Please, help me forgive.

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Can someone please tell me how I forgive? I have so much aggression pent up from the past. So much so that it's consuming me. I don't want to to resent anymore. I'll never have the opportunity for revenge, and I know I'll never see an apology for any of it. Please, help. I want to be healthy not just in my body and blood, but in my mind again.

Have you confronted the people who you feel have wronged you? Not in a violent sense, but told them how they've affected you? Revenge isn't worth it, but you feel someone has wronged you and you can't get past it, speaking your mind can help. Have your say, don't expect them to understand or apologize, and then see if you can move on from that. If that doesn't work there are ways you can cope with your anger without having to deal with the people who've hurt you. This is one of the worst things about being an introverted person I think ... you bottle up all the s**t other people give you, and then you realize you can't get it out again. Good luck - been there many times myself.

as they say in AA, "when you don't forgive someone else for their trespasses, you are letting them live rent-free in your head." to forgive is to "let go and let God." letting these people live rent-free in your head basically is corrosive to you and doesn't harm the evil ones in the least, so why even give their memory another picosecond of your time? these folk who wronged you in the past, will have to face their own karma eventually. don't become involved in their evil via vengeance, as evil rubs off, "lie down with dogs and get up with fleas"-style - IOW if you get your revenge, you have only proven to God that you can be just as bad as your tormentors. the best veangence is to simply be better than they are.

You and I sound identical in this area, and Steps Four through Nine of "The Twelve Steps" are where I found a solution ... and you would not have to be an alcoholic to "take the Steps".

I will gladly help you with that, if you wish, and I caution you to watch out for people who only *think* they know how to do that.

I think there's two types, those who can and those who can't, and neither can change how they are.

I'm of the can't, which sometimes makes me feel guilty, but it's...just how I am. I learnt not to care, or perhaps I didn't learn and the massive amount of hate I have within is just...a product of my inability to forget and forgive.

Of course, there's a threshold for those that can, but I'm talking about the two extremes, and one extreme is usually found in people with an ASD.

A desire to harm is not what drives the resentment;
The resentment can only continue on for just as long as we yet hurt;
Nobody can live without thoughts of others in his or her brain.

Indeed, getting on with your life is the best possible "revenge" there is! Don't give them any more power over you.

If nothing else helps, go to the gym/clean the house/sign up for boxing/martial arts course and release it out of the system.

One thing that helped me the most is meditation, but to each his own.

Craig Ferguson reran an interview with Desmond Tutu the other night, during which they discussed this very topic. Craig repeated a quote he couldn't recall the source for that went something like: '[Clinging to] resentment is like taking poison and expecting someone else to die."

Tutu talked about how Nelson Mandella invited a man to his inauguration who, 27 years earlier, had been instrumental in sending him to prison and had attempted to have him killed. Talk about the best revenge being living well. How do you stand in the same room with someone who's done you so much wrong?

I don't know - I've been wrestling with that for the last couple of years, and my sense of outrage at injustice just won't allow me to let it go. It's as if I'm giving in to the bully - submitting to their psychological rape once and for all if I ever stop resisting. Perhaps the same part of the brain that allows some people to have faith, also allows some to forgive - a part that in my brain is a void - 'cause I can't seem to muster either quality, no matter how much I would like to be able to.

Thanks everyone, for helping out. Someone said there's probably only two types- those who forgive and those who don't, and you can't help it. I hope that's not the case. I'll keep praying and trying.

I've forgiven everybody who's done me wrong, the second week, of this past September. I was able to go back to being the real me, the Kinks Fan that you all know, today, the third week of September.

Why? Because I've forgiven everybody in my life, who's ever done me wrong. I was going through a punk rock rebellion, until I've found my ability to forgive.

I hope when I can finally forgive, my own transformation is that profound.

Let it be known to the person(s) that they are forgiven and tell yourself in your mind that you don't mean it and you won't forgive them and in time you will feel better just for saying that you forgive them.

In some circles, that could result in a broken nose if the other person believes s/he had done nothing wrong!



Maybe you mean that merely as some kind of simple gimmick playing on one's having at least a willingness to forgive? If so, maybe that could be helpful for getting oneself over a hurdle of one kind or another.

The best way to learn to forgive others begins with seeing our inherent need for healthy relationships with them and with cleaning our own sides of the street so we can be found acceptable to them. After that, it is not uncomon for those who have hurt us to at least consider doing the same ... and all of that can lead to forgiveness all around.

Figuring out how to word what's happened to me has provided a lot of relief. I'm pretty hypergraphic to begin with, so it's an understandable approach that might not work with everyone.

The most important thing is finding a way to let it out, and move on, and as easy as that can sound, it's anything but easy. Different people are going to have different coping mechanisms, and it'll vary for each stage of grief. Just give yourself time, and try to figure out what helps you learn to accept what happened, and start putting it behind you.

Just don't expect it to be quick. These things never are.

Remember that autism spectrum disorders are defined as communication deficits, and figuring out how to communicate what happened could have a significant impact on your ability to move on. It's a normal mechanism of dealing with grief that simply isn't as functional in us.

ok, i used the incorrect term, i should have said that keeping resentment in one's head doesn't AFFECT one's enemies one way or another. it doesn't enlighten them as to the error of their ways nor persuades them one way or another. so why bother keeping them in one's noggin? dwelling on past hurts only rubs the wounds rawer and delays healing further.

I understood your logic there, and I was not meaning to disagree. Rather, I am saying it is impossible for many people to dismiss such thoughts so simply.



Agreed, but that fact does not empower people to release resentment and heal.