Forgiveness Two: The Gift
A few years ago, I was conducting an initial interview with a new client. I was gathering basic demographic information, asking him about his family background. He stated that he had three sisters. He added that they were very close, both geographically and emotionally. I summarized, stating, “So there are four of you.”
At that point, my client broke off eye contact with me and muttered, “No, there are five of us. I have a brother.”
“Where is he?” I asked. “”I don’t know, and I couldn’t care less. The last I heard, he was living somewhere in Southern California.” He then explained that several years ago, at the family Thanksgiving dinner, his brother had made a cruel and thoughtless remark, and my new client had stormed out of the holiday repast, never speaking to his only brother since.
My client’s anger (and pain) was evident. I decided to address his hurt with a seemingly ridiculous question: Is it possible that your brother is reclining poolside in the sunshine right now, smiling while sipping on a beer or an iced tea while we are shivering here in snowy Michigan?” Not surprisingly, my client looked at me like I was the one who needed counseling or medication. He curtly responded “I don’t know and why would you ask such a crazy question?”
I explained, “It was obvious from your response that the very mention of your brother elicits a negative reaction from you. My point is simply this: it appears that you haven’t forgiven your brother. I can’t know anything about the incident at Thanksgiving years ago, but I do know this: you are paying for your absence of forgiveness, not him. For all we know, he is sitting around that pool and smiling. You don’t extract revenge by not forgiving him. You are simply hurting yourself.”
My client retorted angrily, “He doesn’t deserve to be forgiven. He never apologized to me.”
I get it. I understand his anger and disappointment about that. But it is my experience that we often withhold forgiveness because we don’t understand what forgiveness is not. Forgiveness is not saying that the offense was OK, that it was acceptable behavior. And forgiveness is not acting as though the offense didn’t happen.
For example, if you lend a friend $50 and she doesn’t re-pay the debt, it may fester with you. You can choose to forgive the debt in order to move on (and this forgiveness may take place simply within your mind), but you can also choose to good-naturedly refuse a future request for a loan. And you would happily accept the re-payment in the unlikely event that the $50 returns to you. The goal in forgiving the debtor is to return to a positive and productive relationship with your co-worker, friend, neighbor, or even sibling or parent. As long as you are hanging on to feelings about your lost $50, it will be a barrier against moving forward.
The principle is this: Forgiveness is a gift you give yourself, not the person being forgiven. When my aforementioned client can find forgiveness for his brother, the grimace will leave his face and the bile will cease seeping into his stomach. What his brother is doing in Southern California will be unknown to him, but he will feel better nevertheless. My client could choose to re-establish contact with his brother or choose not to. In either case, forgiveness will be liberating for him, both cognitively and emotionally. As the snowman says, all change begins with a new idea or thought. And “I forgive” is the new thought.
To harken back to last week’s story about the mugging victim, let’s try to implement the following:
Pull out the knife. For your sake!