Now here's the biggest question: how can we let go of our anger and move on?
This is a tricky one. Last week, we explored how to differentiate intention from interpretation to help us understand that most things people do or say have nothing at all to do with us. But, ok - sometimes it does. Sometimes, people go after us or target us. And sometimes, we're left with long-lingering anger, even after that person is no longer part of our lives.
What can we do go let go of that? Should we let go of it?
To me, the only way forward is to forgive. Notice I didn't say "forgive and forget"? Forgetting abuse, torment, or directed attacks, particularly if they were frequent, isn't possible. And it's actually not beneficial because it's denial.
But, forgiveness is possible.
Why, you're wondering, would I want to forgive someone who did so much damage?
What's the alternative?
When we hang on to anger, the person it's about isn't feeling it. Oh, sure, they might if they directly interact with us, but if they're long gone - nope. They won't. So the one suffering is us. At that point, we're the ones doing the damage. We're the ones losing sleep at night over it all. So from that perspective, forgiveness is actually about self-preservation.
Forgiveness also opens up the space for empathy. Most healthy, well-adjusted people don't go around intentionally abusing others - that's actually the anti-thesis of being a healthy, well-adjusted person. So, then why are they like that? What happened to them that they're so damaged that this is the only way they know how to function? And how tragic is that?
We can think of the worst possible examples here as evidence. Pick a career criminal and when you dig a little bit, you'll see that there's usually a combination of abuse and mental illness involved in their formative years. Does that justify anything they did? Nope. Of course not. But it does open the door towards empathy just a sliver. No one wants to be that way. They're just functioning on some fucked up wiring and don't know how else to interact in the world.
I'm not just being abstract or detached as I explore this. I've had to really reach deep and pull out some empathy and forgiveness for a family member. He was an incredibly difficult man and we did not have a good relationship. I held a lot of anger towards him for years, long after he died. But then, I learned more about his upbringing and honestly, I wouldn't wish that on anyone. Does that excuse how he treated those he claimed to love? Absolutely not. But it's also very sad to understand that he held so much internal self-loathing that he unconsciously re-created situations that would end in his total alienation. He unwittingly pushed people away, no matter how hard they tried to remain in his life and that, in turn, only reinforced his deep belief that he was somehow unlovable. That understanding helps me forgive him. That's just plain tragic and sounds like hell. He didn't want to live that way - he was just too damaged to know otherwise and too scared to try to do anything differently.
Empathy can lead us towards forgiveness and forgiveness can lead to peace. We're have a very limited time here: don't we deserve to live with some modicum of peace while we're here?
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