Those who say forgiveness is weakness haven’t tried it.
DESMOND TUTU
via The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World
Major props to the Archbishop here. If there’s anything more difficult in life than forgiving someone who has hurt you deeply, I don’t know what it is. Hard enough when the person says they’re sorry and asks you to get over it, but the truth is, most people won’t ask. Much of the time, when we need to forgive someone, it will be a person who truly believes they’ve done nothing wrong.
In one exercise at church, the pastor asked us to write down the names of everyone we needed to forgive. She said not to worry if the list was long. She had done this exercise many times, and some of the names on her list appeared over and over because as hard as she tried, she couldn’t seem to manage it. And at the top of the list every time, she told us, was her own name.
Forgiveness is not weakness. It requires a strength most of us don’t think we have. I know I still have a lot of names on my list, including my own. But with any luck, forgiveness will turn out to be like any other exercise, and we will build up the muscles with practice. The one thing I know for sure is that not forgiving takes joy from my life, so whether or not I owe it to the other party, I owe it to myself.
Archbishop Tutu has offered forgiveness to the perpetrators of apartheid. That’s Olympian level forgiveness, and it takes time. But we’ll never get out of Little League if we don’t start somewhere. Maybe with the guy who cut us off on the freeway?
Kimberly forgives the IOC for taking baseball out of the Olympics and screwing up her metaphor…or at least, she’s working on it.
Weakness is interpreted by those that act strong but are truly fragile when it comes down to testing that strength. Those fragile individuals see weakness in forgiving other’s, accepting ones own imperfections and being polite and courteous. See what I mean about their fragility. It does not take much to crack their facade.
Thank you so much for my daily shot of clarity. Love you!