Written by Dr. Michael Ballard

It took me a long time to understand what it means to forgive someone.

Like most people, there have been times in my life when I have been hurt. And if I’m being honest, sometimes I didn’t want to forgive. I had been wronged, and the other person didn’t deserve my forgiveness. They hurt me, and maybe they weren’t even sorry for what they had done. Sometimes they lied about it. Maybe they justified their actions or made excuses. Or they didn’t want to talk about it. Other times they refused to apologize and then turned it on me, like somehow it was my fault and I had made them do it. Or they would apologize, only to do the same behavior all over again, which hurt even worse.

Forgiving someone who acts like that just didn’t feel natural. It didn’t feel right. I felt like by forgiving them I was letting them off the hook for what they had done, like I was telling them that their actions weren’t that bad. That’s ok. I’m not mad. It’s not so bad. Don’t worry about it…..

But that’s not how I felt. At all. Their behavior was not ok. It hurt. It was a big deal. I did not want to let them off the hook. Except this only made me feel worse. Sometimes I would ruminate about the hurt, thinking about it late at night when I couldn’t fall asleep. Other times it would distract me when I was at work or with my family. My head would spin and I could feel a gross pit in my stomach when I thought about what happened.

I didn’t deserve this torture. It just wasn’t fair.

And it also made me feel guilty. Shouldn’t I forgive them? Isn’t that the right thing to do? Wouldn’t a good person forgive? Especially a Christian! It’s what I’m supposed to do, right? Because of this, at times I would practice what I now call “cheap forgiveness.” I would guilt myself into forgiving someone, at least on the outside. “Oh, I forgave that person,” I’d say, even to myself. But on the inside nothing had changed. I was still angry and bitter. And it still hurt.

After too many sleepless nights of drinking this poison, I realized that I was only hurting myself. I was the one who was stressed out, losing sleep, and seething in anger and bitterness. The other person wasn’t. They weren’t torn up on the insides because of what happened. In fact, they probably weren’t thinking about what happened–or about me– at all. So after a lot of soul searching, I realized that forgiveness is not about accepting or excusing their behavior. It’s not about making excuses for the other person or saying what they did wasn’t that bad. That’s not actually what forgiveness means.

Forgiveness is about letting go.

Letting go of the hurt, the pain, the bitterness. And it’s about preventing their behavior from hurting me any longer. They already hurt me once. I don’t need to keep repeating the cycle by keeping the hurt alive in my heart. So if you’ve been hurt, don’t let the pain continue. Stop fanning the flames of bitterness and resentment. Stop letting the past continue to damage you. Learn to forgive–not in a cheap superficial way, but through real, deep forgiveness. It’s not a quick process, and it’s not easy.

I won’t pretend that it is, but neither is holding on to the hurt.

 

Dr. Michael Ballard began studying the importance of forgiveness as part of his doctoral work while studying for his Ph.D. at the University of Denver. He understood that forgiveness is an important part of anger work and an important part of Christianity. He wants his clients to understand forgiveness is more than just ‘forgetting and moving on’. For more information on Forgiveness Therapy here at our South Denver office, call or click to request an appointment with Dr. Michael Ballard. To hear more about his approach to Forgiveness Therapy in anger management, listen to his appearance on the Church Chat podcast or read the transcript.