Rear view of person with long blonde hair sitting on suitcase at the end of a dockHow we treat ourselves affects our interactions with others. If I beat myself up for not being perfect, how will I be loving toward a friend or a romantic partner who has “failed” me? How will I be able to set realistic expectations for others if they aren’t realistic for me?

So often, we are unloving toward our perceived flaws. We criticize our bodies, without thanking our body parts for the important functions they serve. We criticize our personal qualities, without practicing compassionate curiosity. Our mistakes are rarely used as opportunities for growth. Instead, our mistakes are used to create a track record proving how “incompetent” we are.

In an ideal world, we would be in control of our lives and tailor them to our liking. In the real world, however, we are faced with messiness on a daily basis. There are more gray areas than black-and-white ones. Our plans don’t always pan out, and our expectations are not always met.

[fat_widget_right]

It always surprises me how dehumanizing our problems can be. Anxiety convinces us that we are “crazy.” Depression convinces us that we are “worthless.” Perfectionism convinces us that we are “never enough.” Yet we invite these abusive voices into our daily routines. Whatever happened to healthy self-love and self-respect?

In today’s modern world, many people appear to be self-absorbed. We often spend more time on our phones than actually socializing with those around us. There is difference between being self-absorbed and practicing healthy self-love, however. Being self-absorbed centers on the idea of empty external validation. On the other hand, healthy self-love invites acceptance, integrity, and creates space for personal values. Healthy self-love is the ability to notice one’s “flaws” and attempt to improve those areas through compassionate healing. Healthy self-love allows a person to be human. Healthy self-love does not connect one’s self-worth to one’s performance.

Think about it: A lack of healthy self-love leaves us feeling ashamed and alone. Over time, a lack of self-love can lead to depression, anxiety, loneliness, and a sense of emptiness. These issues develop such a centralized position in our lives that we may grow fearful of leaving them behind. We latch onto them as though our identities will be compromised if we try to move beyond what they have planned for us.

If it was up to depression, we might lay in bed most of the day. If it was up to anxiety, we might avoid speaking in public. We know that not loving ourselves may leave us feeling lonely and tired. We know that negative self-talk may only invite more anxiety. Yet we continue to stay married to our challenges. We offer loyalty to our problems and, in doing so, leave less space for self-love.

If it were up to depression, we might lay in bed most of the day. If it was up to anxiety, we might avoid speaking in public. We know that not loving ourselves may leave us feeling lonely and tired. We know that negative self-talk may only invite more anxiety. Yet we continue to stay married to our challenges. We offer loyalty to our problems and, in doing so, leave less space for self-love.

Our problems attempt to compare us to an unrealistic standard that is never consistent. The standard continues to grow as we age. As we age, the standard attempts to find a new cohort to compare us to.

We carry “suitcases” from childhood into adolescence. We fill up our suitcases with more unmet expectations and perceived disappointments and carry them over to adulthood. The cycle continues until the day we die or we realize our problems will never allow us to love ourselves.

When we judge others, it’s usually because they have “failed” to meet an expectation that our problems have set for us. Either we have “failed” to achieve that expectation as well, or we have “succeeded” at complying with the expectation. Lack of self-love steps in and whispers: “I have failed at meeting this expectation, and so has this person. I don’t like myself, so I don’t like this person, either.” Lack of self-love also can whisper: “I have complied with this certain expectation. This person has ‘failed’ to meet this particular expectation. They are not perfect and not worthy of my time.”

The way you treat others is a reflection of your internal dialogue with yourself. If you have cheated on a romantic partner, it is less about your romantic partner or the third person in the scenario. It is more about who you would have hoped to be with, alongside the third person. It is about you.

If you have judged another person, it is more about your relationship with mistakes or differences than it is about the other person. Problems have a way of tricking us into loyalty. Problems guide us to black-and-white thinking. Our goal is not to step away from personal values and morals. Our goal is to have acceptance and love for ourselves—enough acceptance that we are able to remind ourselves that we will be okay regardless of how others choose to live, regardless of other people’s actions.

Do you love yourself enough to forgive yourself for the things you think you have not accomplished? Can you be compassionate with yourself and accept yourself so fully that you stop looking for others to do what you have “failed” at? Can you remind yourself that where you are at this very moment is exactly where you need to be?

Man consoling sad woman on sofaAll close relationships have difficult moments, times when partners feel hurt, disappointed, or frustrated with one another. But some wounds are so deep they threaten the fabric of the relationship. At these times, the wounded partner’s experience can typically be summarized as either: “When I needed you most, you weren’t there for me,” or, “I trusted you and you betrayed me.” Either way, the spoken or implied reaction is, “I will never trust you and risk being so hurt and disappointed again.”

Practitioners of emotionally focused therapy (EFT), a well-researched, effective model of couples therapy, call these destructive experiences attachment injuries. EFT encourages hurt partners to share not just the facts about their injury, but the deep pain and sadness they experienced. Offending partners are helped to listen non-defensively, fully understand the emotional impact of their behavior on the injured partner, and express sincere remorse and regret. Couples are then guided through the process of asking for and receiving the comfort and support that was missing at the time of the injury.

[fat_widget_right]

When partners complete this process, many find their bond is not just repaired but strengthened. They understand each other’s needs and experiences in new ways that allow them to be more responsive to each other in the future.

But for a number of couples, understanding their partner’s experience and offering heartfelt apologies is not enough. The wounded partner still has trouble moving on, and the remorseful partner feels stuck in purgatory, not knowing what more to do.

If you have ever been that remorseful partner, unable to regain your partner’s trust, chances are you have experienced your own emotional pain. You may have felt hurt your partner wouldn’t give you another chance, sad your thoughtless behavior had such monumental consequences, ashamed of what you did, scared you would never repair your relationship, or angry your partner was unwilling to move on.

Chances are, you felt confused and stuck. What more did your partner want from you? What more could you do?

At that moment, your confusion, fear, anger, hurt, or despair placed you at high risk of doing something to make things worse. Or, afraid to say or do the wrong thing, you might have done nothing at all. Either way, your good work in understanding and acknowledging past mistakes could easily be undone.

But for a number of couples, understanding their partner’s experience and offering heartfelt apologies is not enough. The wounded partner still has trouble moving on, and the remorseful partner feels stuck in purgatory, not knowing what more to do.

What you may not have understood is that you—your presence, comfort, and understanding—were the key to your partner’s recovery. Your partner felt alone and abandoned at a vulnerable time. The antidote to this painful memory is to experience your presence whenever they share their pain, for as long as it takes to believe they can count on you again.

Whether partners share pain for the first time or for the hundredth, they are asking, “Do you really care how I feel? Are you really there for me now?” If the answer is, “Yes, I’m here and I care, and I’ll be here for as long as it takes,” your relationship has taken at least a small step forward. If you grow impatient, if you get angry or defensive or hopeless, your partner may again feel dismissed or alone at a time of need. In other words, you will have replayed and reinforced the original hurt.

A couple I recently saw—I’ll call them Allison and Mark—exemplify how couples can continue to struggle after a heartfelt apology. After months of working on their relationship in therapy, Allison summoned the courage to tell Mark how deeply wounded she had been since a dismissive remark he made to her several years earlier, at a time she was depressed and overwhelmed.

Because of the good work they had already done on their relationship, Mark was able to take in Allison’s experience without defending himself or minimizing her pain. Understanding the magnitude of her wound, he was stricken. He expressed his heartfelt apology and sat with her in a moment of shared sorrow.

But the wall Allison had put up to protect her from ever feeling that vulnerable and hurt again did not immediately come down. “I wish I could just take the wall down and move on,” she told him sadly, “but I can’t yet. I don’t know why.”

And then he panicked. What if Allison never recovered from this injury? What if there was no way to undo or repair the damage? What if she decided he couldn’t be the man she needs?

In his panic, Mark tried to convince her they couldn’t change the past and she needed to begin trusting him again. He understood what he did wrong, and he would try to be a better partner. But instead of feeling reassured, Allison felt he was telling her, “You shouldn’t be feeling hurt and alone anymore. You should be able to move on.”

If the conversation stopped here, as it often did at home, Allison would have felt Mark was once again dismissing her feelings, leaving her to struggle alone. She would have felt less trust in him than before the apology and added a few more bricks to her self-protective wall.

But this time, I was able to explain that Allison needed a different kind of reassurance. Mark then turned to her and said, “I’ll wait as long as you need me to. I don’t care how long it takes for you to take the wall down. I’m here and I love you.”

And with that, their relationship took a small but important step forward.

Your very sad story is touching. You’re worried that you’ve wasted four years of your life and clearly miss the man who was your partner, and you long for the good times you spent together. Nevertheless, your memories of the good are almost buried in your regret. I’m glad you’re seeing a therapist to help yourself grow and develop and learn how to hold onto the good, so you can learn to care for yourself and how to take care of yourself, too, and become a better partner. It’s apparent to me that you have accepted responsibility for your role in the way things ended, and that shows growth.

[fat_widget_right]

Part of human development is learning to accept yourself and your actions, your history, and use it as a springboard to move forward in your life. As your therapist says, forgiving yourself is essential. Once you do that, it’s time to shut the door on it. You cannot return to your past.

Clinging to the past and especially to regrets about your behavior may feel unconsciously like a way to cling to the person who was once your partner, but in fact it’s only a memory you’re attached to.

You seem preoccupied with thoughts about how your partner thinks of you now. You’re worried that the bad times will outweigh the good ones, and the good will be forgotten. This may or not be so for him—we don’t really know that—but what we can be sure about is what your feelings are. You can remember the good and the bad that you both experienced, forgive yourself, forgive your partner, and move on. The best testament to the good times you enjoyed in your relationship is the ability to hold onto the good and go forward with your life. The past has a vote, not a veto. It can vote to show you better paths in the future, but it cannot have veto power over the rest of your life.

After some time of healing and mourning, I hope you will be ready to move on and use all you have learned to forge a new relationship filled with compassion and love for yourself and the person who becomes your next partner, if and when you choose to pursue another relationship.

Clinging to the past and especially to regrets about your behavior may feel unconsciously like a way to cling to the person who was once your partner, but in fact it’s only a memory you’re attached to. The person has gone away, and you deserve something real, solid, and present.

I wish you patience and success as you continue your journey with your therapist.

Take care,
Lynn

Downcast girl sitting on fenceIf the title of this article threw you off a bit, it’s OK—I understand why it would. After all, forgiveness is quite the hot topic. Religious leaders, spiritual gurus, and even some mental health professionals emphasize the importance of forgiveness as a part of finding true happiness and freedom. I get where they are coming from. I can understand how forgiveness could be beneficial in some circumstances. For example, if a loved one says something uncharacteristically harsh in the heat of an argument, and you would like to keep that person in your life, it may be beneficial to understand that we all sometimes say things we don’t mean when we are upset and to forgive him or her in order to move forward in the relationship.

I work with people who have experienced horrific traumas at the hands of other people. These traumas include acts of sexual abuse, rape, exploitation, and physical and emotional abuse. Some of the perpetrators are relatives and some are not. Regardless, the degree of trauma in each of these cases is significant and has had a major impact on their lives and well-being.

The people I work with in the therapy room are resilient and courageous. They are able to work through their traumas, but many get caught up on one point: They believe they are supposed to forgive the perpetrator but can’t seem to get there.

[fat_widget_trauma_ptsd_right]

This is what I tell them: You don’t have to forgive in order to move on.

Understand that if a person comes in and finds that the word “forgiveness” resonates, I do not discourage it. We roll with it. But often people struggle with this word, and rightfully so. They do not want to imply what happened to them was in any way OK. They don’t want to excuse the perpetrator’s behavior. They feel the perpetrator is not deserving of forgiveness. The worst thing I can do as a therapist is to talk people out of the way they feel.

Emotions are important and automatic. When we can acknowledge and appreciate even the darkest, most negative-feeling emotions, they often soften and release. As soon as I say, “You don’t have to forgive,” the person usually breathes a sigh of relief.

Once we have determined that forgiveness is not necessary, we work on finding a word that will be more congruent for the person in his or her trauma work. I like the word unburdening.Once we have determined that forgiveness is not necessary, we work on finding a word that will be more congruent for the person in his or her trauma work. I like the word unburdening, which is something I first heard in Richard Schwartz’s book Internal Family Systems Therapy. I understand unburdening as a letting-go process. That is, letting go of the power the trauma has over a person, expressing and releasing anger and other strong emotions about what happened without criticism or expectation of what needs to come next. This includes allowing a person to have as much time as is needed to feel whatever he or she is feeling. This may include rage, hate, and resentment, among other emotions.

It is equally important for others to refrain from pushing someone into forgiving a perpetrator. Even if the intention is coming from a good place, trying to get someone who has been violated to forgive can feel like being victimized all over again. Instead, it is more helpful to validate that the person is entitled to his or her feelings. Being a listening ear instead of trying to fix the issue is much more supportive and healing. The person needs to be able to have a voice and express what he or she is feeling and thinking without the fear of judgment.

The brain and body are so intelligent. It is important to allow the natural process of working through trauma to happen and to remove any barriers that may get in the way. This includes the belief we aren’t supposed to feel “negative” emotions or that we have to forgive. Once we remove that expectation, the natural process moves through. Even if someone doesn’t get to a place of forgiveness, he or she can still move on, unburden themselves, and thrive.

GoodTherapy | What to Do When You’re the JerkI’ve been a jerk many times in my life. But one time that stands out for me happened when I was 13. I had been invited to the bat mitzvah of a girl I barely knew. A bat mitzvah is a big event; at least 100 people were there. After singing “Happy Birthday,” some kid usually started chanting, “Skip around the room, skip around the room, we won’t shut up until you skip around the room.” Obviously, the intent was to make the birthday child … skip around the room.

On this occasion, I started the chant, but it fell flat on its face. Not a single person joined the chant with me.

It wasn’t until I was in college, recalling this embarrassing incident, that I finally realized my shameful behavior. The birthday girl, who appeared in class sporadically, sometimes showed up on crutches and sometimes arrived in a wheelchair. I had completely forgotten about her disability because she had put them aside for her bat mitzvah. Ignorantly, obliviously, I had thrown her illness in everyone’s face. What a horrible child!

It’s easier to forgive a child’s behavior than an adult’s. It’s also easier to forgive unintentional cruelty than intentional harm. But regardless, I will always feel a little ashamed that I hurt that girl and her family that day.

[fat_widget_right]

Shame, that gut-wrenching, nauseating feeling, keeps people from acknowledging when they’ve been hurtful. So often, admitting that you’re guilty means being overcome with shame. We all want to be the good guy. It’s awful to discover that we’ve been the villain.

The other thing that stops people from admitting when they’ve been wrong is punishment. Often, the punishment is shame: “Shame on you!” If a person admits to a spouse that he or she has been overreactive or harsh toward the spouse, will the person be understood and forgiven or will he/she be punished and repeatedly shamed?

Being able to take responsibility for one’s bad behavior is in everyone’s best interest. Being condescending, being harshly critical, being explosive, being prejudiced—these behaviors and more may occur for all of us, but unacknowledged and unchecked, they can become a person’s identity, overshadowing higher qualities and damaging or destroying relationships.

What to do:

What not to do:
Twelve-step groups, support groups, and psychotherapy can assist individuals in regaining clarity and self-compassion in order to end abusive behaviors, including the abusive behavior of self-loathing and self-abuse.

These suggestions are sometimes easier said than done. It can take time, patience, and emotional support to work through these steps. A person may not get the understanding and forgiveness he or she desires. It’s important to do it anyway, regardless of the reaction. Just because someone becomes aware of his or her behavior doesn’t mean it won’t happen again. Hopefully, with repeated awareness and commitment, the person can learn to stop it faster.

In families that carry histories of substance abuse and/or physical abuse, the level of damage can be extreme, resulting in a greater need to justify, ignore, or suppress awareness of these behaviors. Twelve-step groups, support groups, and psychotherapy can assist individuals in regaining clarity and self-compassion in order to end abusive behaviors, including the abusive behavior of self-loathing and self-abuse.

No one is perfect. There is no shame in learning, growing, and striving to be your best self.

Offended coupleYou find yourself in a fraught situation: your partner has just learned about your affair. Feelings of panic, anxiety, fear, shame, and guilt overwhelm you. You aren’t sleeping well, maybe waiting for the other shoe to drop, worried that every conversation will lead to your partner telling you it’s over. You have some decisions to make: should you stay or leave the relationship? If you decide to stay, there are some realities you must accept—specifically, the repair process could take a couple of years. It will require a lot of emotional and behavioral work.

Think of it this way: repairing an affair is like trying to rebuild an investment account after having made a series of short-sighted trades that wiped you out. You feel pressured to save and reinvest quickly to recreate what you had, but just like with a financial investment, relationship investments cannot be rebuilt quickly. At first, your balance is zero. It is through your efforts that the balance in the account grows. Just as all of your spending decisions will affect how much you are able to deposit in your retirement account, the daily decisions you make about your relationship will result in how quickly you build up your relationship account.

The unfaithful partner must accept the reality of the slow repair process. Just when everything seems to be going well and you are hopeful that forgiveness will come soon, your partner may be triggered by a thought, event, or feeling and be thrown back into the well of anger and despair. Continue to think of it as an investment account. Checking the balance every day won’t make it grow faster. What does make it grow faster is making everyday choices that please your partner.

[fat_widget_relationships_right]

Love is behavioral—it takes attention, attunement, regular and healthy communication, compromise, and a willingness to play the long game. Short-sightedness in relationships is a self-inflicted wound. Do not cut corners by passing up chances at affection or emotional connection, or by rationalizing that unhealthy behaviors don’t count or won’t be noticed. When in the process of repair, the unfaithful partner must act from an understanding that everything he or she does matters. Your actions and words will serve to either help rebuild your relationship or contribute to its breakdown.

The partner in the process of repair needs to accept that he or she may be under the microscope. You will be watched, assessed, and perhaps feel like you are under surveillance. Before allowing this to upset you, remind yourself that you created this situation.

You may be wondering what really helps in rebuilding trust in your relationship. From my perspective, relationships are repaired mainly through small gestures. Trips to romantic destinations and expensive gifts may seem like obvious ways to increase trust, but they’re not. Trust is developed by engaging in trustworthy behavior on a regular basis.

To help you clean up your relationship mess, here are some suggestions that may increase trust between you and your partner:

  1. Cut out the secrecy. Your partner may want to have your passwords for your phone, banking, credit cards, and social media accounts. This may feel invasive and unnecessary to you, but to your partner, this gesture sends the message that you get it. Hurt partners often gain reassurance by engaging in the process of “checking.” Many hurt individuals greatly dislike the act of checking up on their partners because they genuinely want to trust you. Reading emails and text messages can make the hurt partner feel parental. It’s an uncomfortable situation for both parties, which is why it often stops shortly after it starts.
  2. Increase your availability. If your partner contacts you, make every effort to either answer the phone, text, or email back immediately. If there were frequent communication dark periods during your affair, your partner will respond to your unavailability with increased anxiety, which leads to lack of trust.
  3. If after ending the affair you are still contacted by the affair partner, tell your partner of the contact. You may resist doing so out of fear it could lead to a fight, but if he or she finds out later about any further contact between you and your affair partner, trust will be weakened.
  4. Be honest about why you chose to have the affair. One way to not make the same mistake twice is to understand why you made the choices you did. Sharing the truth can be and often is very painful, but it is a vital aspect of the repair process.

ContemplativeDeath is a subject that is generally off-limits in our society. We spend much of our time denying its existence and its inexorable approach, even though we all realize that we will die “some day.” For the most part, however, we try to convince ourselves that the day is far away and we operate from the premise that we are invincible—until the wheel of fate rolls around to show us just how vulnerable we really are.

We imagine that our loved ones will always be there for us, and often fail to take the time to let them know just how much we really care about them. This fact was recently driven home to me when a very dear friend finally lost the battle he’d been waging against cancer for the past year. Although I called and visited him regularly, I struggled with watching him age before my eyes and melt down to a frail, skeletal version of his once-healthy self. He unfortunately passed away before I really had a chance to say goodbye and tell him how much he’d meant to me.

During challenging moments such as these, we realize just how precious and fleeting our lives really are. We tend to take for granted many of the factors that contribute to our happiness, such as our health, our homes, and our families and friends. In the blink of an eye, our worlds can come crashing down as we come to realize just how weak and defenseless we are against the casualties of time.

[fat_widget_grief_right]

In addition, we frequently feel as though we cannot communicate our pain to others, as the grieving process is not truly honored in our society. After a short amount of time, we are expected to pick ourselves up and carry on with our lives as though nothing had happened. As death is such a taboo subject, others often feel awkward talking to us about our loss, which can leave us feeling cut off from our friends and acquaintances and alone with our suffering.

In other cultures around the world, they have special ceremonies and rituals designed to celebrate the ancestors who have gone before them. They keep them alive in their hearts and souls by dedicating holidays to remember them by. They share stories about the loved ones they have lost, honoring their lives and rejoicing in their passing on to a higher plane. These rituals can be of genuine help in assisting the families and individuals left behind to come to terms with death.

When a loved one dies, we mourn the loss of his or her companionship and presence in our lives, and feel bereft by the void that is left behind. We often regret not having shared with them our deepest feelings or having allowed ourselves to be more open and vulnerable with them. In some cases, we may also be left with unresolved issues if we have not come to terms with our underlying emotions, such as anger or resentment, toward the person who died.

These feelings can continue to haunt us long after the individual’s death, making it difficult in some cases to get on with our lives. This was the case for one of the persons I worked with, a person who harbored considerable hatred toward his father for the abuse that he had suffered at his hands. He grew up feeling unwanted and unlovable and thought that he was somehow to blame for his father’s abusive nature. He was consumed by bitterness for many years after his father’s death, which prevented him from being able to enjoy his life despite having a loving wife and a beautiful home.

His inner world was an ongoing nightmare until he started to gain a new perspective during the therapeutic process by realizing that he had not been to blame for his father’s abusive nature and that he had ended up internalizing many of the same dynamics himself. He came to see that his father probably had his own inner demons to contend with and had unfortunately just been repeating the cycle that likely had been going on for generations in his family.

As his compassion grew, he started to open up his heart to forgiveness. This played a huge role in his ability to heal and let go of the hatred that he had held onto for so long. Paying a visit to his father’s grave was the final ritual that allowed him to let go of his past and to start to move forward again in his life, with a newfound sense of compassion for his own human imperfections as well as those of his father.

Although we have not all grown up in abusive environments, we can all relate to this story on some level, as we have a tendency to carry some anger and hatred toward others regarding unresolved past wounds. These feelings of bitterness prevent us from being able to fully inhabit the present moment, as we ruminate on the pain that we’ve experienced and continually perpetuate our suffering. However, we can never find peace or joy in our lives as long as we are holding onto grudges for past wrongdoings. The resentment we feel ultimately hurts us much more than the person who initially caused us harm. And if the individual we hold a grudge against has died, this can compound our problem, as we tend to internalize this anger, thereby hurting ourselves even more.

Our psychological health therefore depends on our ability to forgive others. But we also have an even greater need to forgive ourselves for our own past transgressions and learn from them the lessons that we were intended to learn in order to move beyond them. Constantly beating ourselves up for something we have done in the past will not change what happened, but it will affect our ability to be happy and to truly love and accept ourselves now.

We are all human beings with imperfections and failings that we can learn from. As we open our hearts and begin to forgive and accept the aspects of ourselves that we have previously judged and rejected, we become more compassionate and loving toward ourselves as well as others. We learn to truly live our lives fully, rather than just surviving or waiting for a misfortune to hit us. We experience grief and pain, but we also become able to love with all our hearts. We start to drink deeply from the well of compassion that nourishes all who draw near and connects us on a deep level—the level of our own humanity.

eye of manWhen I was in college, my friend Matt hit an old woman with his car and killed her. Every time he passes the street where she died, he remembers what happened and feels scared and sad. She died on a dark and windy night; it was raining hard. She came out from between two cars, suddenly, into the middle of the street, probably in a hurry and trying to avoid getting too wet.

Matt didn’t see her, didn’t know she was there until the moment of impact. He stopped his car, tried to help her, and called for the police and an ambulance, but it was too late. He is filled with remorse and has nightmares. Even if it was a mistake, he killed someone’s mother and grandmother. Matt lives feeling sorry, but he cannot make up for this tragedy.

Matt’s story, of course, is not unique—many similar tragedies unfold every day. The lives of all involved and their families are permanently stained. How will they sleep? How will they come to terms with what happened, even though it may have been an accident? Are friends and relatives of the deceased ever able to accept the tragic consequences, or should they extract revenge? What would that look like? Perhaps as time passes they no longer feel angry, although they will probably carry the sad memory of the incident forever. History can’t be changed, but the way we relate to it and remember sometimes can be.

[fat_widget_right]

A person can’t be brought back to life, but there are circumstances that are less dire and sometimes our feelings about what happened can change. I’m thinking here about breach of trust, about infidelity, about people who thoughtlessly hurt the people they love. In a moment, or maybe a series of moments, they have an affair, and then, after some time, they are caught by their partner. “I’m sorry,” they might say. “It didn’t mean anything. I didn’t mean it.” And perhaps they are genuinely regretful, filled with remorse, about the loss of trust they’ve caused, about the wound to their relationship.

Is their remorse worth anything? Should they suffer, to make up for the suffering they’ve caused? Is it possible to make up for anything?

Can they ever be trusted again? Can they trust themselves, can their partners trust them, or will there always be questions? “Where did you go?” “Who were you with?” “How come you’re home so late?” “Who were you just talking to on the phone?”

In the Dear GoodTherapy.org section of this site, there are many people asking themselves, “Can I forgive?” “Can I ever trust again?” “How can I get even?” These are unbearable, painful, suffering questions—tears seem to seep through the Internet and onto these pages.

I started off with examples of a woman who was killed in a car accident. An affair is not a car accident—nobody dies—but there is a murder of trust. My friend Matt lost trust in himself after the accident and never wanted to drive again, although he had to and does, regularly. The people writing about their partners’ infidelity lose trust in their partners and in themselves, too. Seems paradoxical, doesn’t it? They ask, “What do I do now?” “Should I leave?” “Get divorced?” “End the relationship?” “Should I forgive?” “I want revenge! I want them to know what I suffered. I want them to suffer even more than I did!”

Who deserves revenge? Maybe people who have been wronged feel like they do, but the cycle of revenge can be endless—eyes for eyes until we are all blind. So I think no one deserves revenge, really, even if you feel like you do, even if you’ve been treated unfairly, even if people or circumstances have been horribly mean to you. Do what helps you live your life well now.

Destroying trust is a hateful action, and sometimes people take a long time to get over it, but we need to get on with our lives, to make ourselves whole. You know what they say: “Living well is the best revenge.”

couple having problems“David, tell Randy you’re sorry.”

“Sorry.”

The mother takes 7-year-old David to another part of the playground. By the sound of the “saaaaawry,” I’m guessing that David was being obedient, but he didn’t really know what he did, didn’t feel like it was his fault, and wasn’t sorry at all.

As adults, we hear (or even give) apologies such as, “I’m sorry you felt hurt.” “If I did something that hurt you, I’m sorry.” “I apologize, but I was really distracted by something else.” “I’m sorry, but you should know that I really love you and you shouldn’t take it so personally. It’s just the way I am.” “I’m sorry, but you are really making too big a deal of this. It is just a little thing.” “I apologize, but give me a break.” “I’m sorry for the problem you had. My assistant is normally on top of things.” When we give such apologies, we can say, as 7-year-old David did, “But I apologized!” However, when the apology (as in the examples above) is an inauthentic or inadequate apology, it doesn’t heal, doesn’t resolve, doesn’t soothe, and the hurt remains unmoved.

[fat_widget_relationships_right]

Authentic and effective apology is the very core of healing, clarifying, and restoring relationships, from interpersonal to organizational to cross-cultural ones. A real and well-thought-out apology can, like forgiveness, cut the cycle of anger, revenge, and hatred. However, making a genuine apology causes the giver to be extremely vulnerable. You are admitting directly to another that you did something that caused harm. This is very humbling! Doing so is also challenging because it’s like leaping off a cliff into the unknown. You are not in charge of how your apology will be received. Your efforts could be harshly rejected, your hopes for healing thrown back in your face.

A client spent some months working with his shame about having abused his younger sister. From a most humble place, he wrote her an apology in the hope that this could be a first step in restoring their relationship. Several weeks later, the letter was returned to him, with “Rejected. You will not be forgiven.” written across his words. He was devastated. Over time he began to look at what he could do rather than grieving for the loss of his relationship with his sister.

His sister couldn’t accept his apology, but he could demonstrate that he had learned and changed by volunteering at a women’s crisis center. He also could be proud that he had broken many generations of family history by not abusing his own daughters. These actions, which he was proud of, had shifted his inner wound from the shame of feeling unforgivable to the fact of being unforgiven. He could now move on.

I asked a few of my friends to remember a time when they needed to and did offer someone an apology. Usually, we rightly focus on the feelings and needs of the hurt person, but I wondered what the apologizer got from the process. This is what I heard: “I got to let go of at least some of my guilt.” “The apology was accepted. It repaired the relationship, and the friendship actually got better.” “In the process of getting to being able to apologize, I went through all my defenses and finally got to see something about myself that I didn’t like and face the truth about a familiar and hurtful pattern I had been denying or at least had been unaware of. This was hard work. Once I got it, the apology was easy.” “Honestly, I don’t know if I got anything at all. It was really like just getting it out of the way.” “It was unbelievably relieving for me.” “It took such courage. I try so hard to be ‘good,’ and it was painful but freeing to be able not only to see but to take responsibility for doing a bad thing.” “I learned that it’s really OK to make mistakes. What isn’t OK is not to apologize for them and learn from them.”

Apologies open big doors. As John Kador puts it, “Apology is the bravest gesture we can make to the unknown. … Apologies unmask all the hopes, desires, and uncertainties that make us human because, at the moment of genuine apology, we confront our humanity most fully. At the point of apology we strip off a mask and face our limitations. No wonder we hesitate” (Kador, pp. 43-44).

What is the value of apology to the one who has been wounded? Opportunity for restoring relationship, deescalating conflict, rebalancing power, recovering dignity, letting go and moving on, stopping a cycle of resentment and revenge, and increasing trust in the human capacity for goodness and truth. This is a strong litany. From the biggest perspective, “quarrels often escalate into serious conflicts on the fulcrum of apology. … Throughout human history, endless cycles of revenge and untold suffering have resulted from the denial of effective apology. It’s a tragedy because apology has the power to defuse almost all human conflicts” (Kador, p. 45).

In my book Right Use of Power: The Heart of Ethics and in my ethics programs, I talk about resolving difficulties as one of the most important and challenging skills to learn as leaders and human beings. I describe five things that most people need to hear in order to for an injured relationship to be restored. Not all of these things will be essential in all situations, but at least one—and probably more—will be needed. Here they are (Barstow, p. 160):

  1. Acknowledgement
  2. Understanding
  3. Regret
  4. Learning
  5. Repair

Making “a genuine apology or/and authentic expression of … regret” is the complete description of No. 3.

Effective Apologies

With a deep bow to Kador for his excellent book Effective Apology: Mending Fences, Building Bridges, and Restoring Trust, I want now to suggest how one can make an apology with greater wisdom and skill.

Kador also names five dimensions in making an effective apology (Kador, p. 124): recognition, responsibility, remorse, restitution, and repetition. Here’s more about each of these.

General Considerations

Accepting Apologies

The other side of offering an apology is accepting one. On the receiving side, you must discern whether the apology is genuine and whether it feels satisfactory. Accepting is just accepting. It doesn’t automatically include trusting or forgiving. Rebuilding trust happens over time. Forgiveness is a separate process.

When you do accept an apology, it is important to make an acknowledgment. Responses such as, “It was nothing,” or, “Don’t worry about it,” or, “You don’t need to apologize,” or, “It’s too late” have the effect of dismissing the intended communication. They trivialize a vulnerable moment. Before learning about the apology process, I had thought that when I said, “It was nothing,” I was being kind, generous, and forgiving. I now understand it to be disrespectful. When the apology is genuine, it is best to say, “I accept your apology.” The interaction needs to be complete and acknowledged. A friend’s “I’m sorry I’m late; I know that caused you some extra work” deserves my recognition of her humility and awareness of her negative impact. “Thank you, I accept your apology” as a response in this case works well.

Apology can move mountains. A half-hearted one can make things worse. A sincere and well-crafted apology can restore relationships.

It sounds like you have tried to get help in so many ways, yet nothing has worked for you. That must be incredibly frustrating. There is no question that being left by a parent is painful. You are entitled to feel anger and hurt, though I hear you say that you don’t want to feel that way anymore, that you want to let it go. If you want to let it go, you will need to find a way to forgive your mother. When we forgive, we actually release ourselves, not the other person. Your mother is still responsible for the choices she made. Forgiveness does not mean that you are OK with her choices or that you condone them. You can’t change the facts of her choices, but you do have an opportunity to change what those choices mean to you.

There is no quick fix for these kinds of feelings, and the strategies that work will vary from person to person. Some people respond well to mindfulness work, whereas some people find cognitive behavioral approaches (REBT in particular) most impactful. I can offer you a couple of strategies to try, though in my experience, working through these strategies with the help of a professional is most effective.

The strategies I can suggest involve reframing how you tell your stories. Right now, you tell your story about how your mom left you when you were 16. My hunch is that each time you tell it, you may re-experience some of the emotions of loss, anger, confusion, or grief that you felt at the time. This can reinforce those feelings of hurt and keep them activated. The first step to making a shift is to start telling the story from the third person rather than first. Become a neutral observer watching the events. Instead of saying, “My mom left me …” you narrate the story, saying, “The mother left her daughter and the family …” By approaching your story this way, you start to get some emotional distance from the events and they aren’t quite as triggering. You may notice details that you didn’t pay attention to before. This is the first step.

When you are ready, you can try telling the story from the points of view of others—other people in your family, and eventually your mother. Consider what they were thinking and feeling, how they made the choices they made, how they saw events. By taking on the perspective of others, it can sometimes shift how we feel about a set of events. Again, I’d recommend that you do this with the support of a therapist who can help guide you through this process.

Another approach I’d like to mention is re-parenting work. Again, I strongly recommend doing this with therapeutic support. The main goal of re-parenting is to go back to the time when you felt abandoned, hurt, and let down, and to allow yourself to feel deeply while also becoming the loving parent to yourself you wish you’d had. Allowing yourself to fully experience and feel the pain of your abandonment is the key to healing here. You learn to offer yourself the unconditional love and support you wanted from your mom. You learn to nurture yourself and heal those deep, painful wounds which can ultimately allow you to release the anger you’ve been holding on to. This approach can be intense, and it is important to find a professional you trust to help guide you through the process.

Best of luck,
Erika

toddler-staring-out-windowI see many people who struggle with self-esteem issues. In fact, self-esteem issues and depression almost always occur together. Which one causes the other is not always clear, but the majority of people seem to have the self-esteem issues first.

People often tell me they want to die—because they “shouldn’t exist,” were “never wanted,” never “fit in,” are a “burden,” “don’t deserve anything,” or even have the feeling they “did something horrible” but don’t know what.

Generally, this viewpoint comes from something that happened when the person was very young. We now know that even embryos traveling down the fallopian tube are being affected by their environment in ways that have implications for physical and emotional health throughout the rest of their lives.

[fat_widget_right]

To work with this, sometimes I ask people if they deserved to live (or die) when they were an embryo, then a fetus, then a newborn, etc. Most people see themselves as innocent and deserving to live at some point. Going through this exercise helps them see that there was a time they could have compassion for themselves, rather than blame or condemnation. For others, as we advance in age, we come to a place where they can no longer say they were innocent and deserved to live. That can lead us to the origin of the issue. If they can’t say they were good anymore after age 2, 4, 10, or whatever, then we look for what happened at that age to change that. Almost always, it was some kind of abuse or trauma.

For example, I saw a woman who wanted to die and believed she didn’t deserve to live, despite the fact she was a kind, giving, loving person. She was severely depressed and obsessed about suicide. She told me if therapy didn’t work, she was going to kill herself. One of the things I did was to take her through this exercise. She reluctantly conceded that she was innocent as an embryo, fetus, and newborn. When we got to 2, she said she deserved to die at that point. When we explored it, she said something happened then to change this, but she didn’t know what. Few people have conscious memories from that age, so early memories can be challenging to resolve.

But then she said she had an image, but she was sure it didn’t happen—”it couldn’t have happened.” The image was of a sexual assault from a family member. It was very specific and unusual. We processed the image as if it was a memory with EMDR, and she felt enormous relief. She no longer thought she was so bad that she didn’t deserve to live. She finally saw that she had done nothing wrong and the shame wasn’t hers. It belonged to the adult perpetrator.

Others blame themselves for their parents’ divorce, or for their parents’ lost lives after marrying each other only because of the pregnancy. People blame themselves for being the gender the parent didn’t want, for their mother dying in childbirth, or for their parent’s depression. When children try to make sense of something that feels terrible in their world, and no one helps them, they tend to think they caused the problem. So many innocent children grow up feeling guilt, shame, and self-hatred because of this. Sometimes, they don’t even remember why. Once they can connect their adult perspective with their child beliefs, they see that it’s unreasonable to punish themselves the rest of their lives because when they were too young to be responsible, their parents made the choices they did.

So if you think you are bad, disgusting, undeserving, unlovable, or inadequate, were you so as an embryo? A fetus? A newborn? An infant? A crawling baby? A walking toddler? A talking toddler? When did you become unforgivable, and why?

hiker-looking-at-horizonMany years ago, I was betrayed by a friend I admired. If I had been asked to forgive her, my immediate answer would have been, “No.” But if someone had asked if I wanted to be free from the anguish and distress that I felt from her betrayal, I would have shouted, “Yes!”

Forgiveness is more than releasing your hands from the neck of the person who hurt you. It is truly about releasing your hands from your own neck. Forgiveness is about your own freedom from the grip of pain caused by someone else. In reality, forgiveness has nothing to do with the other person; it’s about you. Forgiveness does not need to be asked for because it isn’t done for the sake of the “offender.” It’s done for our own healing and well-being.

[fat_widget_right]

It goes without saying that when we’re considering forgiveness, it is because we’ve been hurt, wronged, or betrayed. Someone has done something to us that caused us pain. A pivotal component of forgiveness is the recognition of the intensity of your pain. You have to sit in and with your pain. You can’t ignore, rationalize, or wish it away. You must simply let it be. You can talk, journal, cry, or scream about the hurt and painful emotions, but they must be allowed to surface.

Another key step to forgiveness is in understanding how the pain and betrayal affected you. Pain isn’t an isolated experience or emotion. When we are hurt, it affects all aspects of ourselves and our relationships. Consider a man who just learned that his wife was cheating on him. Understandably, he is hurt, sad, and angry. He also has trouble focusing at work, his patience with his children is low, and he begins to withdraw from his friends because he is too embarrassed to discuss his wife’s infidelity. His emotions go beyond his wife’s betrayal; now the pain seeps into other relationships.

Part of understanding the intensity and depth of the pain is in comprehending how your pain affects you in other ways. Ask yourself the following questions:

Take time to write, think, or talk about your answers to these questions. Revisit the questions over time, perhaps at three months, six months, and one year. Have your answers changed? Do you notice anything different each time you answer? Are your feelings the same or have they shifted?

You cannot simply decide to forgive someone and expect it to be done. It takes time, compassion for yourself, and the support of others to work through the pain that you endured. Often when we are hurt or grieving, there is internal pressure and external pressure from family, friends, and society to “get over it”: “It’s been six months; why haven’t you forgiven him for cheating? Are you still upset about what she said to you?” These statements suggest a time limit for moving on after being hurt, but everyone has a different time frame. What takes one person two weeks to forgive may take another person one year to forgive. We all have our personal and individual processes of forgiveness that cannot be rushed.

When you are in the process of forgiveness, it is crucial that you have compassion toward yourself. Enlisting the support of people who are also compassionate toward you and will not rush your process is also beneficial.

Once you’ve acknowledged your pain and you understand how it has affected you, you can ask yourself: What do I need in order to be free from this pain?

What are your stories and experiences of forgiveness? How have you been able to forgive? When have you struggled or been unable to forgive? I want to hear from you!

Important Notice

GoodTherapy is not intended to be a substitute for professional advice, diagnosis, medical treatment, or therapy. Always seek the advice of your physician or qualified mental health provider with any questions you may have regarding any mental health symptom or medical condition. Never disregard professional psychological or medical advice nor delay in seeking professional advice or treatment because of something you have read on GoodTherapy.