Forgiving yourself is an imperative step when healing from tragedy in life.  Continuing on the Mary Setterholm story as written by Steve Lopez in #1, we can’t really be sure if forgiving herself is a process Mary has successfully completed.  She certainly has created significant healing in her life and has moved into a new phase. 

Forgiving yourself is one of the most difficult of all steps of forgiveness.  It is often thought that forgiving the other person is difficult …  only to find that the freedom and release we hoped for from letting go of this past negative experience is not happening.   

Forgiving yourself is a completely personal issue…and has nothing to do with what anyone else might think you need to forgive.  When we have been a victim, through betrayal, incest, physical/sexual and/or emotional abuse, the question comes up “Why do I need to forgive myself, I didn’t do anything wrong?”  And this is often true.  The need to forgive yourself  may simply come from continuing to replay the incident over and over in your mind. This causes the production of  hormones due to negative feelings, maybe fear, rage, hate or anxiety.  Your body does not know the difference between a real threat and one that is imagined or remembered.  This causes the  release of  fight or flight hormones throughout your system….again, and again, and again – depending on how many times you replay the incident in your mind.   The worst part is …. it is as if the perpetrator is continuing to violate or betray you. 

Forgiving yourself, even if done gradually and through different layers can create freedom and an unexpected ability to forgive others more easily.  Perhaps the biggest gift is the increased compassion and understanding for yourself and others.

From the waves of tragedy to the waves of release!

Tags: Forgiveness, Mary Setterholm, Self forgiveness, Steve Lopez

This entry was posted on Monday, July 27th, 2009 at 6:26 am and is filed under Compassion, Forgiveness, Releasing the past. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.