Tagged: “psychology today”
Some people forgive better than other people. Is this because of certain neurotransmitters in the brain?
I have an essay at Psychology Today entitled, “Does Your Brain Cause You to Forgive?” My answer is no. Instead, I think it is continual practice of the moral virtue of forgiveness that makes certain people excellent in the forgiveness process. Here is a link to that Psychology Today essay:
Does Your Brain Cause You to Forgive?
Correcting Forgiveness Misconceptions and Distortions
Misconceptions and distortions are nothing new to most professionals—particularly to the professionals who employ forgiveness interventions and forgiveness therapy. Since the first empirically based study on person-to-person forgiveness was published in the social sciences (Enright et al., 1989), there has been vigorous debate on exactly what forgiveness is and is not.
That debate has generally been positive and helpful in the overall evolution of forgiveness from a simple concept (and primarily a religious credo) to a vitally important mental health approach for many people who have been victimized. At the same time, there still are a few in the mental health professions who are criticizing forgiveness with some good points but also with some errors.
Those who dispense misinformation about forgiveness prevent many individuals from
choosing forgiveness when they could truly benefit from deep emotional recovery.
Dr. Robert Enright
Dr. Enright, co-founder of the International Forgiveness Institute (IFI) and the man labeled “the forgiveness trailblazer” by Time magazine, has been using scientific research methods to study forgiveness for more than 35 years. Whenever he learns about an inaccurate or erroneous premise that is being circulated, he tries to address it head-on. That’s exactly what he did just this week by factually countering an essay published on Feb. 20 in Psychology Today.
The essay, “Why Forgiveness Isn’t Required in Trauma Recovery,” was written by a Chicago psychotherapist who is also a speaker and author. While acknowledging that “I’ve witnessed the benefits of forgiveness for many of my clients,” the author’s main contention is that “forgiveness is potentially problematic when incorporated into trauma treatment.”
While Dr. Enright says he has heard all those erroneous assertions before, he quickly drafted his own essay providing fact-based and true-to-life counter arguments for each of the claims. His goal in doing so, he says, was not to heavily criticize, but instead “to protect the integrity of a genuine process of forgiveness, free of confusions of what forgiveness is and is not.”
Dr. Enright’s critique of the original essay was published on Feb. 26 by Psychology Today. While the publication gave his clarifying discourse the same title as the original Feb. 20 article, it added a significant subtitle, “Why Forgiveness Isn’t Required in Trauma Recovery: Published misconceptions of forgiveness may discourage people from trying it.”
The blog essay by “the father of forgiveness research” (the title bestowed on Dr. Enright by The Christian Science Monitor) provides 5 succinct and factual responses to the original article’s 5 contentions. It also clarifies two points on which he agrees with the article: 1) “forgiveness after unjust behaviors is not necessarily for everyone;” and, 2) “as a moral virtue, forgiveness never ever should be forced onto anyone.”
Dr. Enright is no stranger to Psychology Today. In fact, in the past 5 years he has penned nearly 100 blog essays as part of his own dedicated column for the publication’s website called “The Forgiving Life.” Those blog posts have been accessed online more than a million times–an average of 548 times per day since he began writing them.
According to Dr. Enright, he will continue his efforts to provide information to Psychology Today readers and he will continue to clarify points when there appear to be misunderstandings about forgiveness and forgiveness therapy so that both therapists and clients can make informed decisions.
LEARN MORE:
- Read the original article: “Why Forgiveness Isn’t Required in Trauma Recovery”
- Read Dr. Enright’s critique of that article: “Published Misconceptions of Forgiveness May Discourage People from Trying It”
- View Dr. Enright’s “Top Ten Psychology Today Blogs”
- Access all of Dr. Enright’s “Psychology Today Blogs“
Dr. Enright’s Forgiveness Essays Reach One Million Views
What is the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the phrase “one million?”
- One million dollars?
- One million stars in the sky?
- One million pebbles of sand on a beach?
For Dr. Robert Enright, the psychologist who is often called “the father of forgiveness research,” the term one million gained a new significance recently when he learned that the blog column he writes for Psychology Today has surpassed one million views.
“When I first began studying forgiveness 36-years ago, it was extremely difficult to find even one single academic article on the subject,” says Dr. Enright. “The fact that my blog essays have been read more than one million times during the past few years is an extraordinary story of how important forgiveness has become in our lives.”
Appropriately called “The Forgiving Life,” (the same title as one of Dr. Enright’s most popular books), the Psychology Today column authored by Dr. Enright focuses on how forgiveness benefits individual, family, and community health. At the publication’s request, Dr. Enright wrote his first Psychology Today forgiveness essay in December 2016. Since then, he has written 93 blog entries as part of the series, all of which are available on the publication’s website.
Dr. Enright’s Psychology Today blogs have been accessed online an average of
548 times per day since he began writing them.
Here is a list of 10 of Dr. Enright’s most popular Psychology Today blogs (with hyperlinks to the actual articles):
- Afraid of Mingling with the Relatives This Holiday Season?
- A Message for All Who Bristle at the Idea of Forgiving
- How Forgiving Are You? Take the Forgiveness Test
- 6 Things to Consider Before Reconciling with an Ex
- Whom Do I Forgive in the COVID-19 Crisis?
- Finding True Love: 7 Questions to Ask Your Potential Partner
- Are Some Acts Completely Unforgiveable?
- Why Forgiveness Is Heroic
- Five Forgiveness Exercises for Couples
- Why We Need Forgiveness Education
“My Psychology Today essays are designed to pose a challenge to everyone who reads them,” Dr. Enright says. “I want readers to consider whether they can incorporate forgiveness into their everyday interactions so that they can become more compassionate while at the same time becoming healthier. I call it becoming forgivingly fit.”
You can access all 93 of Dr. Enright’s Psychology Today blogs at The Forgiving Life.
According to the website’s Author Profile page:
Robert Enright, Ph.D., is a professor of educational psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, a licensed psychologist, and the founding board member of the International Forgiveness Institute, Inc., who pioneered the social scientific study of forgiveness. He is the author of over 120 publications, including seven books: Exploring Forgiveness, Helping Clients Forgive, Forgiveness Is a Choice, Rising Above the Storm Clouds (for children), The Forgiving Life, 8 Keys to Forgiveness, and Forgiveness Therapy. His colleagues and he have developed and tested a pathway to forgiveness, called Forgiveness Therapy, that has helped incest survivors, people in drug rehabilitation, in hospice, in shelters for abused women, and in cardiac units of hospitals, among others. Enright has developed Forgiveness Education programs for teachers in Belfast, Northern Ireland, Athens, Greece, Liberia, Africa, and Galilee, Israel.
In your experience, are people more critical of others who are unjust or of themselves when they break their own standards?
I find that people are more critical of themselves than they are of others. Many people find it difficult to welcome themselves back into the human community once they have behaved badly. I discuss this issue in a Psychology Today blog centered on self-loathing here:
The Cure for Self-Loathing? Self-Forgiveness
2020: A Year We Will Always Remember
Do you remember 2019, the year before last year? It was a year plagued by worldwide unrest, hurricanes, and societal conflicts. When it mercifully sputtered to its end, people sang and drank and danced happily on its grave, assured that 2020 surely would be a much better year.
For a few months, it was. But then, thanks primarily to what was first labeled a “miniscule coronavirus” discovered in a far-away land, 2020 turned out to be much worse for many millions of people around the world. It was one of the most challenging years in modern history—a year to forget, but one we will always remember.
Yet, as a forgiveness researcher and co-founder of the International Forgiveness Institute (IFI), I am proud to report that despite its many challenges, 2020 turned out to be our most productive year ever since I began studying forgiveness three decades ago.
HERE ARE JUST A FEW OF OUR NOTABLE ACCOMPLISHMENTS FOR 2020:
1) We completed and had published 11 significant scientific research projects. I was able to team up with a different group of uniquely-qualified specialists for each of those projects. Covering a wide range of cultural diversity, and encompassing studies in seven countries with both adult and child participants, those studies included:
- Development and implementation of a totally new forgiveness tool—The Enright Group Forgiveness Inventory–that has important implications for world peace. As part of that project, we tested the tool in China, Taiwan, Slovenia, and the U.S. It will soon be available on the IFI website at no cost to researchers.
- Completion of three “peace education initiatives” in China, Iran, and the U.S. that are designed to inspire and engage educators, students, and community leaders. I continue projects like these because I genuinely believe that forgiveness is the missing piece to the peace puzzle and that the IFI must continue its mission of “Healing Hearts, Building Peace.”
- Seven other projects documenting how Forgiveness Therapy can positively impact the homeless and those in prison, help prevent bullying (Spain), assist female acid attack victims in Pakistan (a significant social issue there), and others.
+ See all the 2020 IFI Research Projects +
2) As recognition and adoption of our Forgiveness Therapy interventions grows, I was able to develop and deliver more than a dozen targeted forgiveness presentations in the U.S. as well as in Scotland (Edinburgh), Northern Ireland (Belfast), and Slovakia (Bratislava) during 2020. Audiences included cancer treatment specialists, pediatricians, oncologists, and other medical specialists; prison maximum security staff and inmates; school administrators and teachers; and university faculty, research associates, and students.
+ See the full list of 2020 Forgiveness Presentations +
3) Responding to frequent requests from national and international news reporters, I was able to complete media interviews, podcasts and video productions in Spain, Germany, Italy, Israel, Canada and a variety of U.S. locations. One of those podcasts—hosted and broadcast by Dr. Alexandra Miller, a popular family relations psychologist—was downloaded by individuals in 225 US cities and 22 foreign countries in just the first three weeks after it was recorded.
+ See the entire list of 2020 Media Engagements +
4) In addition to all that activity, I managed to continue our promotion of the immeasurable benefits of forgiveness and Forgiveness Therapy by:
- Authoring 12 new forgiveness-related blogs for Psychology Today;
- Originating 12 additional blogs for “Our Forgiveness Blog” on the IFI website; and,
- Providing written responses on our website for 208 “Ask Dr. Forgiveness” questions.
Yes, 2020 was a ground-breaking, record-setting year for the science of forgiveness, for the International Forgiveness Institute and for me personally. At the same time, the pandemic has helped us realize that life is too short to be unhappy. Living in the moment matters. Being there for the people you love matters. And it gives us the chance to add to our Unfolding Love Story.
There is one sure way to get rid of your unhappiness: Make this year the one when you learn to forgive. If you live a forgiving life, I guarantee it will be a happier and healthier life.
Robert
