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Wednesday, June 17, 2009
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THE FOLLY OF FORGIVENESS
(1st half)
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CHAPTER 1
FORGIVENESS ? ?
Forgiveness — that Holy Grail esteemed as the route to self-love and freedom and health and happiness — has eluded many of us.
Yet... any hope of our experiencing a satisfactory life seems to hinge upon our forgiving the miscreants of our past, those adults who failed to read Doctor Spock’s Guide to Child Rearing, those peers who skipped out on the anti-bullying symposiums, those siblings who thought it a laugh-riot to drop spiders and snakes into our schoolbags.
Nonetheless, we’ve likely had epiphanies. Ephiphanies usually along the lines of:
“I am a spiritual (read ‘superior’) being, and
thusly blessed and residing so far above the foul
philistines who dared harm me, it is my duty —
alas — my saintly gift, to be in the position to
pardon my enemies.”
This may be the closest many of us have come to forgiveness. But these elevated epiphanies that rest — as they do — upon our goodliness are not the solid everlasting things we hoped for.
Yes, yes, we understand the sophisticated version of forgiveness as being something we balefully “release,” as opposed to the dubious ritual of self-righteous posturing wherein we don our papal gown and pardon someone. But we wonder how exactly this miracle of letting go of a hideous past is supposed to occur when we’ve been building a case against our nemesis for weeks, years, even decades.
Well, all is not lost. I have found a key. And what is that key? The key to forgiveness? ...
CHAPTER 2
RUN!So what is this key to forgiveness?
It is to stop willing ourselves to forgive. To quit straining our poor overworked minds and torn emotions in a bid to make sense of why we’ve been mishandled. To cease trying to forgive those people who’ve scarred us so profoundly that years after the fact, steam is still coming out of our ears.
I’m not a psychology major, have never counseled anybody, nor have I ever wanted to. But when I began to talk about having found a key that unlocked the door to freedom from the past, people’s ears started pricking up. I saw eyes widen with possibility, with the idea that maybe they too could find a path that made sense.
Especially a path that didn’t require them to forgive anybody!
It was clear that struggling with forgiveness was not working for them, just as it had not worked for me.
Why has forgiveness not taken for so many of us?
For one, the word forgiveness implies engagement with the fiend who committed the injustice against us. Moreover, forgiveness demands understanding and compassion for the boobs who've had the audacity to screw with our tender souls.
Since we can find no logical reason for the actions of our enemies, we resist compassion, and are unable to successfully grapple with the notion of understanding why anyone would commit such awful deeds, because we ourselves would never commit such awful deeds.
Certain things are so obviously wrong.
So self-evident.
So plain.
As such, compassion and understanding pass us by. Though we may have had glimpses. At times, sputtering within our frame of reference, we considered how an injured child could grow up to injure others, or how a bullied child could later in life become a bully. However, the problem with this schemata is … what about the thousands of bullied children who DON’T become bullies? Adults aren’t required by some immutable law to commit those sins committed upon themselves.
Thus, the idea of compassion can fade under the harsh light of reason, wherein the fact that grown adults have a choice rises up like a cement wall, again blocking out the light of forgiveness.
Where does this leave us poor saps who were damaged as children, or as teens … or for that matter, as menopausal women or balding men?
We all want to get rid of the past so as to get on with our lives, but how is this possible when “forgiveness” is foisted upon us with its requisites of compassion and understanding?
CHAPTER 3
WHY FORGIVE?
With surprising consistency, the more I attempted to solve this riddle called forgiveness, the more angst-ridden I felt. But there had to be something to this forgiveness notion — God knows enough saints and gurus have bandied it about over the millennia.
Ultimately, I decided to try and figure it out myself, beginning with an investigation into the whys of this much-sought-after Holy Grail. Amongst the slew of reasons for attempting forgiveness, the ones that came most readily to mind included:
Because we should
Because others say we should
Because all the self-help books say we should (not to mention the Bible)
Because we seem to keep replaying the original hurt in our current relationships
Because we notice our resentments seep into other areas of our lives
Because some part of us knows we aren’t free
These seemed viable reasons to forgive. Thus, I attempted the next step in the equation, and tried to boil down the common denominators involved in the actual process. From what I could deduce about the traditional route to forgiveness, it went something like this:
First, we think of someone we resent, someone who did us wrong, and we write their names down.
Second, we swish around in our brains how exactly our nemesis made our lives a living hell.
Was it lying?
Cheating?
Stealing?
The 10 Commandments are a great source of inspiration for this section of the exercise.
Now that we’ve listed the jerks responsible for our pain and detailed exactly what they did to us, we are ready for step 3 in the traditional forgiveness process, the step wherein we’re supposed to holler — EUREKA! I FORGIVE!!
SUMMARY OF “OLD” STEPS TO FORGIVENESS
1. Think of the person we need to forgive…i.e., the person we loathe.
2. Get into the whys and wherefores of the scoundrels’ misdeeds.
3. Then…FORGIVE ‘EM!
That’s right. Whether we were abandoned, used, abused, betrayed, neglected, unloved, disappointed, deceived, ridiculed, or humiliated, we list the shmucks of our past, detail their misdeeds, and then…SHAZAM! Forgive ‘em!
This, according to much of the wisdom I’ve come across, is how we do it.
And this is why forgiveness doesn’t work for all of us. The process demands we become hypocrites, in that we’re supposed to take our felt pain and smother it under a molasses-like coat of positive emotions. Which leads us to…
CHAPTER 4
WHY NOT FORGIVE?
Negatively charged emotions are the rope, the chains, the very glue that keep us hinged to the person we deplore. But denying these negative emotions or trying to manipulate them with forgiveness is not the answer either. In fact trying to forgive, willy-nilly, can trigger our charged emotions to new and unfathomed heights, as we’re forced to put our focus on the person we’re triggered by.
Not the result we’re striving for.
On top of that, our attempts to forgive can result in getting smeared with great big dollops of guilt. And why is that? Probably because we’re unable to follow the dictates of almost every self-help book on earth, all of which demand we’d better do this forgiveness thing or rot in hell.
These are but a couple of the many fine reasons to bypass the forgiveness trap. Yet, the fact remains that we want freedom from our past.
So how do we do this?
First of all, let’s try and figure out why we’ve been clinging to our fretful histories to begin with. Herein, I have cobbled together a smattering of possibilities.
We cling to the traumas of our past…
1. Because we don’t know how to release our past
2. Because without our hurts and resentments our identity
would be … well … un-identifiable
3. Because we get attention while distressed
4. Because we think we’re protecting ourselves from future pain
5. Because discussing our wretched pasts is a conversational goldmine, guaranteed never to dry up
6. Because rotating on the past has become a mental habit
7. Because we want to mentally figure out why we were hurt
8. Because we’re unaware that our ties to the past rob us of our future
9. Because we think we’re keeping our enemies at a distance with our invective
10. Because our bad experiences have created or supported our belief in a cruel and uncaring Universe, and we’re trapped by this belief.
CHAPTER 5
TOP 10 LIST :
WHY WE CLING TO THE PAST
Holding
onto ancient resentments is akin to scarfing down two pounds of
biscuits slathered in butter and gravy, in that the consequences are
the same — disturbing ailments, mental sluggishness, and emotional
retardation.
So why do we hold on so tightly to past hurts and resentments? Well, I cobbled together a smattering of possibilities.
We cling to the traumas of our past…
1. Because we don’t know how to release our past
2. Because rotating on the past has become a mental habit
3. Because we think we’re protecting ourselves from future pain
4. Because we get support and attention while distressed
5. Because discussing our wretched pasts is a conversational goldmine, guaranteed never to dry up
6. Because without our hurts and resentments our identity
would be … well … un-identifiable
7. Because we want to mentally figure out why we were hurt
8. Because we’re unaware that our ties to the past rob us of our future
9. Because we think we’re keeping our enemies at a distance with our invective
10.
Because our bad experiences have created or supported our belief in a
cruel and uncaring Universe, and we’re trapped by this belief.
[ILLUSTRATIONS from this chapter can be
viewed in PHOTO ALBUM]
Now, I'll be going into some detail on each of the stealthy ways we avoid releasing our past.
A. We cling to the past…
Because we don’t know how to release the past.
Well, by the end of this book, you will know how. Isn’t that grand!
B. We cling to the past…
Because discussing our wretched pasts is a
conversational goldmine, guaranteed to never dry up.
It
is often seen as pompous, conceited and inappropriate to discuss our
successes, our good health, and our fulfilling relationships.
Meanwhile, blathering on about our plights is a time-honored way to
bond with others.
As I cottoned on to this notion and began to
notice the conversations around me, I was floored at just how much we
humans use past traumas to establish rapport. Whether the past involves
a skiing injury, a cheating boyfriend, a business partner gone bad, or
poor service at the neighborhood spa, all the myriad slights and
disasters of our lives are fodder for an alarming number of
interactions.
It is endemic, a part of our society.
And I can understand why.
After
all, there’s no better way to start an animated conversation over the
water-cooler than to riff on someone who’s done us wrong. It’s a great
way to infuse energy into a dialogue. The appeal is huge! Hence, even
though we all know from our Mama’s that it’s not nice to talk about
people behind their back, we just can’t help ourselves. And what better
target than someone who’s hurt us?
When I began to refrain
from discussing my own personal trough of injuries, I felt positively
boring around those pals who had exciting exploits wherein they were
injured and damned displeased about it. The sheer energy that exuded
from them in the telling of their horrific tales was like watching a
power boat zip from the pier, waves of agitated energy crashing in
their wake…
Wheeee!!! Such fun!
Sadly, there is a
downside to all this gleeful retelling of our pasts, filled as they are
with enough pain and betrayal and tragedy to rival a Shakespeare play.
The downside to this sort of sharing is that with each re-telling of
our miserable past, with each recounting of the scum who harmed us, we
more deeply entrench ourselves in the past, more fully embrace what we
don't want.
It's not that we give up venting entirely. It can
be useful to blow off steam, to gain clarity, to really be heard. What
I'm talking about is the endless rehashing of past episodes that leaves
us feeling self-righteous and agitated after the telling.
Why haven’t we let go, then?
If
relating with others primarily about our troubled pasts is the bedrock
of our relationships, there's a real possibility that letting go of our
past hurts may mean a loss of relationships.
At a subconscious level, we know this.
As
well, subconsciously, we know that the sheer volume of freed-up energy
that'd come from releasing our pasts could unleash chaos. It could mean
changing our communities, our friendships, our careers, our
partnerships… everything!
As humans, we like our deadbolts and
security systems, our guard dogs and alarm bells. We feel safe living
an orderly existence and don’t particularly want our boat rocked,
regardless it may actually be turning a particularly sharp corner
towards a more wondrous destination.
C. We cling to the past…
Because without our hurts and resentments our
identity would be … well … un-identifiable.
Ah
yes, fascinating, this one. Who would we be without our anger and hurt
and fear and defensiveness and all those other goodies we drag around
like a sack of dead cockroaches.
Goodness!
Our identity as it stands — would be unidentifiable.
What would we talk about with our friends?
Where would the drama go?
We’d be lumpen shapeless blobs without our fix of past wrongs to keep us mentally sharp.
We’d have to start everything all over again from scratch …
A big blank slate.
Yes, there are many reasons that hanging onto a past fraught with troubles is appealing.
D. We cling to the past…
Because we get attention while distressed.
No, that wasn’t a typo. I didn’t mean to say “nice” story. I did say “rice” story.
Once
upon a time, a scientist had 3 sealed jars of cooked rice. To the first
one, he directed love. To the second one, he directed insults. To the
third one, well, he ignored it.
A period of time passed and the jars were opened.
The
rice in the first jar (loved) was still almost good enough to eat even
after much time. The rice in the second jar (insulted) had gone bad and
moldy. In the third jar (ignored) — to the utter shock of the scientist
— the rice was positively putrid! Far far worse than the rice that had
been insulted.
When I heard the rice story — and it is a true
account, not a fable — it was a revelation. A revelation in that
receiving no attention had a markedly more destructive effect than
receiving negative attention.
To return to the idea that we hold
onto the past as a means of getting attention, the rice story gives
solid testimony to the importance of getting this need met. At the same
time, garnering attention through tireless repetitions of our dastardly
histories is not the optimal way to let go of said histories.
E. We cling to the past…
Because rotating on the past has become an
unconscious mental habit.
This
very list, with its handy spaces for you to add in any mental habits
I’ve missed, should lead to an awareness of your own quirky mental
habits. Thus, you can let go of those twisted, yet oddly comforting
thoughts & emotions, once and for all.
F. We cling to the past…
Because we think we’re protecting ourselves
from future pain.
We
think regurgitating our past will prevent us from getting
sucker-punched again. As a result, we come to approach our lives from a
protective standpoint. The problem is, to be protective takes energy.
Not only that, but we can’t simultaneously be protective and vulnerable.
Protectiveness.
Vulnerability.
The two are mutually exclusive.
So
as long as any part of us is wandering about the planet wearing our
protective gear and armoring ourselves against future pain, we’re
blocking out the very things we desire, like freedom, intimacy with
others, spontaneity …
On top of all that, to be protective is to
be contracted. Contracted, our muscles pull in, our breath becomes
shallow, our jaws and hands become tight. These lead to decreased blood
flow, decreased oxygen, decreased immunity, which in turn lead to
tightening and hardening and rigidity.
Armor.
And this armor hurts only one person, the person shackled within it.
By
armoring ourselves against future pain, we shut ourselves off from
healing in the present, and at the same time keep alive a crippling
past. On the flip side, to release the past, is to free ourselves in
both the present and the future. Ya can’t beat that!
G. We cling to the past…
Because we can’t mentally figure out why we
were hurt.
This
one’s a biggie. In fact, this particular reason for holding onto the
past is so central in blocking us from letting go, that I’ve dedicated
an entire chapter to it later on.
In summary, we humans need
order. We need to make sense of life. We need to see logical cause and
effect so we don’t go bananas over the sheer chaos of things.
Our
mind’s insistence upon forcing everything to make sense, unfortunately,
can have tragic consequences. When we’ve been harmed in some
inexplicable way, our yearning to make sense of the incident compels us
to make ourselves wrong. It’s the only way we can impose logic on
something illogical.
Internally, we rebel at this curse we’ve
laid upon ourselves, but remain hooked by our need for answers,
twisting the knot tighter. But there is a solution …
H. We cling to the past…
Because we’re unaware that our ties
to the past rob us of our life energy.
When
our daily quotient of energy is sucked up maintaining our cable cord to
the past, we suffer. Our creativity suffers. Our vitality suffers. Our
physical bodies become starved of the energy they need to renew and
heal. Our current relationships become starved of the energy they need
to renew and heal.
It’s just awful.
Do a little test on
yourself to check the validity of this idea around losing our life
energy. The basis of this test lies in the wisdom of our own bodies.
While intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually, we may have the
wisdom of Fred Flinstone, our bodies contain the wisdom of the ages.
For
this test, monitor how you physically feel after discussing a
negatively charged event. Does your chest tighten? Your jaw feel tense?
Your head ache? Your body feel contracted?
Conversely, if you’re
discussing a cheerful movie, your loyal cat, or a terrific pair of
sandals, does your body feel energized? Vibrant? Awake?
These are cues about what your current patterns are doing to you, and clues about the direction of your future.
I. We cling to the past…
Because we believe we are keeping our enemies at a distance with our invective.
This
belief is faulty to the core, though it seems on the surface to make so
much sense. Yes, if we direct anger at the miscreants who harmed us —
that’ll keep ‘em at bay. This is related to the earlier idea we had
about armoring ourselves.
The truth is that in an actual,
real-time, dangerous situation, expressed anger may be a very helpful
strategy. For instance, with certain wild animals, it is wise to start
stomping and yelling and clapping your hands together in a display of
aggression that’ll have them thinking twice about sussing you out for
dinner.
Mentally using this same strategy, however, on a past
fiend does not protect us, or keep the fiend at bay. In fact, in a
cruel paradox, our mental attacks don’t scare our nemesis into the
distant recesses of our memory, but rather keep them alive and kicking
at the forefront of our minds, inexorably tying us to them for an
eternity… and then some.
To entertain old hurts equals
nurturing and fertilizing old hurts. Thus, they don’t recede into the
distance, but grow and grow and grow, like weeds on a compost pile.
J. We cling to the past…
Because our experiences created or supported a belief in a cruel and uncaring Universe, and we became trapped by this belief.
Yes,
we become trapped by this belief in an uncaring Universe — condemned to
perceive the world and our past as just the way things are, leaving us
resigned, helpless and depressed. Hence, the raging success of
anti-depressants.
So sad — the hopelessness, the helplessness of those trapped in a Universe that is . . .
simply . . .
not . . .
friendly.
If
the Universe is unfriendly, all that’s left is to suck it up, drown it
out, and live a life of quiet — angst-filled — desperation.
Since
most of us are not even aware of our core belief regarding the attitude
of the Universe towards us, it is difficult to impossible to shift this
belief. Needless to say, a belief in an uncaring and cruel Universe is
a fundamental block to releasing a seemingly cruel and uncaring
personal history.
CHAPTER 6
EINSTEIN 101 :
THE FRIENDLY UNIVERSE
"No problem can be
solved from the same
consciousness (i.e. the
same level) that
created it."
Albert Einstein
The Problem with Forgiveness
Forgiveness
attempts to solve the problem (of feeling injured) at the level the
problem’s created. That is, at the personal level.
So and so did this (pain) to me, so I’ll do that (forgiveness) to them.
[see illustration in "Photos" file]
Must we — as Einstein suggests — jump to a different level to solve problems (or in this case, to heal emotional injuries)?
Truth
is, we can cut an oceanliner of resentments off at the canal just by
deciding to be hurt only by people we know intentionally and
maliciously tried to screw us over. This, as opposed to getting ruffled
over the many incidents of thoughtlessness, miscommunication and
insensitivity where no real malice was involved.
For instance,
let’s say a friend knocks our bowl of Fruit Loops onto the floor. Well,
sure, we could go into our heads and take this personally and make up
all kinds of stories and interpretations around how we’re not valued by
this awful friend, and how we deserve better, and on and on.
On
the other hand, we could consider whether we positively know that our
friend intended to harm us. If they didn’t, we can let it pass. There’s
nothing to forgive.
All of us injure and are injured with
frightening regularity when there’s no ill-will involved whatsoever.
Wouldn’t it be nice to cut others some slack, and in kind, have others
assume the best about our intentions?
What about if our friend
stands over us and our breakfast cereal and shouts, “I curse you—AND
your Fruit Loops,” and then with foul intent sends the bowl flying
across the room?
If a few moments later that friend says, “Uh,
sorry about my fit. I just found out my house burned down and my
husband left me for my sister,” this injury can also be released at the
same level it’s been created. That is, one-on-one, at the personal
level.
However, let’s say a long-term buddy curses us and our
cereal, sends the bowl flying, and stomps out of our lives — for good!!
— leaving us humiliated, rejected, hurt and confused even years later.
And let’s suppose that despite our bravest attempts to release our hurt
and anger, we still feel hopelessly trapped by our emotions. Emotions
like rejection, betrayal, and abandonment, which refuse to loosen
despite the passing of time.
It is here that we segue from our
first piece of Einstein’s wisdom: “No problem can be solved from the
same consciousness (i.e. the same level) that created it,” to our
second piece of Einsteinian wisdom:
"The most important
question you'll ever ask
is whether the Universe
is a friendly place."
Albert Einstein
“What a strange segue,” you say.
Well, it’s with the above quote that we shift away from the level of the personal and towards the level of the impersonal.
The
first step is to crystallize our own beliefs about the relative
friendliness of the universe. To help get you started, I’ve constructed
a couple of checklists. Tick in the boxes that resonate and see what
comes up.
CHECKLIST
You think the Universe is a friendly place if…
Your best pal stands you up and you assume she must be saving a hapless
squirrel from becoming roadkill … or some other heroic deed.
Your acquaintance doesn’t show for a movie date and you assume he must have had a serious emergency and begin to pray for him.
When a fellow cuts you off in traffic, you think, “his wife must be in
labor and he’s off to help bring a new baby into the world — how
glorious!”
When friends shut up as you approach — you
don’t think, “they were talking behind my back,” but instead see
yourself like Jesus parting the crowds, who stand in awe of your very
presence. (Though this one might involve somewhat more than thinking
the Universe is friendly and cross into delusion).
You think the Universe is an unfriendly place if…
When someone knocks your elbow whilst passing by you in the produce
aisle, you run your grocery cart full-on into them, determined that no
one’s gonna take a swipe at you without consequence.
When
the waitress charges you for two Shirley Temples when you only had one,
you demand to see the manager, and try to have the waitress fired for
trying to scam you.
The teller at your bank is slow to
process your transaction and you think this is a ploy to convey to you
that you are worthless and undeserving.
You believe the roadwork sites around the city are going out of their way to personally make you late for work.
Based
on the above checklists, you might see the beginnings of a pattern. If
you think the world’s a pretty friendly place, the likelihood of your
needing this book is significantly less than those of you who see every
mite-sized misdemeanor as cause for a full-out war (as some world
leaders do.)
For those of you who, as of this very moment, are
thinking that all the latter examples I listed are justified, and
furthermore, that to refrain from acting vigorously and swiftly to such
slights would surely lead to such slights increasing in your life with
ever greater frequency — I have some news.
3:12 PM
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