Regarding the process of forgiveness, I know that the Enright Process Model is flexible, allowing individuals to move forward or backward based on their personal progress. What is the minimum requirement (in terms of specific steps or psychological state) for someone to be considered to have achieved forgiveness within this model?
There are at least three indications that the person has forgiven: a) because part of the process is to understand what forgiveness is and is not, a person is able to self-evaluate whether or not the process is relatively complete. Please keep in mind that forgiveness is not a perfect activity. In other words, a person still may have residual anger or sadness remaining, but as long as the person is in control of his or her emotions, rather than having the emotions control the person, then it is safe to assume that the person has forgiven; b) as the late Lewis Smedes said in his 1984 book, Forgive and Forget, you know you have forgiven a person when you wish that person well; c) we have, free of charge at our International Forgiveness Institute, the Enright Forgiveness Inventory Short-Form that consists of 30 items with a range of scores from 30 to 180. A general approach is that if a person can score above the median of 105, then it is likely that the person has forgiven the one who was unjust.
