Why Is It Difficult To Forgive? The Keys To Knowing How To Reconcile
Knowing how to forgive is a very important ability, especially if it is related to maintaining good social relationships, in addition to acquiring great importance during therapeutic processes.
However, it is not that easy. Sometimes it is difficult to accept the apologies of others and try to overcome the damage received. That is why many people wonder why it is difficult to forgive and it is something that we are going to look at in more depth below.
Forgiving is human, and, in fact, according to a study carried out at Yale University by Molly J. Crockett’s group, we are all born with this capacity.
However, As we grow, it becomes more and more difficult for us to forgive, either because we are afraid of being hurt again or because our personality is that of people with low tolerance for betrayal. Be that as it may, not forgiving becomes a defense mechanism, which, at times, can be detrimental to our correct socialization.
We must understand that forgiveness is not simply a set of behaviors towards a person who has done something unpleasant to us, but rather an attitude towards oneself. It is about not allowing circumstances that have been painful for us to become something that affects our way of being and contaminates our lives. With forgiveness you grow emotionally.
One of the reasons why it is so hard to forgive is that It is seen as a synonym for weakness It is often thought that, by forgiving someone who has hurt us, we are giving them free rein to do what they did to us again, in addition to not making them see what they did wrong. Actually, this is not so. Forgiveness does not mean that we accept what was done to us, but rather it is a way of allowing ourselves to move forward.
Forgiving is not an act of charity or submission, nor is it an act of humiliation or allowing abuse, but rather accepting that that person was wrong and, if they are aware of the damage they did, we allow them to evolve as a person. What he did to us must be taken into account as to when it was done, not generalizing it to the person’s way of being. This can be difficult, because whether it is because you are angry or sad, sometimes it is not possible to separate the negative event from the person who carried it out.
Forgiveness is as if it were a gift, not for the one who receives it, but for the one who gives it It is not that it becomes an act of tolerating the damage received, but rather accepting what has happened and trying to overcome negative feelings. Nothing should be expected from the other, especially if there has been a repeated precedent of having done harm. The goal of forgiveness is to learn that oneself is more important and to manage the pain.
Another reason that prevents us from forgiving others is the pain we are still feeling because of the harm they have done to us. This is especially visible when the act in question is very serious or the person who did it to us is someone we trusted almost blindly. It is usually very difficult to forgive betrayals from family, partners and friends, causing the trust we had in them to be greatly weakened. By loving these people intensely, the fact that they hurt us is something that is truly very painful.
In these types of situations, the disappointment experienced is very deep, given that we had formed expectations in relation to others When the clash between our expectations and reality occurs, disappointment appears, an emotion that arises from seeing that things are not as we expected. This is when emotions such as anger, anger, sadness and, of course, resentment arise.
The importance of forgiveness
When we are hurt, we express a whole series of feelings that, although adaptive, are negative and that, if maintained in the long term, can affect our health, both physical and mental. Resentment becomes a kind of aura that surrounds us and that becomes increasingly stronger remembering everything they have done to us and that has made us angry, feeding back and consuming us inside, in addition to negatively affecting our social relationships.
Forgiveness does not mean that things are solved by magic nor does it necessarily imply that there is reconciliation, however it does provide a certain relief, both for the injured person and for the person who hurt. With the act of forgiving we become wiser people and grow emotionally.
You have to make the wise decision to understand that We should not blame others for our own misfortunes, unless they have done very serious things to us, such as abuse, theft or infidelity. Always to the extent possible, you should accept what has happened, try to forgive and learn from the event, no matter how unpleasant it may be.
If it is not forgiven, the pain becomes chronic. It must be understood that the pain that arises from this type of situation is like an iceberg: the person who suffers from it only shows a small part of all the pain they really suffer. Forgiveness is like taking an icebreaker across that huge chunk of ice, breaking it up and making it much easier and faster to melt.
Everyone has made a bad decision at some point that ended up hurting them after a while. It is possible that when the decision was made, it was not up to the task Regardless of the seriousness of the issue, it is very important that we are human and, like everyone, we can make mistakes from time to time, but we must also allow ourselves to forgive ourselves. The decisions we make and the results, whether positive or negative, are part of our learning.
When the bad thing we have done comes back to wander through our minds, we have to try to tell it ‘Stop’, since it no longer has to come back nor claim a role that it already had at the time.
There is no need to beat yourself up. As the saying goes, ‘falling is allowed, getting up is an obligation’, that is, you can make mistakes but you must always move forward and learn from experience. One will not be able to forgive others if he has never forgiven himself.
