The power of forgiveness

Forgiveness is about letting go of the past. It is about moving forward. It is about leaving the past behind you. You think about forgiveness either when someone has offended you or when you have offended someone. When you know you have offended someone, you ask the person to forgive you. The courage to do so is uncommon. It means letting go of your ego. It means accepting personal responsibility for the action that had caused the offence. It means off loading and lightening yourself of the burden of guilt. By walking to the person you have offended and saying the magic word “sorry”, you have successfully passed on the onus of forgiving you to that person. It is not in your power to enforce the forgiveness. It is left to the person you have offended to accept or reject your apology, pardon the offence and forgive you.

The oneness of humanity has made it almost impossible to live together without stepping on each other’s toes. We have more things that keep us working together for our common good than things that keep us apart from each other. We need each other. But we must learn to respect the uniqueness inherent in each other. We do not have to agree with each other on every issue every time.

Someone asked me the other day if I thought forgiving is the same thing as forgetting. I said ‘no’ and ‘yes’. I said “no” because forgiving should automatically set in the process of forgetting. I said “yes” because forgiving does not necessarily mean forgetting. After forgiveness, the process of forgettingness (pardon my use of word) can be long. It can also be short. It depends on a number of factors including the magnitude of the damage already done as a result of the offence committed. It also depends on your ability to find a new and positive way of thinking about the person you are seeking to forgive.

Have you ever thought about the reason for the phrase “forgive and forget?”  Why not “forget and forgive” instead? It is because forgiveness comes before forgettingness. You cannot forget if you cannot forgive. You forgive first, and then forget process follows. You find it hard to forget when the wound is still fresh. Only time will heal it.

Forgetting has both spiritual and physical dimensions. You can work hard and strive to put the past behind you, but the process of forgetting the past takes an act of grace. It is not in your control. That is a spiritual thing. The physical bit is to make a determined effort to spend less time thinking about the offence and about the person that has offended you. The less time you spend thinking about the offence and or the person in a negative way, the more the power that heals all wounds will work with you and help you to put the offence and its consequences behind you, helping you to forget the past.

The time you spend thinking negatively about the offence and or the person makes you becomes bitterer, more hateful and angrier both with yourself and with the offender. This increases your spirit of heaviness which had set in at the time of the offence and had weighed you down unable to step out of your rut. When you remain unforgiving, you make no progress. You stagnate. When the person that offended you has long forgotten and moved on with his own life, you are still enclosed in your own little world of misery. So long as you let yourself remain in that enclosure, you keep open the door that brings in all sorts of dis-eases into your life.   

What makes it easy for some people to harbour malice and remain unforgiving? Why do some people find it so difficult to forgive a perceived enemy long after they have asked for forgiveness? What makes it so hard for some people to get out of their negativity and stagnation even long after the perceived offender has come in a contrite spirit asking to be forgiven? Is it their ego? Is it hatred? Is it self-centredness? Is it inferiority complex? It is lack of progress in their life? What is it that can make someone to be unforgiving? It is lack of love? Or, it is just about their emotional feelings? There is nothing wrong in feeling angry when offended. It is natural. But once the offender has come back to his or her senses and has asked to be forgiven, the process of forgiveness should set in. This does not mean that the negative feelings you had as a result of the offence will disappear immediately. It will take a while to go. It is spiritual.

There is power in forgiving. It is the power that can heal wounds. It is the power that can mend broken homes. It is the power that can sustain relationships. It is the power that can restore peace to the family, to the neighbourhood, to the community, to the nation and to the world. It is the power that can re-establish trust to employees of an organisation. It is the power that can bridge bridges enabling old enemies to become friends again and competitors to become co-operators. It is the power that can create enabling environments for progress and development.

As Alexandra Pope once succinctly put it “to err is human to forgive is divine”. To this I would humbly add “if you allow”. If you allow divine into your life you will develop the heart that is capable of forgiving. What do you to “allow” divine into your life? You allow by becoming aware that every person that crosses your path at one stage or another has a role to play in your journey in life. The role can be positive, negative or neutral depending on your response. It can have huge or small impact. It must fill a purpose in your life. It is part of the flow.

When some people try to resist their role, the divine has a way of enforcing it. The divine can bypass you and give the role to another person; it does not matter whether the role is good or bad. If you had successfully played your role and it turns out to make positive difference in the life of another person, you would have had the privilege of sharing the success story with that person. This is my passion.

 Learning to become acutely aware of the role a person has come to play at a particular point in your life is essential to understanding yourself, the person and the purpose for which he or she has come to cross your path at that point in time and space. Once the person has played his or her assigned role, it is time to let go of the past, move on with the rest of your life and step into the next level. Yesterday is gone. Today is your present, your gift. Tomorrow will look after itself. Hakuna Matata.