Miracles News

Tweet

April-June, 2013

Understanding Forgiveness

by Rev. Mary Beth Ellis, O.M.C.

Forgiveness is probably the most important spiritual lesson for many reasons, one of which is that our lives depend on it.

To truly forgive we need to understand the why’s and how’s of how it works. As with any fix-it project, the most important factor, after the decision to repair something, is to use the right tools. Without the proper tools, all the determination in the world usually results in little change. We are fortunate to have these tools today. I wish I’d had them at 16. I wish I’d had them at 30 when I was blaming the world for my problems. I wish I’d used them yesterday when I felt slighted by one of God’s children, and condemned him in my mind.

Historically there have been three major steps in the development of Judeo-Christian spirituality. Out of the chaos of our animal ancestors and Cro-Magnon man’s habit of randomly killing to get whatever food and territory the other had, a giant step in our spiritual evolution arose. Some tribes quit randomly killing anyone in their way. They would only kill the tribes of a tribesman who had harmed them. The whole tribe was mercilessly slaughtered — but it wasn’t done randomly, but to avenge a wrong. Then another giant spiritual step was taken.

With the advent of Judaism and the teachings of Moses, a second giant spiritual step was taken. The Jews were admonished to live by the dictum of, An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Instead of punishing a whole tribe for what one member had done, only the person who had transgressed was accountable. Think what peace ensued and how much more sane life must have become.

Then somewhere around 2,000 years after Moses came another Jew who introduced the 3rd major spiritual step — a revolutionary idea that changed Western culture. He asked us to turn the other cheek. He lived his idea by forgiving sinners and even asking God to forgive his crucifiers for they ‘know not what they do.’ Lest we think that idea of forgiving too daunting for ordinary men, Christ very clearly said, These things that I do, ye shall do also.

We see instances of forgiveness everywhere. It is possible. When the Dali Lama was asked if he had forgiven the Chinese communists for invading Tibet, stealing their land and mercilessly killing countless Buddhist priests and monks, he answered that he had forgiven them because he understood that they were doing the only thing they were programmed to do. He saw that the Chinese soldiers were like a wind-up toy soldier that had been made to stand straight until a child wound it up and set it on its course. Even if one of these toy soldier’s tracks spilt milk all over the floor or scratched the antique chair, few sane people would have issues with forgiving it. Everyone understands that it was just doing what it was constructed and programmed to do. The Dali Lama understood that about men. We are programmed by hundreds of thousands of years of instincts. We are programmed by society

Let us now turn to the real crux of the issue of forgiveness. Why should we forgive everyone for everything and how in the world do we do it?

There are many reasons why we should forgive:

1. First of all, it’s just the right thing to do. Probably most people would like to be able to do it. It’s mature. It’s noble. It’s respectable.

2. Secondly, forgiveness sets us free ­— free from the negative energy that consumes us when we don’t, from the negative emotions that make us sick, and from the torture that we inflict upon ourselves as a result.

Dr. Hans Seelye won the Nobel Prize in 1937 for his “stress theory.” He said that there is a chain of factors precipitating all diseases, but that the stress link was the common denominator. For example, for polio there are a number of links, the polio bacillus, a somewhat compromised immune system, fatigue being some of them. But if a person doesn’t have stress, even if he has all the rest of the polio links in the chain, the person won’t contract the disease.

Not forgiving, holding inside the negative emotions of not doing so, causes stress and depression. Many doctors have written about the correlation of stress and depression to diseases like cancer. Not forgiving is a spiritual cancer.

3. The third reason for forgiving is that it brings us closer to God. If He made us in his image and likeness, and if He is all good and loves all His children unconditionally, shouldn’t we want to be more Godlike, more like who we are, and see the good and God in everyone? We are all part of God. In the East, people say “Namaste” when they encounter others. It means, “I salute the God in you.” Namaste.

We all know that we should forgive, so let’s get on with the real biggy: How do we forgive? What are the tools? How can we get to a point where it is sure and even automatic in our lives?

Most of the tools involve a greater understanding of the process and the psychological awareness of how our minds and programming work. Just going to church and hearing about it doesn’t always make forgiveness possible for most of us. Going to church doesn’t make us a good Christian any more than standing in a garage makes us a car.

It takes understanding and awareness, but it is also up to each of us to practice. Just being aware and admitting to ourselves that we aren’t forgiving someone is a huge step. Most people repress it. But ultimately we have to: 1) be aware that we aren’t forgiving, 2) understand the process, and then 3) practice, practice, practice, until our original fumbles go on to a touchdown.

So we come to the first tool which has two sides: a) awareness and b) turning it over to God. Awareness means simply allowing ourselves to admit that we are harboring negative, unforgiving thoughts about ourselves and others. If we don’t own up to it, we’ll never be able to deal with it and cure it. If someone is in denial about being ill, he or she usually won’t be able to cure the malady. Sometimes the result of looking at these thought processes is alcohol, drugs, or ‘schitzing’ out — or some other form of buffering it out. *This inability to be a forgiving person makes us feel separate from others, separate from God, separate from the All. Often we can’t accept what we see because we feel guilty and we condemn and won’t forgive ourselves.

Some Eastern religions say that one should not change anything for a period of time after seeing an issue. If you start noticing that you aren’t a forgiving person, just notice all the times you aren’t. Don’t try to change yourself right away, or you will be inclined to buffer it out. The ego doesn’t like seeing these things.

Once we have clearly seen and had time to digest what it is that we want to deal with about ourselves, we need to realize that all that we have seen should simply serve as a learning experience in the school of spirituality. It can help us see where there is an opportunity to see differently and be free. The last thing we should do is not forgive ourselves. It’s then that we must remember part B of this tool: b) turn it over to God and ask to see the situation differently. We needn’t use our egos to forge a battle against it. That is just playing into the old habits of letting our self-serving egos that got us into the situation in the first place get us out. We need to a) identify what we aren’t forgiving and then b) sincerely ask the Holy Spirit to help us see the situation differently. We simply need to realize that we are powerless with our special anti-forgiveness programming that we inherited through evolution and from society that often corrupts. We no longer need to kill our prey to eat. We don’t need to wipe out our neighbors to be safe. We don’t need all those instincts any more. In fact, the remnants of that programming are counter productive in our society. We may have some remnants of the fight or flight tendencies, the vengeful thoughts, and our egos even have the reasoning power to figure out ways why forgiveness doesn’t apply to a certain situation. We may feel powerless when dealing with the vestiges of the very traits which helped our genes survive. But if we admit to ourselves that we are powerless and then turn it over to God, the answer will always come — maybe not in three minutes or even a day, but it will come. “Ask and it shall be given.” Our Higher Selves know the answer right now. It is within our power to forgive. If we turn it over to God and then listen for the answer, peace will come in a form you will recognize.

So tool #1 is to let yourself clearly see when you aren’t being forgiving and then to turn it over to God and ask that He help you see the situation differently. And, of course, don’t fail to forgive yourself for not being perfect.

Another tool is visualization. Imagine the person whom you can’t forgive as a newborn baby. Imagine that adorable, innocent, precious child smiling at you and reaching for your love. Then it starts screaming during your important conversation with its parent. You’re irritated, but it’s not hard to forgive the newcomer to planet earth for being hungry, sick or in need of attention. The baby is just doing what babies do. Fast forward 40 years. The baby is fully programmed. This baby in a man’s suit, was allowed to watch the wrong programs, meet the wrong people, play the wrong video games. He steals your wallet or idea at work. He is mean to you. Maybe that baby, for whatever reason, grew up physically, but never did psychologically. Its adult self is still crying out for love, screaming to get what it wants, spitting up on people, if it needs something. The baby who didn’t understand that its demands for being the center of its universe weren’t acceptable in society has matured physically but is dwarfed psychologically. It never grew up.

Scott Peck, who wrote The Road Less Travelled, also wrote a book called People of the Lie. Those are the people who only grow up physically and who commit terrible crimes because they still believe they are the center of the world. Dr. Peck refers to this phenomenon as pure narcissism — the adult stays psychologically dwarfed as a baby.

We are all narcissistic at times, but most of us sooner or later realize we aren’t the center of the universe and we develop compassion for others. We don’t metaphorically scream and throw toys or shoot people ‘til we get what we want. Some of our brothers never had that opportunity, and they became hardened criminals — maybe even serial killers. It might be helpful for us to visualize them as Scott Peck suggested — as overgrown babies who are still narcissistically demanding and taking what they want, with no thought to the inconvenience and pain it causes others. Some don’t have the capacity.

Now our society has carefully decided what the social contract is that we are all to abide by, and it has decided what should be done to those who don’t or can’t live in accordance with it. That is not the issue here. I’m merely suggesting a tool. The tool of imaging the “sinners” in our lives — those who don’t say and do what we want them to — as grown narcissistic babies, no different from a mentally or physically challenged adult who can’t function. This tool of imaging can be helpful to work with until we learn to use more complex spiritual tools.

So the second tool is to visualize the person we can’t forgive as the innocent baby that he was originally, before the damaged child got corrupted. We can never judge a man until we’ve walked in his moccasins. We never know how physically, socially or psychologically damaged another might be.

There is God in everyone, and most people who do bad things probably wish they hadn’t done it or hadn’t needed to do it to survive. Do we condemn Jean Valjean in Les Miserables for stealing the loaf of bread from the baker so that the young child wouldn’t die of starvation? He served his 20 years for being a thief, but do we find it hard to forgive him? Many people honestly feel like what they do is right. Many can’t help it. Some are too damaged not to. Some just don’t think. But if we condemn them in our hearts, we are hurting one of God’s children and ourselves. We are also exhibiting a kind of insanity ourselves for thinking that the world and others should be just like we want them to be, like the psychotic who thinks he’s Napoleon and that everyone should salute and obey him and be exactly as he wants them to be, and not who they are.

Another, and the most complex of these tools is one that we all learn in Psychology 101. It is the tool of projection recognition. It tells us that when we feel bad about ourselves and can’t accept it, we often project what we think of ourselves onto others and then judge them. This creates an unreal, uncomfortable world that is founded on myth. It creates confusion, more negativity and separation. We feel that we have done or thought something unworthy, like being selfish, rude or controlling, and then we see another as selfish, rude or controlling, and we judge and condemn them. We thus don’t have to deal with it in ourselves.

We think that we aren’t supposed to be selfish — we can’t accept it in ourselves so we project it on Henry or Jane Doe and we hate them for their vile actions. Jane took the last portion of chicken. Henry didn’t give you credit for your idea in the workplace. It’s not to say they didn’t do these things, but the judgment, often hate, and certainly not forgiving these things is more charged because that’s exactly what you have condemned yourself for and suppressed. We then project it onto another and deal with it there.

There’s a saying, “If you spot it, you’ve got it.” I suppose that some true sociopaths or psychopaths can escape these guilt feelings, but most of us feel bad about ourselves when we don’t live an exemplary life. The result is that our unconscious knows what is going on, just as the man in the mental ward knows on some level that he’s not Napoleon, yet he lives his life in an insane quagmire. So, tool #3 is an awareness of the fact that we often project our guilt onto others and then find them hard to forgive.

So the logical conclusion to this phenomenon is to Stop, Look, and Listen. Stop your monkey-mind thoughts and see what’s going on so clearly that nothing is between you and the reality — no judgments, no emotional responses, no suppression. Look carefully at what is going on. Are you judging another for something that you yourself feel about yourself? Forgive yourself. Turn the tendency of self-condemnation over to God. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you see it differently. Then listen to the answer. It’s all just a spiritual learning experience.

We need to forgive ourselves. When we do, there is no longer a need to project what we don’t forgive onto another. Then the miracle of forgiveness happens automatically and sets us free to be at one with Holy Spirit and others. Peace, balance and love can enter our lives. This principle is interesting, because by forgiving others of their “sin,” we are forgiving what we have suppressed in us. By forgiving ourselves, we won’t have to project the “sin” onto another.

So, the third and often most difficult tool, is to look at the things that we can’t forgive in others, consider that it’s a symbol for something we can’t forgive in ourselves, and ask God’s help in forgiving ourselves. Realize that it’s just a learning experience, and nothing to feel bad about — and then enjoy the peace and the realization that you have taken a huge step in your spiritual growth. You are also free to live your life with this part of yourself healed.

When really looking at this idea of forgiveness, I am probably most struck by something from A Course in Miracles workbook. It says about forgiveness that, if we do, Your brothers stand released with you… God’s Son will weep no more… Heaven offers thanks for the increase of joy your practice brings even to it… I hear the Voice That God has given me, and it is only This my mind obeys.

Jesus said, Forgive them, for they know not what they do.

May we all have the willingness to bring understanding to the process of forgiving so that we may do so and be more like the Christ. May we thus be liberated from living a life separate from God and His children. May we practice until we have gained the peace and joy that is ours to have.

© 2013, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a Friend

Printable Page

Back to main page of Miracles News.

Has this page been helpful to you?
Your contribution to support this site is greatly appreciated. To make a tax deductible contribution with a credit/debit card, click here.
Click here to donate from your PayPal account.
Or send a check to Pathways of Light, 12530 Lions Chase Court, Huntley, IL 60142.