Emotional Conflicts Make Forgiveness Hard | Self Improvement ...

Identifying and resolving emotional conflicts leads the way to the process of forgiveness and peace of mind.

When I ask a client if there is anyone they need to forgive, often the immediate answer is no.

However, when we start our work together, there is almost always some resentment, anger, blame and even hate lying underneath. It?s no surprise to them because they already know that they have these feelings.?But people often don?t relate these feelings to the need for forgiveness.

More importantly, the way we?ve been taught to forgive doesn?t exactly make us want to rush to do it.

The Raging Storm

If you were in the middle of a raging storm outdoors, you?d immediately look for safe shelter.

When the raging storm is inside us, somehow we find it really easy to stand there right in its eye, letting it beat us with what its got.

When you have a minute, take these words one at a time and think about the images and feelings they generate in you:

Anger ?Hate ? Blame ? Resentment

Do they make you feel bad just reading them? Perhaps you feel your tummy tighten as you brace yourself against what they stand for. And that?s just from reading these words.

Now imagine what?s happening to your body as you carry these feelings around with you every single minute of every single day. Even if you don?t think about them all the time, it?s an open loop that means they?re still there (Read?Why You Should Care About the Ziegarnik Effect)

It?s no coincidence that getting rid of these feelings improves confidence, self-esteem and your over-all sense of well-being. It?s no coincidence that actual physical pain, illness and disease start to reduce as you stop these feelings from gnawing away at your health from inside.

But you already know ? without me having to say it ? that carrying this raging storm around inside you is hurting you and it?s doing nothing to make the other person repent for what?they?ve?done.

The Paradox of Forgiveness

Forgiveness is enshrined with religious and spiritual unattainability?that can put us off even thinking about it. We?re not Gods or saints ? we?re not qualified to forgive anyone.

We?re brought up with this ideal that says we MUST forgive others because it?s the moral thing to do? and then comes the guilt?

• Are we a bad person because we don?t want to forgive that git?
• Are we evil because we want cold, hard retribution for how we were treated?
• Are we self-centred because we want the other person to admit they hurt us and make up for it in some way?
• What does it say about our pain if we trivialise it by saying ?ah, ok I forgive you, just don?t do it again.?

How can we possibly consider forgiveness when there is so much conflict to address?

Language is beautiful and empowering. It?s also murderous when it loads so much meaning into a single word that the essence of the word becomes a corrosive snake-pit you wouldn?t go near if they paid you a years salary.

Forgiveness is more than a word. It?s more than the people who?ve betrayed you.

Forgiveness is not about morality. It?s about owning your life.

Simone?s story

Simone (not her real name) came to me for help with her confidence soon after she?d started a new business. After working through the top layer of her issue, we eventually arrived at the core of what was keeping her stuck. Simone?s world and self-identity had been destroyed after having been sexually abused by her stepfather as a child.

Upset, angry and obviously in a great deal of pain, she told me straight up that there was no way she was going to forgive this man for what he had done to her. And I never tried to make her.

Instead, I helped Simone deal with her raging storm. Methodically, using various NLP and EFT techniques, we let the storm find its way out of her body. The day it left, Simone?s tears were unstoppable as she grieved for her lost childhood, the ridicule she?d faced and all the opportunities that had slipped by her.

Afterwards, when she thought about her stepfather, she felt no pain or hatred. It had taken on a factual quality and she saw it as part of her personal history. Describing what she now felt when she thought of him, she said ?I can ignore him, he?s not important, very small. ?He seems to me now like when I wipe dog turd from my shoe and don?t need to think about it again. I don?t like him but I don?t hate him. My throat is okay now, I don?t feel I am choking or gagging?

She never said she?d forgiven him, but his impact on her life was gone. Her confidence was back and her husband called me a week later to say she was all lit up from inside ? radiant and glowing.

Simone shows that forgiveness is a process of removing the negative impact of someone else?s behaviour from our spirit.

Forgiveness is not about them. It?s about you and owning your life.

Is there someone you can?t forgive because of an emotional storm?

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Source: http://paradoxofreality.com/conflict/personal-empowerment/the-emotional-storm-of-forgiveness/

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