Recently on the Bonnie Hunt Show, Dr. Wayne Dyer, internationally renowned author and speaker in the field of self-development, told his personal story of forgiveness. He said his father had abandoned him when he was a little boy. Consequently, his mother, who was just 22 and had two other boys (all her sons were under 4-years-old), had to place them in foster homes. Dr. Dyer grew up hating his father and held anger and resentment towards him.
In 1974, Dr. Dyer found out his father had been dead for ten years from cirrhosis of the liver caused by alcoholism. He decided to visit his father’s grave in Biloxi, Mississippi and, when he arrived, stood there for three hours. He said he stomped on the grave and was still angry but, in the final few minutes he was there, something came over him. While standing at his father's grave, as he described on the show, this thought emerged: “From this moment on I send you love, and I forgive you for everything that you have done.” He said that when he walked away from the grave, everything in his life changed.
Dr. Dyer said at the time he was overweight, drinking too much, and was in a bad relationship. His writing was not doing the things he had wanted. But after his “act of forgiveness,” he said his whole life took off. He wrote the book Erroneous Zones, which became a worldwide best-seller 14 days after he wrote it. He stopped drinking and got back into shape. He also started attracting the right people into his life. His life transformed when he forgave.
Through forgiveness, people can experience life-altering outcomes. Understanding what forgiveness is and how people can practice it, just like throwing a baseball, for example, helps to begin the process of healing and creating a better life.
Below is how forgiveness can lead to a better life, but first a discussion about what forgiveness is and what it is not.
What is Forgiveness?
Director of the Stanford Forgiveness Project Dr. Fred Luskin, a pioneer in forgiveness, has conducted groundbreaking research on forgiveness training methods and the resulting health benefits. In his book Forgive for Good: A Proven Prescription for Health and Happiness, he says, “Forgiveness is the feeling of peace that emerges as you take your hurt less personally, take responsibility for how you feel, and become a hero instead of a victim in the story you tell.”
He explains, in the book, that forgiveness is not condoning the behavior of someone who hurt you, and it’s not the same as forgetting, or having to rejoin with the person. For example, a daughter can forgive her father for years of abuse, but she doesn’t have to have a relationship with him.
Also, forgiveness is not giving up claims to justice or compensation he says. An example of this is the right for a woman to sue her ex-husband for child support, but then she doesn’t have to hate him.
Forgive and Forget?
A Chinese proverb says, “He who seeks vengeance must dig two graves: one for his enemy and one for himself.” The cost of not forgiving someone and seeking only revenge or remaining angry, can mean the difference between being miserable and being happy as the proverb eludes to.
Dr. Luskin explains that people, who have not forgiven, created what is called a “grievance story,” which has them stay stuck in a certain way of thinking about their hurt. Once a person understands how a grievance is created he or she can begin the process of forgiveness.
A grievance is created, he describes, when something happens in people’s lives that they didn’t want to happen or something they wanted to happened didn’t. People then take this painful event personally, blame the offender for how they feel, and tell the story over and over in their minds. People, he says, forget that there are other ways of looking at the same situation, and it’s because they lack the training and skills to do and see things differently.
A Victim Becomes a Hero Through Forgiveness
Once people understand what a grievance story is and that they have one, then they can choose to create a different, more empowering story. Dr. Luskin explains that as a person journeys through the stages of forgiveness and practices techniques and new ways of thinking, a new story emerges, and that is one of a hero. He says that a person no longer feels helpless in response to painful events or lacks control over thoughts and feelings. Heroes, as he says, have worked hard to overcome adversity and refuse to fall victim to challenging life events.
“Forgiveness means that your story changes so that you and not the grievance are in control,” says Luskin. He describes a victim story as: "Look at what life did to me, and I’ll never recover,“ as opposed to a hero story: "Look at what life did to me and look how well I’ve coped with it.”
A New Path in Life is Created
Dr. Wayne Dyer’s act of forgiveness allowed him to transform his life in an extraordinary way. To think that this man who has inspired millions through his life’s work could have spent years in anguish over his father, while experiencing average results in his life is inconceivable.
How many people could be sacrificing their gifts, talents, strengths, success, and quality of life in general to hold onto anger towards someone? How many people can be taking their lives to new heights if they gave up being right to be happy? Forgiving people can profoundly change a person’s life as it did with Dr. Dyer. With the words, "I forgive you," a new and better life path can be created.
For Dr. Fred Luskin’s Nine Steps to Forgiveness and information on him and the Stanford Forgiveness Project, please visit his website at LearningToForgive.com.
Sources:
Interview with Dr. Fred Luskin
Forgive for Good: A Proven Prescription for Health and Happiness by Dr. Fred Luskin
Stacey Porto - Stacey Porto, CC is a certified life, career and business coach, graduating from the Life Purpose Institute of San Diego, CA. She has a ...
Join the Conversation