excuse me and forgive me
The apology and subsequent forgiveness release stress and are healthy for the relationship, which turns out to be healthy for the partners in the relationship. Relationships that include healthy apologies and forgiveness are less stressful, more supportive, and therefore healthier for the people in them.
Forgiving is not easy. When you have truly forgiven, there is no lingering resentment, because the problem is solved. You have learned to heal the pain and prevent its recurrence, so that you can forgive and wipe the slate clean. Knowing how to express feelings and finding ways to prevent similar pain from happening again makes it possible to forgive one another.
The dictionary defines forgiveness as “giving up resentment of,” but my definition of forgiveness is a bit different. Giving up resentment is nearly impossible when there are too many real hurts to forgive. It can also be reckless, because the resentment is a reminder to be careful with this person or in this situation. Letting go of resentment without fixing the problem leaves you vulnerable to being hurt or mistreated over and over again.
Of course, holding on to resentment will not protect you or allow you to let go of the past and move on. As long as you hold on to resentment, you will feel like a helpless victim, hopeless and dependent on your past history. You need to learn to forgive, but simply “giving up resentment” is not enough. You need a new model of forgiveness.
steps to forgive
To forgive effectively, follow these main steps.
1.Understand why you are hurt. It’s common to have hurt feelings and be disappointed, but not know exactly what it is. What do you feel? Are you mad at someone? What did he or she do? You’re sad? Why? Taking the time to clear up your disappointment and hurt feelings will make it easier for you to come clean with your partner and easier for your partner to decide what to do. If your partner did something wrong, just blaming doesn’t make it clear exactly how you got hurt or what exactly you need to forgive your partner for.
two.Know how to take care of yourself. It seems very logical that if someone else hurt you, then that person should fix it. But it doesn’t always work that way. If someone you love has hurt you, he or she doesn’t understand how you feel, isn’t thinking clearly, or isn’t in control of their own actions. This can be true in minor and major injuries. If your husband forgets her birthday or his wife has an important social date on the day of the big game, there could be several causes. If the mistake was due to faulty communication or bad memory, you can fix it by placing a calendar in a prominent place in your home and marking each important date, perhaps with different colored pencils to indicate whose note it is from. Techies can put on their PDAs. If a date is on the calendar, there are no excuses to ‘forget’.
3. Get help. If it is a very serious problem, seek help. When there’s clearly more than can be fixed by talking to each other, and you think your partner is out of control (he burns dinner when he drinks too much, he gambles a lot of money every payday, one of you has a drug addiction) You will need more than this book can give you, and I highly recommend couples counseling and problem-directed therapy or rehabilitation.Go with or without your partner, and you will learn how to take care of yourself until he or she regains-control. Until you know how to prevent yourself from being hurt again, forgiveness is meaningless.
Four.Let your partner know how you feel. Once you are clear about how you felt hurt or disappointed, you can be clear with your partner. Don’t accuse, just speak in terms of your feelings. “My feelings hurt when I didn’t know where you were at the party.” Or “I’m disappointed because I wanted you to remember my birthday.” Or, “When I found out you cheated on me, I felt worthless and worthless in your eyes.”
5.Tell your partner what you think would fix the problem. When you offer a possible solution, your partner will have a clear idea of what you want. You can say, “When we go to parties, I want you to tell me where you are, and I want you to understand why I feel bad if you don’t.” Or, “I want you to keep me informed of where you are and what you’re doing, and allow me to call you at random times, until I’m sure you’re keeping your promises.”
6.Listen to your partner’s version of what happened. Sometimes neither you nor your partner have really broken trust and the problems are mainly due to a difference in perception, so it is important to understand how your partner viewed the situation. This also keeps the discussion on a more even level, with both partners discussing the issue rather than one accusing and the other defending. You may find out that your partner even thought she was doing something you wanted. “You kept saying you didn’t want to celebrate this birthday, and I thought you meant it.” Or, “You never wanted to have sex with me, so I thought you’d be okay with me going somewhere else.” Whether you like what you hear or not, the only chance you have to solve the problem is to listen and try to understand.
7.Reach a mutual solution to the problem. If someone is very hurt or very defensive, it may take a few discussions to resolve this issue. Remember that it is worth the time you spend, because you will prevent this from becoming a recurring problem. If you can’t figure it out together after a few tries, see a counselor. Forgiveness skills are so important that you really need to learn them if you don’t already have them.
8.Have a forgiveness ceremony. This can be as simple as looking into your partner’s eyes and saying “I forgive you”; or as complicated as renewing the vows once the problem has been solved. The important thing is that you communicate that the air is clean, the pain forgiven and the problem is over. You won’t be able to do it honestly if you haven’t done the steps above.
You don’t have to condemn your partner to be wary of their uncontrolled or thoughtless behavior. Instead, they can recognize that they are both fallible human beings, do whatever it takes to work things out, and then forgive each other. When you both take responsibility for correcting these mistakes in your relationship, mutual trust will grow, and where trust grows, so does love.