Oy, Forgiveness

I was asked by a loyal reader to touch upon this topic. It’s always such a hard subject. The idea of forgiveness is unbelievably layered, complicated, challenging, and scary for so many. I have yet to meet a person who doesn’t struggle with it. For observant Jews who are beginning to think about the High Holidays, specifically Yom Kippur, forgiveness is weighing on us. Most people have no understanding of what forgiveness really means, or how to do it. When someone has deeply hurt us, it’s so hard to forgive. One of the most destructive nods to forgiveness today is that ubiquitous, insensitive directive to “get over it”. In today’s culture, where we rapidly move from one thing to the next, we feel like it’s a personal failure, a weakness even, to not be able to just “get over” something. Then many of us begin the process of self loathing and shame, in clinging to our stories of hurt that prevent us from moving on. If we can’t forgive and forget, it’s internalized that’s it’s all our fault. “Get over it” is so harmful because it removes all accountability from the person who hurt you, placing all the responsibility on you, the one who was hurt, to move on. To “deal with it”. More so, it completely invalidates the fact that you, a precious, sensitive person with real feelings, have reason to feel hurt/ sad/angry. When our pain isn’t seen, our voices aren’t heard, and our experiences are ignored, it feels so awful because it is. It’s like someone dumping a bag of smelly, rotten garbage on your head, and then telling you to “deal with it”, making you seem pathetic if you can’t. First of all, please know that’s not true, ever. Anything that you are feeling is real. We can never force another person to make our experience matter to them. Trying to get someone to see it your way often leads to intense frustration. Yes, sometimes we are dealing with others who care about us, made a mistake, and do want to know how they hurt us. Usually, though, it’s realistically not so. This is why, as I’ve learned, the first (and often only) person that my experience has to matter to is Me. The more I practice this, and I’ve had lots of help in learning how to do it, the better my relationship is to myself. When I am deeply hurt and I’m able to hold myself through it, that is more soothing than banging my head against the wall, trying to seek validation from others. Also, when I can do this, it creates an inner spaciousness that softens me to the possibility of beginning to forgive someone else. We cannot truly forgive others if our inner dialogue with ourselves is cold and unhealthy. The way we talk to ourselves, and our ability to first see ourselves as fallible human beings, will set the stage for how we relate to other people. If you treat yourself like crap, getting angry at yourself for not just getting over it, yet you can forgive someone else who just took a dump on your head, it’s likely not forgiveness in the true sense; it’s codependency. We are so often terrified of having someone angry at us, even if they were the aggressors. The idea of this person cutting you out of their life, ignoring you, and making you feel less than is too much to handle. So we push our feelings aside, ignore our pain, and forgive in order to keep this other in our orbit. In short, we self abandon. THIS is the root of most inner shame. It’s almost never what someone else does to you; it’s what YOU are doing to you. The way we hold, or drop, ourselves is so major. When we are aligned with our experience and radically aware of how we are feeling, the need for outside validation drops significantly (or entirely). This is one of the reasons the concept of forgiveness is so misunderstood. It’s because it starts within. We must learn to cultivate such a strong and kind level of inner compassion to ourselves, thereby paving the road to forgiveness that extends outward. We cannot give what we don’t have. If our river of self forgiveness is dry and empty, you can forget about forgiving someone else.
Coming from the background of a religious Jewish community, where women are lauded for being long suffering martyrs who shove their feelings aside for the benefit of others, I have had to wade through some very deep conditioning. I was taught that feelings are selfish. To notice them or worse, honor them, was to not be a team player. And if I’m not on the team, then I’m against the team. In order for the team to function, each player should shut their mouth and do what’s required to maintain equanimity. Any form of stability is a totally false illusion; it’s an empty tree trunk being held up by contaminated roots. You can forget about the branches, those will snap off in five seconds. If the roots aren’t healthy, nourished, and fortified, the tree is diseased. It will be vulnerable to collapse. The image of this tree represents every dynamic, including your own with You. We are designed to have times where we are overcome with thoughts, and full of feelings. We are also designed to not cling to any of them, but that’s for other posts. In writing about forgiveness, we must address all the feels in the moment. It’s not selfish. If anyone couldn’t make space for your feelings, then they weren’t able to acknowledge their own. Knowing this is a key piece in forgiveness, the ability to see the one who hurt you as a human who makes mistakes. The lens through which to know this begins with your own view of yourself in this light. You make mistakes, say the wrong thing, hurt, judge, and invalidate too. We all do. You aren’t bad and you don’t suck. You aren’t a failure. You are a complex person who will not always get it right. Being human is a practice, possibly the hardest one out there. It is essential that, in our knowledge of our own mistakes, we hold ourselves accountable. We can only do this if we regard ourselves with kindness and flexibility. Without our own accountability, which is truly necessary for repair, external forgiveness is also impossible. The other person must be held accountable for having hurt you. This does not mean they will BE accountable. We can’t control their level of willingness and emotional maturity. But, it means we fully hold them to account, possibly without judgement, so that we can rationally know what happened to us. In order to sort through our feelings and sift through hurt, we must admit with full honesty that this person harmed us. Forgiveness requires that our wound be scraped clean from the source of pain. If your child has a wound that needed to be cleaned, treated, disinfected, and stitched up, you wouldn’t slap a bandaid on him and expect it to be fine. The wound will ooze, fester, spread, and you’ll likely wind up in the hospital dealing with a raging infection.  So too with emotional pain. When it’s not treated properly, it doesn’t go away. It spreads and grows stronger. That’s why forgiveness is so hard; it’s not done honestly and healthily.   The knowledge that we have to “get over it” is different than the wisdom needed to soothe and heal pain that’s been inflicted by someone else. Cheap bandaids don’t work. Their adhesive will crap out, and the bandaid will slide off, revealing a worse wound than before. Radical awareness towards our own emotional experience is needed to forgive. Burying your feelings so you won’t get kicked off the team isn’t a true solution. It’s why so many of us struggle with forgiving the same people over and over, often for the duration of a whole lifetime; we think we have to sweep our pain away to do this. Again, it’s creating space between us and our feelings, by honestly holding them without judgement, that starts to allow for a widening where we can let others in to our process. Thereby possibly incorporating them back into our lives. This can be slow, quick, possible or not possible. Forgiveness of ourselves is not negotiable, but forgiveness of others is truly a case by case basis. If someone has a history of hurting you with no accountability, and has no plans of ever stopping, you can forgive them but not allow them into your precious life. Giving someone access to you, when they have shown utter disregard for your humanity, is hands down self abandonment. It’s not forgiveness, it’s abuse. No one ever has the right to consistently harm you on any level. Not your parent, spouse, partner, friend, or child. Boundaries are not selfish, they are an important tool that keeps relationships healthy. They dictate how we are required to be treated, and teach us how we are required to treat others.
 Each person who hurts us is different, resulting in different types of pain. Sometimes it’s just a misunderstanding, a miscommunication, or a common human foible. Other times, you can be dealing with a sick, abusive, miserable, unhealthy person. Only you can know the route to take with each individual situation. “Forgiveness” for me was always a terrifying word. It was modeled to me in childhood as shutting my mouth, ignoring my feelings, but having no choice in forgiveness, thereby opening myself up once again to attack. It was a vicious cycle that lasted until I removed myself entirely. There are many people that I don’t grant access to. Forgiveness does not mean “come back in and throw poisonous darts at me again”. If it means that for you, then please work on being better to yourself. Setting boundaries with these kinds of people is terrifying yet liberating. It’s an act of self care. Forget about getting a manicure or a massage, real self care is being a safe space for yourself. Loving yourself through the pain that comes with releasing certain people from our lives. Losing people who will always hurt us is very difficult. We can forgive them for being unwell, and regard them with compassion. How sad is it for someone who is always cruel and emotionally destructive? It’s a form of disease. When known without judgement, this feels gentle on our part. We can be fully aware of how broken another person is, forgive them, hold them accountable in our own minds, yet preserve our own well being by removing ourselves. Not everyone gets access to you. There are wonderful aspects to community, but this is not one of them. Geography and shared religious practice does not mean you and your life are public.  Your neighbor might sit next to you in synagogue, but be a mean person who always puts you down, or competes with your child. How sad she must be to behave this way. I can forgive her yet change my seat. A relative who is emotionally abusive and uncaring; what a tragedy to live like that, always pushing others away. I can forgive yet block their number. Or I can not block my number, if I can mentally handle contact without going off the rails. Maybe I’m going off the rails now, and my colitis flares up at the thought of being around certain people. Maybe this won’t be so in the future. It’s all changing, depending on how we feel. Your body is an excellent teacher in relationships. That migraine, backache, need to overeat, or need to be really busy all of a sudden; all signs that something is going on emotionally within you. Who makes you feel nervous, depleted, frustrated, on edge; your feelings are trying to teach you something. Setting boundaries actually helps with forgiveness. It gives us room to feel safe, so forgiving isn’t as scary anymore. You are allowed to feel safe in ALL your relationships.
 This Yom Kippur, instead of begging Hashem to help you forgive so and so, maybe try gently giving that a rest. Perhaps ask Hashem to help you forgive yourself, and to help you build your compassion towards You, which will start to open up your heart. Others can find their way in there, when you are ready. To not be able to forgive isn’t bad. You’re not a bad person or a bad Jew. You just need some more emotional tending in your own garden. Hashem knows this. He loves you, and He is patient. He wants you to love yourself like He loves you. He doesn’t want you to suffer just to stay on the team. He wants you to thrive. He wants you to treat yourself beautifully, so that your heart will grow and include the world. He gave you all these feelings, and so they must be real. You can’t expect Him to protect you if you cannot do that for yourself. Forgive yourself for treating yourself less than, and for treating others less than. Start there, learn from there. The rest will come in time, and if it doesn’t, forgive that too. Untying our own knots ultimately creates a much bigger net of safety for everyone.
Forgiveness is a skill most aren’t taught. That’s why it’s so hard. We are trying to speak Chinese, without ever having taken a class from a teacher who speaks that language. Forgive yourself for acting from what you were taught. We know better, we do better. In my opinion, Yom Kippur shouldn’t be about listing all the ways we suck, hitting ourselves, and begging for forgiveness. Would you want your child to act that way towards you? We are children of a God who loves us and is caring for us in ways we don’t understand. Yom Kippur, for me, will be a day I feel closer to God by showing gratitude for the chance to always practice, progress, and evolve. He wants your evolution. He designed you to evolve. He’s rooting for you. Don’t be afraid of Him. You don’t have to prostrate yourself and beat yourself up. Allow for a new model of forgiveness, one that starts with love. Then stand back and watch as things begin to shift. Old cycles will cease, and new ways of being will emerge.
Forgive yourself for not having known how to do this, and thank yourself for being open to growth and change. You will always be a person who will need forgiveness. So will all other people. But I urge you to redefine what forgiveness means. Sending love and strength as you bravely explore this path. Go new routes if the old ones didn’t get you anywhere. You are being guided always.