Healthy Living Newsletter
This Thanksgiving
Tap the Power of Forgiveness
 Rose has a clear image of her brother sitting across the table from her. His body seemed relaxed, but there was anger in his eyes. “I don’t want to see you at our house again, Rose. You are not welcome.”
Rose barely remembers what the original dispute was about; yet she replays the scene in her mind frequently, and each time she feels the tension in her body that she felt the first time–the tightness across her brow and in her chest. She has never forgiven her brother for what he said that Thanksgiving day 43 years ago.
To a lesser–or greater–degree, nearly all of us harbor bad feelings at one time or another. It may be an unfaithful spouse...or an abusive one; a back-stabbing co-worker; or a drunk driver who killed a loved one.
While these ill feelings usually have little or no affect on the person who is the object of the anger, they do have negative consequences for the one who feels them.
Forgiveness and unforgiveness have been hot topics of research over the past several years, and the consensus view is that the tension Rose feels when she re-plays the scene in her mind is a stress response. If the scene is embellished with angry adjectives and adverbs, as it often is, the result is not to vent but to escalate negative emotions that are harmful to both mental and physical health.
A 2001 study conducted on students at Hope College in Michigan found that subjects who dwelled on painful moments showed an unhealthy increase in heart rate, blood pressure, muscle tension and stress hormones that did not appear in subjects who instead imagined themselves forgiving their offender. Because of these affects, the unforgiving person is at risk for a number of serious health problems, including hypertension, cardiovascular disease, depression, anxiety and reduced immunity.
Based on functional MRI scans, scientists know that different parts of the brain are activated in response to forgiving—as opposed to unforgiving—thoughts. An important step toward good health, researchers say, is to learn to tap the power of forgiveness.
Not Being Soft or Weak
Forgiveness has a role in nearly every major religion, but you don’t have to subscribe to any belief system to reap the health benefits. The concept is perhaps best summed up by an old Buddhist saying: “Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intention of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.”
As therapists see it, forgiveness does not necessarily mean turning the other cheek, denying that you were harmed or excusing the action of the other person. You need not reconcile with the other person or let him back in your life. In fact, if you were the victim of physical or emotional abuse, the first step may be to maintain distance between yourself and the perpetrator of harm lest the cycle of abuse start again.
The idea is not to be soft on the other person but rather to protect yourself from the ongoing consequences of harboring anger. Something bad happened; there’s nothing you can do to change it; but you can move past it and keep it from interfering with your life.
The first step is simply deciding to let go of the anger and change the negative thought patterns. This is what Everett L. Worthington, Ph.D., author of Forgiveness and Reconciliation: Theory and Applications calls “decisional forgiveness.”
This step may entail sitting in a quiet place, imagining that the person who has hurt you is in front of you and silently saying, “I forgive you.” Another method might be to write your feelings in a diary.
Dr. Worthington believes the ultimate goal is “emotional forgiveness”–making a conscious effort to replace the bitterness and anger with positive emotions such as compassion, sympathy and empathy. He suggests trying to “recall the hurt objectively, without blame and self victimization... Then you empathize by trying to imagine the viewpoint of the person who wronged you.” This kind of forgiveness, of course, is a process that occurs over time.
Jeanne Safer, Ph.D., author of Forgiving and Not Forgiving believes that forgiveness is not always possible or necessary to resolve feelings in a healthy way. She recommends a three-step process: 1) re-thinking what happened, 2) re-examining every feeling you have about the event and 3) re-interpreting the injury, with an effort to understand the person who caused it.
Forgiveness is a choice and a skill that can be learned. For those who have trouble on their own, therapy is available. More than 1,200 forgiveness studies have been conducted–nearly all over the past decade–and many specific forgiveness interventions have been developed.
The individual health benefits have been documented–lower blood pressure, decreased risk of heart disease, lower levels of stress hormones and improved immune function.
Rose needs to remember that the most important people to forgive are your closest family and friends. They are the ones most likely to accept your forgiveness, offer their own forgiveness in return and move forward.
This Thanksgiving, offer thanks for all the wonderful benefits in your life, including good health and celebrate a newly found freedom in forgiveness. |
