[Christine08]

HII
I Don’t know if some of you have been thinking about this but at least i have and i wanted to know your opinion about the subject, as I’m new here and I would like to know all of you a little better, so if you want you can describe yourself in a few words and what concerns are you dealing right now, and then give me some of your perspective.
Here it goes.

I don’t know if you had this experience in your life or not, you know, sometimes when someone really hurt you in some kind of way (psychological, physical) as we all know we encounter many people in our lives and sometimes that people hurt us or even our own family do, in many ways, everyone have their own experiences. So what I ask is that, in those situations, are you able to forgive? And to forget? Or do you simply don’t do booth and just continue living and talking to that person the same way, normally. What do you think interfere with not being able to forget or forgive?

So hope you respond to this, because I just want to know a little more about you. So introduce yourself and then give an answer, or just introduce yourself only.

[kindachaotic]

Hello & Welcome! Fairly new myself, am on here primarily for bipolar. It has helped me immensely & have learned so much. Everyone is kind & they don't judge.

On forgive & forget. I can forgive fairly easy but forgetting is tough. If someone hurts me I think it out ( except physically). If it's family, especially my husband, (that's a two way street there...) I can usually do both. But friends I can forgive but then steer clear of, so I guess that's not forgetting... Don't know if that helped. Do Cruz this site & post!

Forgiveness is a form of letting go - part 1

Forgiveness is a form of letting go - part 2

Forgiveness Is Miraculous
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/...s-miraculous-1

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by Christine08

So what I ask is that, in those situations, are you able to forgive? And to forget? Or do you simply don’t do booth and just continue living and talking to that person the same way, normally.

I don't think you can forgive by just trying to do so. For me, at least, it comes only with understanding of myself, the other person, and what makes people do what they do.

Here is a quotation I ran across, supposed to be from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:

"If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each [person’s] life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm any hostility."

http://blogs.psychcentral.com/mindfu...th-longfellow/

[avoice]

Originally Posted by Christine08

HII
I Don’t know if some of you have been thinking about this but at least i have and i wanted to know your opinion about the subject, as I’m new here and I would like to know all of you a little better, so if you want you can describe yourself in a few words and what concerns are you dealing right now, and then give me some of your perspective.
Here it goes.

I don’t know if you had this experience in your life or not, you know, sometimes when someone really hurt you in some kind of way (psychological, physical) as we all know we encounter many people in our lives and sometimes that people hurt us or even our own family do, in many ways, everyone have their own experiences. So what I ask is that, in those situations, are you able to forgive? And to forget? Or do you simply don’t do booth and just continue living and talking to that person the same way, normally. What do you think interfere with not being able to forget or forgive?

So hope you respond to this, because I just want to know a little more about you. So introduce yourself and then give an answer, or just introduce yourself only.

Hi well i'm a voice and i'm a survivor. Nothing more nothing less. I think my name says it all

[Elysium]

I have not yet "learned" how to forgive and I can honestly say at this time in my life that I don't want to. I think the reason I don't want to is that I cannot forget. The things that happened to me when I was younger revisit me multiple times a day....sometimes on the wings of thoughts....sometimes on the backs of smells, or in the hollowness of sound. Sometimes these things hide behind the bushes of my mind and pounce on me as I walk by....or they lie in wait for me in my dreams.

Until I can forget, I don't know that I will be able to forgive....and even with 6 years of therapy behind me, I still haven't been able to stave off the thoughts, triggers, memories, or flashbacks.

I often wonder, will I ever be able to.

[amandalouise]

Originally Posted by Christine08

HII
I Don’t know if some of you have been thinking about this but at least i have and i wanted to know your opinion about the subject, as I’m new here and I would like to know all of you a little better, so if you want you can describe yourself in a few words and what concerns are you dealing right now, and then give me some of your perspective.
Here it goes.

I don’t know if you had this experience in your life or not, you know, sometimes when someone really hurt you in some kind of way (psychological, physical) as we all know we encounter many people in our lives and sometimes that people hurt us or even our own family do, in many ways, everyone have their own experiences. So what I ask is that, in those situations, are you able to forgive? And to forget? Or do you simply don’t do booth and just continue living and talking to that person the same way, normally. What do you think interfere with not being able to forget or forgive?

So hope you respond to this, because I just want to know a little more about you. So introduce yourself and then give an answer, or just introduce yourself only.

Im confused how does the title reflect what you are posting about. your title says forgive and forget so I expected to read a post about you forgiving or forgetting someone in your life. but when I opened the post I find it has nothing to do with forgiving and forgetting someone in your life.

Sorry just the therapist side of me coming through..

you can read about all the members and why they are here by clicking on the names at the left side of the posts (any posts) then choose - View Public Profile.

my introduction is in my profile but short and sweet - I am a NY state CSW therapist with a crisis intervention center and City Hospital Mental Health Unit. I came here looking for others that were working on integration of alternate personalities. That was my primary issue at the time I joined about 2 yrs ago. When I didnt find what I was looking for here I looked elsewhere and found what I needed. In the mean time I was asked to stay here also to help others that needed my help.

I remain here now primarily to help others as the saying goes - to help others is to help one self.

being a therapist sometimes my posts can be a bit loaded or triggering, and being a therapist on a mental health website can also be like wearing a bullseye target at times. Therefore I have chosen to remain moderated so that the moderators can help with my posts and any other needs I may have.

I always let new people know because it was so helpful to me when I first came here - there is an ignore button and I will not be offended should my posts be too much for you and you need to use it. I comes in very handy for me with all the posts that can trigger me.

Welcome to Psych central.

[madisgram]

wow, christine, a great thread! i also liked pachy response. great articles to read re this.
ok here goes-forgiveness, sometimes at first when i've been harmed i find forgiveness begins with acknowledging that i am hurt by the transgressor. this is more strongly felt with family members. i then want to try to get to forgiveness. i remind myself none of us is perfect and we all make mistakes or don't always realize the hurt we/any of us have caused. i'm in a 12 step program. it's suggested when i am truly harmed by another to pray for them for they are truly troubled. i've used this technique and it does work for me to begin exercising forgiveness. i find it gives me more serenity in my life and I am the one who benefits by praying for the other person (!!) even tho i am sincere praying for their troubled spirit. i don't really know why this works but it does. this rids me of resentment which to me is hanging onto not forgiving. i also meditate by feeling the pain, then letting go of the pain and state affirmations that i deserve to love myself, to embrace my loving spirit, to acknowledge that i am worthy and of value to self and others.
forgeting-i don't really forget if i've been harmed but i do give the other person a shot at not being that way again. i may even approach them and tell them i felt hurt when ....to me. this often clears the air if they respond in a positive way. instant forgiveness when this occurs.
BUT if the offense is repeated again and again by a person and the harm is serious towards my well-being i either distance myself to protect me or i move on. however i don't forget at this point cause i need to remember that person is not safe for me to be around.
simply put it is easier for me to forgive than forget. by forgiving i am not giving that person rent space in my head. most times i have the desire to forgive others. (Golden Rule).
by not forgetting if the offense is repeated more than once, i am protecting myself knowing what i know.
in the forgiving situations i can proceed a relationship with that person if that is what i choose. i do need to clear the air with them tho. not pretending nothing took place.
both forgiving and forgetting takes practice for me. but when i feel upset i need to not harbor bad feelings.

[Perna]

I think we can be hurt but not that other people can hurt us; they are outside of us and it is our experiences and perceptions that create the hurt.

For me, forgiveness is only for others who ask for it; it is to make them feel better because they feel they have done something wrong and want to square their own psyches away. I don't believe we can really "forget" things; we can suppress them or they can not mean as much to us so don't bother us enough to get remembered but I think anything that really makes us feel/respond in life, can't then get forgotten.

That leaves me with squaring my own psyche away, with incidents where I do not like what another has said or done that I feel relates to me.

My stepmother use to punish me physically, harshly. When I was first getting to know my husband, I was teaching him how to make pancakes in the blender and he was not a very good/fast learner At one point he struck my arm hard and my brain responded, KILL! I have a strong will though and am very fair-minded and I was able to restrain myself from striking him back immediately and ask, "Why did you hit me?" Apparently I had gotten sloppy and was turning on the blender before the container was properly seated and I could have gotten both of us seriously injured if he had not stopped me.

So, we have my stepmother striking me often enough as a child that I was trigger-ready to strike another, versus another striking me to protect me.

My stepmother is dead and cannot strike me anymore. For a long time I resented that she had struck me in the past, but there's no future in that? In a real sense, we pretty much make our own reality. What I think and perceive (the sky is green) is how I see the world. "Everyone is out to get me" may not be literally true, but, to me, it might be my reality. I cannot change literal truth but I can change how I think and perceive things so that my reality is more comfortable to me. I was in therapy for many many years and part of my trouble was that I'm extremely strong willed and extremely creative, good at fantasy and I would "decide" X was Y and guess what? X was Y for me!

What does that have to do with forgive or forget? We don't need to forgive or forget what happened to us in the past, the past is "gone". My stepmother cannot physically hurt me anymore. Yes, because my stepmother did physically hurt me in the past, a pattern was established so when I am physically hurt in the present, I go right to my stepmother's type of hurt and, now, as a big adult (I remember very well when I realized I was larger/stronger/younger than my stepmother) I can "protect" myself better from such physical assault. But I have many other attributes and patterns and the ability to create even more, positive patterns if I decide to! I did not hit my husband after he hit me and I acknowledged he was "right". I have a pattern of deciding to be fair-minded and asking questions before I kill people In the future, when I'm struck I probably won't lash out, I'll ask why I was struck, I'll look for reasons.

As a child, I wasn't able to do that with my stepmother, wasn't able to know or understand her frustrations and patterns such that she was thoughtlessly physically acting out on me, a child. I can't/have no need to "forgive" my stepmother, she's dead. I have no need to forget her physical violence; as a matter of fact, I need to not forget it. Why? Because it's part of me and my patterns and if I forget, then when someone strikes me in the present, I have no reference point to figure out my response in the present? That's probably why my stepmother struck me in the first place; she was disconnected from her earlier, childhood frustrations and patterns. Did her mother or someone else strike her? We don't know.

Life, for me, is about making connections; within ourselves and with others "out there". Someone asking for my forgiveness for something they perceive they did wrong, helps create a connection between the two of us. Me, remembering, helps create connections within myself.

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by Perna

At one point he struck my arm hard and my brain responded, KILL!

You sound like me!

Of course, I don't kill; that is partly because I learned that if I tried that, I was the one who would be killed...

[buddhablessd]

Yes, forgiveness is hard for me also;

Especially if there is an emotional attachment, i.e., family member. They say that forgiveness is part,if not "the" most important part of the healing process.
In buddhism the 6 paramita's(spiritual term for reaching the other shore,seeing past this realm of existence)generousity, patience exertion,diligence, concentration, prajna(highest wisdom). Patience has three parts; accepting suffering,virtuosity, forgiveness.
So, in essence, we need to be patient in forgiveness. Making it a process of both practice, and prayer. Because holding onto it only hurts the self, not anyone else, in the long run. BB

I'm bblessd, went through rough times in my life,most of which were out of my control(mom suicide at 12, dad drinking problem and womaniizing,unresolved trauma and grief process,addiction,depression,anxiety issues,etc.ect.)finally began to pray for end to suffering,I did AA/NA. I went(I say the lord led me)to yoga,meditation,buddhism,the met-physical,to a better understanding of god. Now, again a practicing christian,I read the bible with different eyes. I still meditate, but now, as a tool to pray.

People, of course, make their choices. The process of forgiveness has been of great help to me. I still talk to my Dad about forgiveness even though he passed over ten years ago. Self-forgiveness has been harder.

I do not need anyone else's permission to reap the benefits of forgiveness. I am aware many are reticent when it comes to forgiveness. I do not push it on others. There are many ways to reach a goal. I have chosen mine.

[Christine08]

Thank you all for your answers, it really means a lot. I can relate to some of answers that have been given here.
The truth is, sometimes it's hard to forgive or forget, we may find some things that allows us to see things in a different perspective,to find peace inside, like some of you said with the meditation, yoga, but on the other hand and think that only can happen after we "grief" from all the pain we feel. I think i can forgive, give chances to other people, depending on the situation, I've forgiven my friend over and over, but then it reached a point i couldn't anymore, those things were harming me, bringing up some things from the past that was painful. But i Don't ever forget, ever. I don't allow myself to, it's like i make myself to remember those things over and over, and i think it is because of some of the things someone here already said that this is a protection, i never thought it that way, and I've been asking myself why i don't forget and why keep remembering all these things.
In other different situations, they are some things we can't really forgive, no matter how hard we try. I give the example of my father, he has betrayed my mom over and over and it confuses me how can she forgive cause she cannot forget, i know it, she said to me. I can't forgive him, not totally, because at some point he did want to leave us and start a new family, and when i was younger he even introduce some woman to me, while he was still married with my mom. I really can't forgive him. But i think i some day want to, i don't want him to pass way knowing i didn't forgive him. But it's so hard, because when i was 6, that was the first time i felt disgusted of my father because we was having sex with others womens (womens of a nightclub) and i will never forget that felling.

At the end of the day we all have different ways to forgive or forget someone, i wish you always find the better way to do that.

"It's easier to ask forgiveness than it is to get permission."

"Forgiveness is an absolute necessity for continued human existence."

"Forgiveness means letting go of the past."

[buddhablessd]

Originally Posted by pachyderm

You sound like me!

Of course, I don't kill; that is partly because I learned that if I tried that, I was the one who would be killed...

Chinese saying; If you seek revenge you must first dig two graves.

One for yourself also.

The lord said; Vengence is mine.
Mathew 7: Judge not, lest you be judged

BB

[Ardmore]

I will never forgive, I hate my life because of him but when the time comes....