Can You Forgive, and Do You Even Want To?
About 120 years ago a phrase came into being: “get out of the doghouse.” If a couple had a fight and one locked the other out of the house, unless there was a barn on the property, the only shelter was likely to be the family dog’s house. Hence, a bid for forgiveness was characterized as a bid to get out of the doghouse.
Humans have a difficult relationship with the concept of forgiveness. We get irritated by the behaviors of others every day in small ways, and sometimes even suffer hardship, hurt, or loss through the actions of others. Both the small slights and the larger ones spark a level of negative emotion pointed toward the perceived perpetrator. Behavioral scientists agree there are at least two components to forgiveness, emotional and behavioral, and while there’s not a lot of research on them, it’s likely that most acts of forgiveness include a blend of both. Let’s look at two examples where an offense is given, and forgiveness might be offered:
- You’re driving to work in well-flowing traffic, when someone jumps into the lane in front of you, causing you to slam on your brakes and spill coffee all over yourself.
- You’ve been part of a committed relationship for decades when you find out that your partner is cheating on you with your best friend.
The first scenario is a minor irritation compared to the second, and yet both require forgiveness in order for you to regain your sense of mental wellbeing. Before you get all up in arms, hear me out – one kind of forgiveness is for you, not for the offending party.
The two kinds of forgiveness are behavioral and emotional:
- Behavioral forgiveness is when you tell the offender that “it’s OK” or “I forgive you.” You’re giving them an out, whether you really forgive them or not. You’re helping them feel better about the irritation or pain they caused.
- Emotional forgiveness is when you release the emotional distress you feel about what happened. You may or may not say words to the other person, and yet you don’t keep stewing in the irritation, anger, and even pain their actions may have caused.
In a research study published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, John Berry, Everett Worthington, and their team found that personalities can be plotted along a scale from likely to forgive to disinclined to forgive. They developed a personality assessment, then compared the level of willingness to forgive against other, better-understood characteristics like anxiety, agreeableness, and how much provocation was needed to produce an anger response. Those who were more agreeable tended to have better relationships, and their blood pressure was lower, indicating a healthier bodily environment.
Forgiveness is the gift you give yourself. You are the only person who can bestow emotional forgiveness, and the only person you’re bestowing it on is you – it has nothing to do with the other person. If you’d like to learn a little bit more about how to give yourself this powerful gift of mental and physical wellbeing, the world’s second-shortest podcast has some wellbeing wisdom to share on that topic:
- Is the past tripping you up today? Here’s a Tiny Bite for that!
- Need an example of forgiveness through mental gymnastics? Here’s a Tiny Bite for that!
- Want an example of forgiveness through humor? Here’s a Tiny Bite for that!
Going back to the concept of “getting out of the doghouse,” hopefully you now see the ways you may put yourself and your mental wellbeing “in the doghouse” from time to time, along with the benefits of letting yourself out of the doghouse. When you continue to tell the story, to others or just inside your head, of wrongs done to you, you’re keeping yourself in a doghouse of your own making. When you let go of the need to re-live past hurts, you take away the power they have over you and take back your own power to lead the life you want to lead. Won’t that be so much more fun?
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