IFI News

The Amazing Benefits of Forgiveness Therapy on Cancer Patients

October 3, 2018 No comments

Time magazine has called Dr. Robert Enright “the forgiveness trailblazer” because of his groundbreaking scientific discoveries related to how forgiveness favorably impacts both emotional and physical health. Now the doctor (a Ph.D., not a physcian) is working with medical specialists in Europe to discover if forgiveness can improve the health of patients with multiple myeloma–a cancer of cells in the immune system.

Dr. Enright will provide an update on his latest forgiveness challenge at the 17th Annual Fall Cancer Conference sponsored by the University of Wisconsin Carbone Cancer Center on Friday, Oct. 19, 2018, at the Monona Terrace in Madison, Wisconsin.

Advances in Multidisciplinary Cancer Care 2018 is the title of the day-long conference that will focus on “Unique Challenges Faced by Young Adults With Cancer.” Dr. Enright’s presentation begins at 2:00 pm and is entitled “Forgiveness as a Strengthening of Emotional Health in Cancer Patients and Their Families.”

While the conference is designed primarily for individuals who are involved in cancer treatment and education of cancer patients and their families, conference organizers are also encouraging patients, caregivers and community members to attend. For registration information, visit the 17th Annual Fall Cancer Conference website.

Forgiveness therapy for cancer patients is not a new endeavor for Dr. Enright. He and his colleagues completed a clinical trial nearly 10 years ago with cancer patients who were receiving end-of-life hospice care. That study found that as the patients’ physical health decreased, measures of emotional health increased if they completed forgiveness therapy.

Next, they completed a clinical trial with patients in cardiac units, where they observed a physical benefit to forgiveness: cardiac health measures, such as blood flow to the heart, increased in the patients on the intervention. Forgiveness therapy, then, has shown both palliative and physical benefits in medical settings.

“So now we’re working with physicians in Europe in regards to multiple myeloma,” Enright says. He explained that multiple myeloma is a cancer of cells in the immune system, that stress is known to compromise the immune system, and that forgiveness therapy has been demonstrated to reduce stress.

Interestingly, case studies in patients with low-grade multiple myeloma have already found disease stabilization if patients complete forgiveness therapy. Could forgiveness – a relatively inexpensive, non-drug-based intervention – become a part of some patients’ treatment plans? Enright and medical colleagues think the answer may be yes, and they are currently developing a clinical trial to understand if forgiveness improves myeloma patient health through measurable biological markers.

“That’s why next we need to do a clinical trial, for cause and effect,” Enright says. “The physicians will measure markers of immune system strength, and then I would bring the hope and anxiety scales to measure the psychological markers.”

Learn more and register for the 17th Annual Fall Cancer Conference.

After 50 Years of “Living as an Angry Person,” Forgiveness Brings Peace

September 26, 2018 No comments

WIBC-FM, Indianapolis, Indiana, USA – Although she is known around the world for forgiving the Nazis who tortured her during World War II, Eva Mozes Kor reveals in a newly-released film that she lived for nearly 50 years as an angry person before learning to forgive.

“I was very angry with many people. I was in a lot of pain,” said Kor as she reflected on her life and how uncomfortable she was baring her soul for the documentary “Eva” that was released in April.

“Forgive your worst enemies. It will heal your soul and it will set you free,” Kor says in the new film narrated by Ed Asner. It documents Kor’s life, her travels and struggles and how she became the person who was able to forgive the individuals who committed atrocities on her, and who killed her family and millions of other people.

Kor and her sister Miriam were the only survivors in their entire family and that was because they were twins who were separated from the others by the Nazis. Josef Mengele, a Nazi doctor, was fascinated with twins and performed experiments on Kor and her sister among others. The lingering effects are believed to be what killed her sister in 1992.

The Holocaust (in Hebrew, “Ḥurban” meaning “destruction”), was the systematic state-sponsored killing of six million Jewish men, women, and children and millions of others by Nazi Germany and its collaborators during World War II. The Germans called this “the final solution to the Jewish question.”

Even before the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, they had made no secret of their desire to eliminate all Jews. As early as 1919, had written, “Rational anti-Semitism (discrimination against the Jews), must lead to systematic legal opposition.…Its final objective must unswervingly be the removal of the Jews altogether.”

In his political manifesto, Mein Kampf (“My Struggle”), Hitler further developed the idea of the Jews as an evil race struggling for world domination. Nazi racial ideology  characterized the Jews as  “subhumans” and “parasites” while the Aryans (Germans) were the “genius” race. Ultimately, the logic of Nazi racial anti-Semitism led to annihilation of millions of Jews. 

A New Film About Archbishop Desmond Tutu –THE FORGIVEN

September 16, 2018 No comments

ScreenAfrica, Johannesburg, South Africa – Two decades after the Truth and Reconciliation Commission addressed South Africa’s violent history of racial segregation, a new film returns to that time to grapple with the terrible truths of apartheid and its legacy.

a film by award-winning director Roland Joffé, is a fictionalised account of Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s efforts as the head of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to confront the atrocities of apartheid in an attempt to heal and unite South Africa.

“This is a subject that’s both social and political but also rather personal, because let’s be honest, we’ve all done things in our lives that we need forgiveness for, that we haven’t come to terms with,” Joffe says of the film. “We’re all prisoners of our history, whether it’s social, cultural or family.”

The drama follows Archbishop Tutu and his struggle – morally and intellectually – with a brutal murderer and member of a former apartheid-era hit squad over redemption and forgiveness.

According to the producers, the story is poignant and timely. “It reminds us of Archbishop Tutu’s gift of forgiveness and the healing it brings, and we are honoured to tell this story.”

“The film is a tribute to the remarkable and healing power of forgiveness and the outstanding compassion and courage of those who offered love and forgiveness as an antidote to hate and inhumanity.”
– Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Archbishop Tutu was honored with the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize for his opposition to South Africa’s brutal apartheid regime. His willingness to forgive those who tortured him, his nonviolent path to liberation, and his ability to articulate the suffering and expectations of South Africa’s oppressed masses made him a living symbol in the struggle for liberation.

The film will be released worldwide on Oct. 5, 2018. You can watch the film trailer at The Forgiven.

Archbishop Tutu, an Honorary Member of the International Forgiveness Institute Board of Directors, is the author of several books including:

 

7 Unscrupulous Traits of People Who are Unwilling to Forgive

September 13, 2018 No comments

Montreal, Canada– A just-released study by PsychTests.com indicates that an unwillingness to forgive others is associated with some rather unscrupulous traits, including a propensity for manipulation and vindictiveness.

Collecting data from nearly 1,000 people who took their Integrity and Work Ethics Test, researchers at PsychTests discovered that those who are unwilling to forgive others exhibit an uncharacteristically high propensity for:

 

  • Vindictiveness
  • Schadenfreude (taking pleasure in the misery of others) 
  • Manipulation 
  • Cynical view of humanity 
  • Disdain for weakness in others
  • Disdain for gullible people
  • Sense of Entitlement 

ON THE FLIP-SIDE

People who exhibit a willingness to show mercy and to forgive, the study revealed, also possess other commendable traits, including:

 

  • Willingness to practice discretion
  • Trustworthiness 
  • Remorsefulness 
  • Accountability
  • Altruism 

“You don’t have to forgive someone who has wronged you — that is your prerogative. But it’s important to understand that forgiveness is a release, a form of catharsis,” explains Dr. Ilona Jerabek, president and CEO of PsychTests.

“When you truly forgive someone, you are essentially giving yourself the freedom to release all the negative energy you have been holding onto — the sadness, the sense of betrayal, the anger, the bitterness, the desire for vengeance,” according to Dr. Jerabek.

“Holding on to these feelings for too long will sap your sense of joy and peace of mind,” Dr. Jerabek adds. “It’s a waste of emotional energy, and serves no purpose but to remind you of the past. The only way to let go of the pain is to learn to forgive.”

About PsychTests AIM Inc. 
Since its founding in 1996, PsychTests has become a pre-eminent provider of psychological assessment products and services to human resource personnel,  executive and life coaches, therapists and counselors, sport psychologists, and academic researchers.

Want to assess your integrity? Take the Integrity and Work Ethics Test

Want to find out how smart you are? Try this IQ test and find out where you stand! Classical IQ Test 

To learn more about psychological testing, download this free eBook: Spotting Diamonds in the Rough

To learn about Dr. Robert Enright’s 4 phases of forgiveness, visit: How to Forgive

Forgiveness gives you a second chance for a meaningful and happy life

September 10, 2018 No comments

Editor’s Note: We asked a recent graduate of our Online Forgiveness Education Course to tell us about her experience with the course. Here is the response from life coach Emily Atallah:

Through my work as an existential logotherapeutic coach, I help people find meaning in everything in their life, including work, family relationships, and in situations where they face insurmountable suffering. I do this mainly by working with the power of forgiveness.

In my home country, Colombia, forgiveness seems like an impossible task for many. With a history of more than 60 years marked by war, drug trafficking and constant conflict, entire populations have now had to confront a hard question: will they forgive those who horribly hurt them even if they never asked for forgiveness?

This made me look for ways I could help those clients who had to leave their home behind, fearing for their safety, and who came to a city that in more than one occasion, receives them with a hostile environment and not much help. Many people with deep wounds derived from the conflict and a past of violence, resentment and vengeance.

As I looked for ways to help, I researched many therapies, but with time, I found them temporary or incomplete. I also looked into the initiatives of religious groups, and though they were having some admirable results, they did not appeal to non-believers.

Then I heard about the International Forgiveness Institute, and all their research on how forgiveness is a psychological matter, not only a religious one. I was personally impressed by their focus on forgiveness’ impact on psychological issues such as anxiety, depression, and others as measurable variables. For me, it meant that now we can present evidence that forgiveness works and can in fact change hearts!

Finding meaning and forgiveness in a life full of resentments is crucial to heal.  To see the offender as a human being and giving them what they deserve in dignity and love, changes your life and theirs.  It restores justice even without reconciliation.

Emily Atallah with her Forgiveness CE Course Certificate of Completion.

Forgiveness gives you a second chance for a meaningful and happy life, an opportunity to live a better, healthier, fulfilling life where people reach for their dreams without the weight of resentful thoughts.

As a life coach, I found particularly reassuring and helpful to learn that forgiveness has a measurable impact on the people I treat despite what the offense was. My time studying at the Forgiveness Institute gave me more tools to better treat my clients, to measure their progress and to encourage them to strive for a better and more meaningful life.

I encourage you to give yourself the opportunity to see forgiveness in a new light and learn about its healing power, by taking the online “Forgiveness Therapy” course through the International Forgiveness Institute.

To learn more about the writer please visit her website: Emily Atallah Coach de vida