It is a practice to cultivate forgiveness for something that has had a deep and significant impact on us, and it’s often an ongoing process that requires time and energy. It’s far from easy, and it requires a great deal of courage. We need to make the commitment to working toward forgiveness, which can be the hardest part. We might not feel capable of letting go of the hurt. We might feel it’s impossible to forgive, or to forget, the wrongs that have been committed against us. We might feel the person in question is an unhealthy influence on our lives. How do we go about forgiving the people who have hurt us?
Addressing Deep Issues
Having forgiveness can be a challenging process because we’re addressing issues we’ve been avoiding for quite some time. We might have been afraid to confront certain subjects, and even more afraid to bring them up with the people who’ve hurt us. We might be afraid to communicate with people we have a hard time interacting with. We might fear they’ll hurt us again, or that we’ll crack under the pressure and not be able to speak our minds. We can have fears around conflict that keep us from even engaging with sensitive subjects. We can have a hard time speaking up for ourselves and standing our ground when we’re in conflict with someone. For all these reasons, having forgiveness is a practice that we want to commit to working towards, and be patient with ourselves during the process.
Finding Tools to Help Us Forgive
Because dealing with conflict and issues that require forgiveness can be so fear-inducing, we might choose to work with a therapist, coach, or spiritual guide to help us with the process. We might want to write about our emotions or use creative self-expression to help us work through our feelings. We might want to write the person in question a letter rather than dealing with them in person. We might want to read more about forgiveness and find inspiration to help us along. To help us forgive the person who has hurt us, we might want to list the things we’re grateful for about them, the ways in which they’ve helped or supported us in the past, or all the things we love about them.
As we confront our fears and push through our resistance, we want to be self-nurturing and compassionate with ourselves, reminding ourselves that this is a challenging process to undergo. Let’s affirm to ourselves that we’re incredibly strong for summoning the courage it takes to even attempt to forgive someone who has hurt us.
The Guest House is a welcoming and supportive recovery home where you will be met with open arms, wherever you are on your journey, without judgment or expectation.
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