hatred that we feel toward them hurts us far more than it hurts them. It is seeing how we hide ourselves in our anger and how those feelings prevent us from healing. It is discovering the inner peace that becomes ours when we let go of the past and forget vengeance. 
Forgiveness is moving on. It is recognizing all that we have lost because of our refusal to forgive. It is realizing that the energy that we spend hanging on to the past is better spent on improving our present and our future. It is letting go of the past so that we can move on.
We all have been hurt. And at one time or another most of us have made the mistake of trying to run away from the past. The problem is that no matter how fast or how far we run, the past always catches up to us-and usually at the most inopportune time. When we forgive, we are dealing with the past in such a way that we no longer have to run.
For me, learning how to forgive wasn't easy. But I did learn, and my life is better for it - even here on death row."
Michael B. Ross Death Row Somers, Connecticut 

"To be angry is to let others' mistakes punish yourself.
To forgive others is to be good to yourself.
Master ChengYen

If you're currently struggling with forgiveness in any form in your life, I hope & pray that you find peace soon. Don't rob yourself of a good life by replaying all of the bad things that have happened to you (or that you have done). Learn from them, grow from them, move on from them. Forgiveness is the key to peace. We need peace & love in order to be happy ♥

If you have any quotes, tips, or thoughts of forgiveness, please feel free to share them in a comment!