(Nimue)
Forgiveness is a complex consideration and very personal as well. It has to be an individual decision, and I feel strongly that it has to feel right for the person doing it. If you feel pressured into forgiving someone, you absolutely should not do it. If forgiveness feels freeing for you, if it heals you and helps you then that is your choice to make no matter what anyone else thinks about it.
I've struggled with forgiveness in the past. There were things that deeply hurt me, that I couldn't let go of or put down, couldn't move on from. I heard that my bringing those things up just felt unkind and unreasonable. The trouble was, those things continued to impact on me, and their legacy remained un-dealt with. What I needed was something restorative to help me change how I felt and to undo the harm done.
We all make mistakes, and sometimes with even the best of intentions things can go terribly wrong. I'm very much in favour of forgiving honest mistakes. However, if something impacts on me, I need that to matter. Some mistakes cannot be undone – what was said, or done, or not done cannot be taken back and easily made over. Putting the burden on the wounded person to just be ok with being hurt and move on from there is a lot to ask, I think. It was more than I could manage, at any rate.
I'm finding it's a lot easier to forgive mistakes when there's some exploration of what went wrong and why. It's much easier to trust that there won't be repeats when time and effort are invested in understanding what went wrong. I can be weirdly sensitive about some things, I have some less obvious triggers and occasionally get caught out by one I wasn't aware of. Spending time on understanding it and figuring out how not to go there again does a lot to reassure me. Being supported in that has helped me healer older wounds, and to overcome the small setbacks that brought them to the surface.
Forgiveness is easy when the mistakes are owned and genuine care is shown. I suspect that should have been blindingly obvious. I've spent my adult life determined to learn from my mistakes, but was in several long term relationships with people who were not inclined to even admit that they might have got things wrong. The idea of someone else wanting to learn, change and grow in response to my needs is very new territory for me. It's also opening up room for self-forgiveness in a way that's surprised me.
I was pretty convinced for a long time that the problem was me – too sensitive, too needy, too difficult and complicated... So I internalised a lot of blame around the things that were hurting me. I felt responsible, and intrinsically wrong. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't fix any of that. The work I did to accept and forgive left me feeling smaller and smaller, and less able to function.
What's happening now is restorative. Making mistakes feels safer – we can try things, and if it doesn't work we can regroup, think it over and try something else. I can afford to make mistakes, or not know things. I have been making a lot of mistakes because there's a lot I don't really know about myself and can't figure out without exploring and taking risks. I'm also not confident enough about which boundaries I can afford to soften and which ones need holding firmly. I'm learning all the time.
Some mistakes cannot be undone. But when what follows after them is soothing and restorative, those mistakes don't loom large. They're easy to let go of and move on from. Mistakes that could have become huge and awful drama can gently deflate when they're just treated as opportunities to learn and understand and do better. The mistakes that are followed up on with kindness and care don't become heavy burdens, or sources of ongoing distress. There may be bruising, but that fades and is forgotten in very little time. There's so much you can't do if you can't risk a few bruises here and there.
No comments:
Post a Comment