Tagged: “hurtful event”

How young can someone be to start forgiving?

We have found that pre-kindergarten children (age 4) and kindergarten children (age 5) are able to follow picture-book stories centered on family love.  This is an important foundation for learning how to forgive.  We have found through our scientific studies that children as young as 6-years-old can understand the causes and consequences to behavior.  They, therefore, can understand unjust actions by others (a cause) and the development of resentment in the offended person (a consequence). Further, these 6-year-old children then can understand that the resentment can be overcome by forgiving, which in some cases can restore relationships (if the other is willing to cooperate).

For additional information, see Your Kids Are Smarter Than You Think.

I am forgiving my husband for some really inappropriate behavior.  Even so, I cannot say that I feel any sense of freedom from all of my effort.  Does this mean that I have not forgiven?

We do not necessarily reach complete feelings of freedom upon forgiving because we sometimes have anger left over.  As long as the anger is not controlling you, and as long as you are not displacing that anger back onto your husband, then you very well may be forgiving or at least in the process of moving toward forgiving.  Has he altered the behavior that you say is inappropriate?  Sometimes there is the unfinished business of seeking justice toward a full reconciliation.  You might need to talk with him about the behavior and if he willingly changes, then this may help with your sense of freedom.

Learn more at Forgiveness for Couples.

I have been offended at least 10 times by my roommate for the same thing: coming in late, being noisy, and disrupting my sleep.  Do you recommend that I forgive each of these 10 incidents one at a time or can I forgive all at once for all of these?

I think you can forgive all at once for all of these, but at the same time, as you forgive, you should ask for fairness or justice from your roommate.  If the roommate had been unfair to you in, say, three entirely different ways, then you could forgive for each of these independent injustices.

For additional information, see Forgiveness Defined.

Have you changed anything about yourself since studying forgiveness?

I think I have become much more attuned to the suffering of others.  I now try to see beneath the surface of others to their inner world, particularly the woundedness that others carry silently within them, and I think there is a great deal of this woundedness in the world.

For additional information, see Choose Love, Not Hate.

I tried to expand my perspective of the one who hurt me. When I did this, I truly saw all sorts of hurts in this person.  Do you know what effect this had on me?  It made me not like myself because I now ask this: “How could I not have seen all of this before?” I think I am stupid and so now I am not liking myself very much.  Help!

Let us take comfort from Aristotle here.  This ancient Greek philosopher instructed us that it takes much time and effort to grow in each of the moral virtues such as justice, patience,  kindness, and forgiveness.  None of us is perfect as we try to exercise any of these virtues.  As part of the process of growing in the moral virtue of forgiveness, we are challenged to take this wider perspective on those who have been unjust to us.

I have found that it is quite rare for people to take this wider perspective without some instruction.  So, please be gentle with yourself.  You still are growing in this moral virtue.  You cannot be expected to be perfect in this process. So, as you take this longer perspective on the one who hurt you, please try to be encouraged that you, like most of the rest of us, do not automatically generate such thinking.

Therefore, you definitely are not, in your word, “stupid.” We are all on this journey of discovery and it is all right that we are not perfect at this point.  In fact, Aristotle counsels us that we never reach full perfection in any of the moral virtues.

For additional information, see Learning to Forgive Others.