I don’t want to forgive her!

I have a client (we’ll call her Samantha) who has a very tense relationship with a close colleague of hers (we’ll call her Carrie). No relation to Sex in the City. 👠🍸

Carrie and Samantha work at the same company. By Samantha’s account, Carrie has always been, well, Carrie. She’s loud, insecure, bossy, narcissistic, and annoying. But she does a good job at her role, so it’s understandable why she’s around. That doesn’t mean Samantha has to like her.

When their company was founded, they were each one of 30 employees so they didn’t cross very much. Well, time has passed and now the company only has…wait for it….3 employees.

😖

This has meant that Samantha has to constantly and closely work with Carrie all 👏 of 👏 the 👏 time 👏. And that has been a very unpleasant experience for her! 

While Samantha has had plenty in her life to talk about during our sessions, for a few sessions in a row, the topic at hand kept being Carrie. Carrie this. Carrie that. Carrie the asshole! Carrie was interrupting the flow of the work, demanding attention on her when it wasn’t appropriate, and even embarrassing the company by demeaning guests. It was driving Samantha absolutely insane! 

Carrie was 100% getting under her skin.

After a few weeks of coaching, Samantha wanted to embrace my suggestion of working on forgiveness. She felt this was going to be the best course of action, even if it meant doing the hard work. But to forgive Carrie was nearly impossible. What a huge ask!! This human has been absolutely terrible to her! Demeaning, condescending, thoughtless, rude, selfish…it was hard to find redeeming value. And then I had the audacity to suggest that she should forgive her?

Literalleigh a quote: “I don’t want to forgive her!!”

It’s funny, in that moment, what I heard was: “I don’t want to let go of this frustration and pain!” I found it confusing. But I also realized how often this is the case and how common it is. We often hold onto hurt feelings as a point of pride and revenge.

What Samantha didn’t grasp (and most people don’t understand) is that, in practice, forgiveness is not about them. It’s for you.

Hear that again.

Forgiveness is not for them. Forgiveness is for you.

You may have been wronged and you may not want to forget, but forgiveness can be the healthiest response…because it helps you feel better. Fuck them! This isn't about them! (Even though they’re the reason for frustration.) They don’t have to be involved in this act at all.

Consider if the person you’re pissed at were dead. Then what? Are you doomed to never being able to make progress because you haven’t had an in-person forgiveness act? No! They don’t ever have to be involved. GOOD THAT THEY’RE DEAD! 🤣☠️⚰️💐

Understanding that forgiveness truly is a personal and freeing process intended to help you make progress in your life is a transformative idea. Suddenly, you’re able to move with better ease and without jolts of frustration.

Samantha has found this work extraordinarily successful. She can sometimes catch herself going back into the hole, but as she becomes aware of what’s happening, she simply redirects and BAM, it’s back to normalcy. Carrie doesn’t have the same effect on her anymore. Carrie continues to be Carrie, but it doesn’t have the outsized impact it once did.

Who would be worth forgiving in your life for YOUR sake?