The Importance of Forgiveness

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Forgiveness can reduce depression and anxiety and may even be associated with greater longevity.

Lingering resentment can prolong the body's stress response, potentially affecting immunity.

Some wounds are too deep to forgive, but releasing self-blame can be a powerful path to healing.

Forgiveness as a concept can be incendiary and polarizing.

Some view forgiveness as surrender, a form of exonerating an abuser and accepting bad behavior. They see it as a shrugging of the shoulders and giving someone who has hurt them deeply a free pass.

Yet others view it as anything but. They see it as liberation, a way to free themselves from the hold of someone who has caused them harm, a path to moving on.

At its core, forgiveness is about releasing your resentment over a past hurt and giving yourself permission to move from a place of pain to a life where you can flourish without being weighed down by an injustice. It is like removing a proverbial backpack that has been weighing you down. It’s a mindset that releases you from being chained to the past and to the event that harmed you.

Of course, some wounds are too deep, some acts too horrific, to forgive the person who inflicted them. That choice deserves respect. But there is another form of forgiveness that can be restorative: forgiving ourselves.

When we have been deeply hurt, at times we turn the blame inward. We ask, Could I have prevented what happened? Self-forgiveness means accepting the event was beyond our control and that we cannot alter the past. It releases blame that was never ours to bear, and extends to ourselves the compassion we might readily offer others.

After all, forgiveness is not about what we owe another person. It's a choice we make for ourselves. We forgive so that the........

© Psychology Today