Forgiveness

A few posts on an forum I go on have got me thinking about forgiveness.
Not just after the abuse from my father, but concerning everything in my life.. my biological father, ex boyfriends and girlfriends, old friends, best friends.. and of course the world, and society itself.

So many people have hurt me so much during the course of my yet so short life. I feel so failed by the people who were not supposed to fail me, by the world I was born into, and the society that was supposed to be able to protect me.

I feel the only way I can ever really be at peace, and heal my little girl inside as well as the broken adult.. would be to forgive everyone I have ever been hurt by. REALLY forgive them. Not forget, forgive. Rise above it.

This is something that I have actually struggled with for quite some time. I used to think I had forgiven these people for what they had done to me, but after everything came out, I don't think I have. I think forgiveness is a very important part of the healing process and it is something that I work on every single day.

"Forgiveness is not done because someone deserves it, it's done because they need it."

Who needs it? Not just the people who have done me wrong, but I need it myself. I need to be able to forgive before I become a bitter woman and lose any hope that I have left.

So I stumbled across a website, that actually, really helped to put a lot of things in perspective. The whole article can be found here: http://www.guidetopsychology.com/forgive.htm
and I will include some quotes of what I found particularly useful.

Please tell me. Why does it feel easier to forgive my father, than to forgive an ex? An old best friend?
I think I have concluded that maybe it's because I was so young and my dad was relatively new to my life, I hadn't yet had chance to form a trusting and secure relationship with him. Whereas with my old best friend, I had formed that kind of relationship with her. So I expected a lot more from her.
"No matter what anyone does to you, no one can take away from you your capacity to do good. You lose it only by willingly giving it up yourself.
So remember that if anyone has ever hurt you, you don’t find forgiveness, you give it.
In forgiving them you ultimately feel mercy for yourself, and you free yourself of your greatest burden: hatred."
 
Agreed. Filling yourself with hatred and anger only hurts yourself, and the resentment does nothing to the person that has harmed you. If I don't forgive those who have done me wrong, what would I achieve?
I have found that to not forgive someone, hurts no one but yourself.
"It's sad that in wishing someone else to hell, you send yourself there also."

That said, forgiveness is still a very long and hard process. But I think if we work hard enough then we will get there in the end. I won't let anyone hurt me any more than they already have, and I most certainly won't let anyone take away my own capacity to do good in the world.

I have the power to do all that I want to do. And so do you. We all do - we are who we want to be, we can accept other people's mistakes and we can accept our own. If we can learn to do this we can learn to finally achieve the happiness we all deserve.