12 Steps to Forgiveness

2. Acknowledge how hurt you are, and even the hatred you may feel towards this person for what they have done.

3. Think of times in your own life when your wrong actions have hurt or disappointed others. We also owed a debt we couldn’t pay. None of us is perfect. None of us is without fault. It is much easier to forgive others, when we bear in mind our own weaknesses and failings. We are all in need of forgiveness from time to time. Maybe we have never committed something as awful as betrayal, but as long as we have an uppity “I’m better than you” attitude, we will have trouble forgiving others. It is important to be honest with ourselves, and to view ourselves with sober judgment.

4. Bear the burden of the person’s wrongdoing. In other words your spouse’s affair is causing you tremendous pain, that’s the burden. Be brave and decide you will face that pain, rather than attempting to escape from it. As you do, the pain will begin to subside. Decide to be bigger and better than the situation at hand. Do what’s right, and the situation will in time be turned in your favor. Remember that doing good sometimes includes confrontation. Doing good is not tolerating injustice.

5. Put it in writing what you will do. I forgive ____________ (fill in the person’s name) for _______________ (write it all down) and it made me feel __________________. Write as much as you need to.

AFTER YOU FILL OUT YOUR FORGIVENESS WORKSHEET

6. Decide to forgive. Say it out loud, “I make a decision right now to forgive Penelope Robertson for sleeping with my brother while she was supposed to be in a committed relationship with me. Her doing that made me feel like our relationship wasn’t important enough to remain faithful and committed. By doing that, she made me doubt every person I dated from that point forward. (verbalize the situation).” Take as long as you need to, and be real. Ask for divine help if you need to.

7. Destroy the list: Rip it up, burn it or tie it to a rock and throw it in the river. What you do is not important; the important thing is to destroy the list.

8. Do not expect that your decision to forgive will result in major changes in the other person.

9. Try to understand the person you have forgiven. What is their point of view?
How do they feel? Why did they do what they did? What have their life experiences been that have made them vulnerable to such temptation or wrongdoing?

10. Expect positive results of forgiveness in you.
What are the benefits of forgiveness?
1) It sets you free from the past.
2) It significantly reduces vulnerability to physical sickness in you. It reduces the amount of toxins in your body. Forgiveness will make you healthier.

11. Think of what you’ve learned through this experience. What could you do better in the future? How can you help others going through the same or similar pain? It helps when you can redeem some meaning and purpose out of all the pain and mess. It feels much better, when we can think it was not for nothing, that it wasn’t meaningless.
Forgiveness is a learned skill. We don’t just know how automatically.