[acceptance]

I am unable to forgive and forget a certain incident that occured several years ago.
I carry the anger and resentment with me... i live in hopes the person who hurt me, will acknowledge the wrong doing at the very least.
and it may never happen.
I cant seem to let go...
i feel that person must be punished...if i forget about it..then its letting them off the hook and accepting that i deserved what i got.
that person is in my life...and we do bump into each other on occasion...and i always give cold shoulder and am rude.

i dont know how to deal with this...

i cant forgive...even if its just for myself...to move forward...

i cant forget the pain, the darkness, the tears ..how i was reduced to Nothing !

have u forgiven without being asked for forgiveness?

Forgiveness doesn't require forgetting or letting the person off the hook for what they did. Forgiveness is not about condoning what someone did.

It took a long time for me to grasp that.

What I discovered is that forgiveness really was much more about myself than it was about the other person. Forgiveness was deciding not to let my life be ruled by bitterness and anger and resentment. Forgiveness was about not letting those people have that much power over me anymore.

It took many, many years to grasp that and actually be able to get to that place, but I did and I am much more at peace with my history.

It is something I have to revisit from time to time. After all, we are only human and sometimes those old feelings ebb and flow.

[Favorite Jeans]

I think that you can reach a place of acceptance that allows you to live well and move on without necessarily forgiving. I know some people feel that forgiveness is crucial to their own ability to get past being hurt and that is something they strive for. I believe that some actions are unforgivable and that people who have no remorse and no desire to make amends do not need to be forgiven.

However, I am usually able to accept that something terrible happened and eventually move past feeling consumed by anger, resentment, hatred or whatever. But it takes time. I also find that getting some empathy about what happened (whether from a therapist or another good person in my life) to be very helpful in moving on.

Maybe the difference between my idea of acceptance and others' ideas of forgiveness is semantic. For me forgiveness involves having some compassion for where the other person was coming from. For example, I can find that compassion for a person who said something mean in anger, but not for someone who rapes another person because they are incapable of seeing their humanity.

It seems dangerous to tie your healing to the remorse of someone who would hurt you so much in the first place. It's like asking an abuser for permission to heal and move on. Most abusers have no interest in making amends. While a sincere apology or other attempt to make amends for wrongs done can be very healing and satisfying, I don't think your wellbeing should depend on it and I don't think you should wait for it to start working on your healing. I'm sorry you were hurt so badly.

Accept the feelings you feel. Than eventually they lose their power.

[unaluna]

You feel that person must be punished? That is scary to me. Once a person shows themself as willing and able to hurt me, my only thought is distance myself from them as soon as possible. Dont let them hurt me again. If you punish them, arent you afraid they will retaliate? Really i try not to mess with mean people. Its not up to me to straighten out the world. I once shushed somebody at a performance of "Cats" and it turned out the guy was drunk and wanted to beat me up. You dont have to forgive them. Are you sure they even know what they did? I have a cousin's wife giving me the cold shoulder and this post is making me nervous cuz im clueless!

[Chummy]

Originally Posted by acceptance

I am unable to forgive and forget a certain incident that occured several years ago.
I carry the anger and resentment with me... i live in hopes the person who hurt me, will acknowledge the wrong doing at the very least.
and it may never happen.
I cant seem to let go...
i feel that person must be punished...if i forget about it..then its letting them off the hook and accepting that i deserved what i got.
that person is in my life...and we do bump into each other on occasion...and i always give cold shoulder and am rude.

i dont know how to deal with this...

i cant forgive...even if its just for myself...to move forward...

i cant forget the pain, the darkness, the tears ..how i was reduced to Nothing !

have u forgiven without being asked for forgiveness?

I could have written this. Only the person that has hurt me, he's family. What he has done isn't something to go to the police for, but it has contrubuted to my mental problems.
I too feel like he should be punished. He just lives his life, while I have been in therapy for many years.
I am talking to my T about this. I know that even if he would be punished or even locked up in prison, I woulnd't feel really better. I would still have my problems.
I don't know how to get over this. My T is helping me with this. If you are in therapy, maybe you can talk about that.

[divine1966]

I think it would be detrimental For my mental health to hold grudges for long. Eventually it is better to move on imho. As about them being punished, sure If they stole or physically harmed etc I would want them to be punished by law. Otherwise I'd focus on living better life

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[Leah123]

The way I worked through that was simply to process my feelings. Mostly in therapy. I didn't need to forgive the person at all. I just needed to feel my pain and free myself of it, work through it, and go on to a more expansive, happier life with all the emotional space I created by acknowledging, sharing and releasing that pain, replacing it with the caring of others and my own goals and self-care.

[wotchermuggle]

I have found that forgiving someone is allowing yourself off the hook - not the other person.

I have had situations where it didn't get resolved and I was left with a lot of anger and hurt. I decided I wasn't going to let someone else dictate how I felt anymore and I burned letters/emails I had and I felt so much better by letting go.

It feels so good to be released from the burden of being angry.

[Skywalking]

This might seem radical, but I don't believe you have to forgive or forget to move on. Acceptance of what happened is far more useful for me, personally. I think society puts too much pressure on us to be forgiving. If you're angry, be angry. If you're hurt, be hurt. Trying to pretend you're not for the sake of forgiveness isn't going to help you feel better.

But accepting that it can't be changed and that the people who hurt you can't be changed or made to *want* to apologize, is very important imho. For me, too, accepting that I was not to blame and have nothing to be sorry for was another big piece of it.

Love to you.