Forgiveness
6 Different Approaches to Forgiving: Which Is Yours?
People have different motivations when forgiving. Six are described here.
Posted June 18, 2019
When people are treated unjustly by others, there is a natural tendency to be emotionally hurt by those actions. After all, people have a right to be treated fairly and so the hurt reflects this reality.
Sometimes that hurt leads to anger and then to stronger anger of resentment and even at times to hatred. To repair the inner turmoil and to re-establish a broken relationship, some people choose to forgive.
Forgiveness is the deliberate choice to be good to those who were not good to the forgiver. This can be hard work that takes time.
To forgive is not to make a quick decision of "I forgive you" and then all is well. The forgiver needs time to work through the process, to begin seeing the humanity in the other, to develop some compassion toward the other, and if reconciliation is to occur, re-establish trust.
To forgive is not to find excuses for the unjust behavior, or to abandon the quest for justice, or necessarily to reconcile until trust is seen as reasonable.
As offended people make the decision to forgive and understand what it is, there are, characteristically, six different motivations through which people approach the process of forgiving. As I describe each, try to see which one is typical for you.
Forgiveness Approach 1. The most typical announcement I hear in conversation, in popular media, and even in journal articles is this: "Forgiveness is for you." If a person is feeling disrupted by the ongoing anger, then forgiving is one scientifically supported way of ridding oneself of the excessive anger. The motive is self-care.
While anger may not be erased entirely, people often say that now the anger is not controlling them. While it is true that forgiving lessens anger, this does not mean that such a consequence defines forgiveness or the forgiveness process.
There is nothing wrong with forgiving to get rid of anger because this is good self-care. If one has a throbbing knee, seeking help for this is not selfish, but self-pertaining for one's own good. We just have to be careful, given how popular this Forgiveness Approach is, not to think of forgiveness as a process only for the self.
Why? This is because it could end up distorting forgiveness as a moral virtue. Moral virtues are for other people. For example, to practice justice is to give others what they deserve. To be patient is to refrain from censure toward another who is not moving at a pace you deem reasonable. Moral virtues express goodness toward others, and so does forgiveness.
To summarize this approach: I forgive for myself. Again, this is not at all dishonorable but implies that one is hurting and needs to do something about this.
Forgiveness Approach 2. If moral virtues are for others, then one forgiveness approach is to deliberately forgive for the sake of the offending person. In this case, to forgive is to offer a hand up to the person who, to use a metaphor, has fallen into the pit. Forgiving offers the second chance for the sake of the other.
Sometimes people hurt us out of their own woundedness. As we realize this, we develop compassion for the other and thus our motivation is to help the other overcome those wounds so that the wounds are not passed to others. Forgiving, in this case, is an other-serving activity.
To summarize this approach: I forgive for the sake of the other who hurt me.
Forgiveness Approach 3. Here the forgiver thinks in "both/and" ways rather than "either/or" ways. The forgiveness is for both the one who offended and the self who was offended in the hope of a re-established and strong relationship.
Forgiveness in this circumstance needs the process of reconciliation in addition to the exercise of forgiving as a moral virtue. As the forgiver is good to the one who was not good to the forgiver, there is a need to see the offending person's remorse (or inner sorrow), repentance (apology), and recompense (trying to make things right, within reason). Forgiving, the offender's seeking of forgiveness, and reconciling, then, become a team.
To summarize this approach: I forgive in the hope of a better relationship.
Forgiveness Approach 4. After people practice forgiving over and over for months or years, they often tell me that they develop new insights about inner pain. They begin to see that there is just too much woundedness in the world and they become motivated to do their part to reduce that pain.
A scientifically supported way of pain reduction, following unjust treatment, is to forgive. Thus, people not only forgive to reduce pain in the self and the other, but they then have the added motivation of bringing the theme of forgiveness to other people so that they, too, have an opportunity to lessen their pain.
This motivation goes well beyond the one instance of forgiving. This motivation is to set in motion the possibility of having an effect on healing others who were never involved in an original offense against the forgiver.
To summarize this approach: I forgive and talk about forgiveness to lessen as much pain in as many people as I can.
Forgiveness Approach 5. I forgive as an end in and of itself. In this case, people are not as concerned about the effect of forgiving, on the reduction in pain, as they are about exercising forgiveness simply because it is good.
Regardless of the consequences of forgiving, whether or not it reduces pain and increases well-being, it is good and so the person will exercise it.
As an act of love toward others, this is a sufficient reason for practicing it. I find that when people are motivated to forgive by this selfless approach, then their own identities of who they are as persons begin to change in a positive direction.
Instead of thinking about forgiveness as an act, the people begin to see forgiving as a lifestyle, as a way of relating to others with unconditional love. Who they are begins to take new form: "I am someone who can love despite pain."
To summarize this approach: I forgive because forgiveness is good in and of itself.
Forgiveness Approach 6. Because many people profess a belief in a transcendent faith, their motivation goes beyond relief and repair in this world. Some people forgive because their particular belief system encourages it.
In this context, it is often the case that to be forgiven by the diety, the one who is offended by others needs to practice forgiveness. As a licensed psychologist, I find that this particular approach can worry some people.
I say this because I see this kind of thinking: "Uh-oh, I had better forgive or else I will not be forgiven by God and so I am eternally condemned." Yet, as I have studied this particular belief system to see if I can alleviate that worry, I find that many people misunderstand these issues coming from faith. In reflecting on the religious exhortation to forgive, I am convinced that the kind of thinking described here is incorrect.
Take, for instance, the Lord's Prayer in the Christian faith, in which people ask to be forgiven only as they forgive. Taken out of context by focusing exclusively on this one theme in the prayer, this idea seems to be a grim and perhaps scary command.
Yet, in its broader context, it is all about love. After all, the one who is praying begins with one of the most intimate and loving set of words by saying, "Our Father." In other words, the one who prays is saying, "I am in a loving relationship. My loving Father values forgiving. I, too, out of love, want to do the same. As I love my Father, I will forgive and be forgiven." This is a petition of love to uplift, not a grim obligation to bring a person down. The motivation here is to love God and to show it by forgiving.
To summarize this approach: I forgive out of love for God.
These approaches are not mutually exclusive. Some people have more than one motivation to forgive.
Six Approaches to Forgive: for self, for others, for a renewed relationship, for pain reduction in the world, for its own sake, and/or for the sake of love for God.
Which is your main approach and why?
