Does Forgiveness Really Set Us Free

We all experience trauma in our lives in one form or another. Lately, I have seen many of these trite little quotes on forgiveness. How forgiving people who have wronged you helps you but does it?

We have lots of things that happen to us throughout life. I suppose it depends on the severity of the act. Someone jumps ahead of you in the queue in the supermarket. Letting it go is probably best.

What if you have experienced abuse and trauma? What about life-altering acts that stay with you throughout your life, that shape the person you become with the sheer trauma of it?

I fully believe that forgiving your abuser is a cop-out. That all it does is validate them. Am I missing the point? Am I stunting my growth by not forgiving my abuser?

We often believe that to save ourselves. To start the process of healing that we need to let go of the anger, frustration and other extreme feelings. I have found the opposite. I spent many years hiding from my feelings, afraid of what they would bring.

EMDR taught me how to reframe the abuse. Through this, I became able to view and experience situations through adult eyes. Helping me in 2 ways:

Being able to process what had happened and reassess the emotions around the abuse.

Able, as an adult, to help my younger self forgive herself for things out with her control.

What failed to happen was forgiveness for them. A part of me can understand the circumstances of their life that broke them to a point where they felt trapped and alone.

That, however, does not give anyone the right to, in turn, break another person. So while part of me gets how people can get to this point is it my responsibility to forgive them? Why should I the situation was not of my making? Forcing me to do so makes me feel helpless all over again.

People will no doubt say that the act of forgiving the other person means that you can move on and get on with your life. That the only reason I can't is because I am not over it. I will counter with this, how the hell would you know. How dare you assume you know what is best for me. I spent the biggest part of my life at the mercy of someone else. I will not go back there again.

Can you move on without forgiving them? Would it be kinder to forgive yourself?

We need to accept what works for people. Telling people forgiveness will set them free is a lie. Unfair because what we are doing is negating their experience and how they want to deal with it.

When you are abused or subjected to trauma, you need to be allowed to deal with the aftermath as you see fit. If you choose to forgive someone for what happened, that is amazing.

Not everyone will ever be in a place to do that. To forgive their abuser, who decided they should have to? When I read these quotes I think WHAT??

Normalise people dealing with what happened to them in a way that suits them. Before I did therapy, not being ready to forgive my abuser became another source of guilt for me. Why? I thought I was doing something wrong, thinking this needed to happen for me to move on.

It doesn’t you can move on perfectly well without forgiving anyone. My advice would be to talk to someone about how you feel and your experiences (if you are ready). Through the act of healing, you will come to a point where you will know if you can forgive or not.

So if you reach the point decide to forgive, well done. Amazing job congratulations on the start of your journey.

So you reach the point and decide not to forgive, well done. Amazing, congratulations on the start of your journey.

Whatever you decide needs to be what you need, not weird forgiveness quotes or well-meaning people who don’t always understand your experiences. We are the Kings and Queens of our own story. Remember as long as you are doing what feels right for you, you’ve got it right always.

You do you.

What happens to people isn’t a one size fits all and neither should how people heal.

Not everyone will or should forgive the people who hurt them.

There needs to be a place in the world for acceptance of peoples choices. If you haven't been part of the traumatic experience, you have no business telling someone they are wrong.

Stop telling people their feelings are not valid. Stop setting the expectations to your level. Trust that our lived experiences make us the experts on ourselves.

I will always choose to forgive myself before the man who violated my trust.

Sorry, not sorry.