What exactly is forgiveness and can you really forgive someone for such a devastating betrayal? Wikipedia says this about forgiveness: Forgiveness is the mental, and/or spiritual process of ceasing to feel resentment, indignation or anger against another person for a perceived offense, difference or mistake, or ceasing to demand punishment or restitution. So, what does it mean to actually forgive someone?

For one, it means that you won’t ever bring up what they have done to you in terms of being mean and to cause pain to them. That doesn’t mean you can never speak of it again but when you do it will be to find insight and enlightenment to move forward and not to throw barbs at the other person just to see them bleed.

Forgiveness is making up your mind to let go of the feelings of resentment, anger, bitterness and hatred you have towards the person that has committed the crime against you. Doing this can take a lot of determination and effort but remember you are doing this for yourself and your health. Forgiveness is NOT for the other person, it’s for YOU! You have to make up your mind that you don’t want to live with these awful feelings anymore. Forgiveness doesn’t come overnight, it’s a process that we all travel through at our own pace.

Forgiveness is also letting go of those feelings of revenge and the desire to punish the wrong doer. You don’t ever have to believe that what they did wasn’t wrong or that it didn’t hurt you deeply. That will always be true. Nothing can take that away as it’s a fact but we don’t have to let that fact ruin our lives by holding onto the need to punish the guilty over and over again. In the long run we aren’t only punishing them, we are also punishing ourselves.