Practical Practitioner

By: Pamela Egan, FNP-C CDE

Letting go: the healing power of forgiveness

You’ve been wronged and you want to get even. For your health’s sake, you’ve go to let it go.

Forgiveness sounds great in theory. When we forgive, we are healthier, both mentally and physically. But in the real world of give and take, push and shove, good and evil, forgive-and-forget can be easier said than done.

Forgiveness has direct health benefits. Living with an unforgiving attitude often results in elevated blood pressure levels, cardiovascular problems and a compromised immune system. Un-forgiveness is a stressful event and produces stress responses. They can accumulate in the body and often show up as symptoms at about age 65 in the average person.

The stress hormones that are released when we harbor ill feelings can aggregate and have effects on the brain. The body is also affected at the cellular level, which throws it off balance. The end result of it all is poor health.

It is important to work on a way to forgive oneself and the other person. There is a correlation between physical and mental health and making peace with oneself and others that have harmed you.

Forgiveness requires a lot of hard work. There are many stages between raw vengeance and forgiveness. What’s so hard is that forgiveness is a free gift. Nobody deserves forgiveness; it’s something we do out of love. If we don’t, it’ll turn us into ugly people physically and emotionally.

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Forgiveness is an act of will rather than emotion. One must decide to do it. It might be years before you’re actually able to forgive. But the important thing is to not seek vengeance; but instead, to let it drop.

We can will ourselves to do it. If you remember the hurtful or the detrimental incidents that have occurred in your life, you are carrying an unnecessary burden with you which will lead you to failure.

To forgive and forget: they come as a pair, for unless you forget you cannot forgive and unless you forgive you cannot forget. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend. We never get rid of an enemy by meeting hate with hate; we get rid of an enemy by getting rid of enmity.

Failure to forgive leads down a path of destruction – of bitterness, self-hate, alienation, relentless cycles of conflict, and downright misery.

However, forgiveness can vanquish all such pain. It can heal both the forgiver and the forgiven. We should remember that everyone faces tough times, betrayal and family problems.

Do we want the world to be choreographed with us at the center or do we accept that the world has its own agenda? We have to learn to work together. Forgiveness is both possible and necessary.

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