Forgiving Others
by Diane Linsley
Forgiveness is a difficult but very important topic to address. As a
life coach, I've listened to heart-rending stories of abuse that are
beyond anything I could have previously imagined.
As a Christian, I've been taught the importance of forgiving others
as a prerequisite to being forgiven for my own trespasses. As a
human being who has been injured in ways that left permanent scars, including physical damage to my body that causes chronic pain and illness, I know how difficult it is to forgive. But I also know of the self-inflicted spiritual damage that is caused by resentment and lasting grudges.
Ultimately, the ability to forgive comes not from ourselves, but by the grace of God. In order to experience this grace, we have to do our part. We must desire to forgive, and we must work to transcend the ego. Then, when we least expect it, the grace comes, and forgiveness just happens.
Forgiving Narcissistic Abuse
Narcissistic abuse is very difficult to forgive. Abuse victims often struggle with confusing feelings of guilt that they can't explain. This type of guilt may actually be disowned resentment.
This occurs in childhood abuse when parents tell the child that he is responsible for "making them" abuse him. The child is not allowed to talk back or express anger. If he slips up and expresses his feelings, he is told that he is bad for not forgiving. Narcissists are skilled at making victims feel guilty.
How do you forgive a narcissist?
Early in my own recovery, I came across an article that told victims to stop trying to forgive abusers. I learned to focus on healing myself, rather than wasting energy trying to force myself to forgive, which just heaps guilt on top of low self-esteem.
The idea of forgiving is scary when you are still vulnerable to abuse. You must first remove yourself from the abuse situation and focus on your healing. Find supportive friends and counselors. Take care of your physical body and your inner child. Practice self-compassion. Connect with your higher self.
I worked very hard on my own healing process for a long time. Then I simply woke up one day (several years later), and everyone was forgiven - not just the abusers, but everyone I'd ever known - all at once. The shift in my energy occurred when I connected with my higher self and found peace.
Reconciling with God
I was angry at God for a long time because I didn't understand that God is not the cause of suffering on Earth. There are truly evil forces at work in this world, and there are some people who give themselves over to these forces and become tools of evil.
This fact was difficult for me to accept because it's scary to think about. But after many experiences with the forces of both good and evil, along with studying the writings of both modern and ancient teachers, I decided that it made sense.
It's difficult for a person who has always wanted to do good works to understand why anyone would want to harm people. But this is probably why a spirit guide told me in a lucid dream that I needed to learn about free agency. In order to experience free agency, the soul must have choices. And since this is the world of opposites, there are plenty of opportunities to make choices.
There are no guarantees that we will be protected from the bad choices of other people. In fact, the more awareness I develop, the more I realize that everything that everyone does affects everyone else. This is downside of Oneness. As a spiritual seeker, I want to be one with God. But as a human being, I am inevitably one with all other human beings on this planet.
An example of this is my neighbor's diesel pickup truck. He likes to start his truck a couple times a day, then go into his house and lounge around while the truck idles for a while. Consequently, my house, along with the other houses in the neighborhood, fills up with fumes. My husband and I talked to him twice, explaining why this is a problem for my asthma.
The neighbor was angry and belligerent, but he slightly reduced the amount of time he idled the truck. I was shocked at his narcissistic attitude and behavior. I decided that it was a sign of the times because researchers say that narcissism is on the rise all around the world. While psychologists are mystified about the cause, I think it's the inevitable result of a materialistic worldview that cuts out God, replacing humble spiritual seeking with the New Age attitude of "me, me, me!"
Anyway, after praying for help, I bought a second air filter for my house from IQ Air. It was the intelligent thing to do :)
The moral of the story is, "It's a lot easier to forgive someone after you have taken measures to protect yourself." The other lesson is, "It's not God's fault. God gave us a beautiful planet with everything we need to be healthy and happy. But he also gave us free agency."
Forgiveness and Self-Compassion
You cannot love yourself and hate others. The more I practice self-compassion, the less fearful I become. I also work on overcoming codependency and developing boundaries.
Until we've healed enough to let go of fear, trying to forgive others feels like denying our own reality. Faking forgiveness, which comes from shaming ourselves or allowing others to should on us ("You should forgive"), just adds salt to the wounds. Fake forgiveness is like smiling when you are really sad or angry. It's not in integrity. Personal growth requires integrity.
Fake forgiveness can short-circuit our personal growth. When we deny our feelings by saying, "I've already forgiven and forgotten," we stop doing the spiritual work that is necessary for true healing and transcendence. That's spiritual bypassing. It's better to feel the pain and keep on working.
When we notice feelings of lingering resentment, we can take the opportunity to pray and ask for help. Sometimes, the problem is we haven't forgiven ourselves, and we are projecting our own inner critic onto others. It may help to work with the voice of the Inner Critic.
The good news about Oneness is that self-forgiveness naturally extends to other people because we are all interconnected. Self-compassion transforms into universal compassion.
A Shift in Perspective
True forgiveness is a joyful feeling. It feels like total liberation. It's so joyful that it makes you want to write a letter to the other person and thank them for the role they played in your life. You are grateful for the lessons you learned - no matter how painful they were - even if you still have the scars.
Okay, let's admit it. We're not quite there yet :)
Ram Dass said, "If you think you are enlightened, go and spend a week with your parents." It's easy to forgive from a distance, which is why the first step to recovering from narcissistic abuse is to go "no contact." The brain can't recover when it's freaking out on high alert.
Forgiveness can be greatly facilitated with understanding. Because I've had so many people to forgive, I've spent a lot of time learning about human development. It's easier to forgive someone when I understand their level of cognitive development. Each level of development is a different perspective, and every person is "right" from their own perspective.
One of my favorite movies is Inception. Fischer was able to forgive when he experienced a shift in perspective that changed his mind about what his father's dying words meant. We will never know what his father really meant, and it doesn't matter. When Fischer chose a different interpretation for his father's words, his life changed.
My favorite quote from the movie is, "I think positive emotion trumps negative emotion every time. We all yearn for reconciliation, for catharsis." ~Cobb
One of my biggest shifts happened when I realized that the abusers were younger souls. Whether or not this is objectively true is irrelevant. This is how I perceive them. They appear to me as children, and I have compassion for them.
Forgiveness as a Spiritual Experience
Like all true spiritual experiences, forgiveness is not something that you can force to happen. It is grace. There's no point in feeling guilty if it hasn't happened yet.
Ken Wilber says, "Enlightenment is an accident. But meditation makes you more accident-prone." So it's time to stop guilt-tripping ourselves and others for not forgiving. That's like getting mad at people for not being enlightened - or expecting children to act like adults.
Forgiving others is not a one-time thing. There are little annoyances in every relationship. These daily trials are like gems on the spiritual path. Without them, there would be no spiritual growth.
This is why we seek for relationship. We cannot develop ourselves in isolation. The ego only becomes transparent to itself when challenged by other egos. Everyone in our lives is a mirror for our ego. With this understanding, gratitude replaces resentment, and the soul rejoices.
Here's a guided meditation for self-forgiveness.
Be well,
Diane Linsley
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