Forgiveness As An Act Of Personal Liberation
One of the legends about the Buddha tells that a woman, grieved by the loss of her son, turned to him to resurrect him. He told her it was possible, but difficult, to bring her son back to life. However, she decided to do anything to save her son. Buddha sent her in search of mustard seeds in a house that had never been touched by misfortune. After a terrible day from one house to another, the woman realized that there was no such house and that everyone had been touched, in some way, by the misfortune.
It is very rare, if not impossible, to meet a human being who has not been affected by a trauma or a difficult event. Sometimes these events have lifelong consequences. This is precisely where the importance of forgiveness lies.
Okay, I forgive you …
Culturally, we learn that forgiveness is giving others a kind of absolution for their lack of tact, bad behavior, or simply a lack of attention towards us. This forgiveness that we grant to others are empty words that are meant to calm the situation, while in the depths of our mind forces collide that push us in different directions.
This kind of forgiveness is not useful for us to improve our life. Instead, we should aspire to another type of forgiveness, which is the process that allows us to obtain inner peace after overcoming a difficult situation.
In search of true forgiveness
In the book “Forgiveness Means Healing”, Fred Luskin argues that true forgiveness is (characterized by):
• To encounter inner peace, which in reality has nothing to do with others.
• It is a process by which we learn to live with the past in a different way, focusing more on our power than on our helplessness. Forgiveness means turning us into heroes of our life and not victims.
• Deeply accept that the past cannot be changed, knowing that the way in which we relate to it can be changed.
• We have the power to change our feelings and the responsibility to do so if we realize that something in our life is not working the way we would like.
• Finding peace and forgiveness does not mean that what has happened is right, permitted, or that any behavior can be accepted. It means that even if that something happened, we can release our emotions and make our life go on.
• Learn not to take things too personally, knowing how to recognize that we all suffer and that we must learn to find our balance.
This last point is perhaps the most important, since it sums up the gist of the speech and has the ability to touch our hearts.
What happened to us didn’t just happen to us
We can recognize that what we live, even if difficult and tormented, is an experience shared by all human beings. In fact, it has already happened and will continue to happen since it is part of the human experience, even if it is unfair. This is a feature that unites us and allows us not to take things too personally. It helps us to give more importance to what we have in front of us and what lies ahead, rather than what we have been through. It is thanks to this that we find the strength to overcome adversity and to let go of what is not needed.
Returning to the legend, it ends like this: the woman, having come to the conclusion that it was impossible to change what had already happened, since it is a very normal thing to lose a person dear to us, found the peace that no one could ever give her. Like this woman, each of us can encounter peace where there seemed to be only suffering.
