I have yet to meet the person whose life goal is to be angry and bitter. And while it’s natural to feel those emotions in the moment, acting on them will only lead to more hurt and more regret as time marches on.
— Sherre Hirsch, Thresholds, p. 93
We may be sure of this, that no man or woman will be condemned for any sin that is past. If he be condemned, it will be because he or she would not come to the Light when the Light came to them, because they would not learn to do as the Light instructs, because they hid their unbelief in the garment of a false faith, and would not obey.
— George MacDonald, Knowing the Heart of God, p. 42
If you are standing before me, beaten and bleeding, I cannot tell you to forgive. I cannot tell you to do anything, since you are the one who was beaten. If you have lost a loved one, I cannot tell you to forgive. You are the person who has lost a loved one. If your spouse betrayed you, if you were abused as a child, if you have endured any of the myriad injuries humans can inflict upon one another, I cannot tell you what to do. But I can tell you that it all matters. Whether we love or we hate, whether we help or we harm, it all matters. I can tell you that I hope, if I am the one who is beaten and bloodied, I will be able to forgive and pray for my abuser. I hope that I would be able to recognize him as my brother and as a precious child of God. I hope I never give up on the reality that every person has the capacity to change.
— Desmond Tutu and Mpho Tutu, The Book of Forgiving, p. 224
Grace means suddenly you’re in a different universe from the one where you were stuck, and there was absolutely no way for you to get there on your own. When it happens — when you stop hating — you really have to pinch yourself. Jesus said, and this is not an exact quote, “The point is to not hate and kill each other today, and if you can, to help the forgotten and powerless. Can you write that down and put it by the phone?”
— Anne Lamott, Small Victories, p. 149
Victims need to feel they are being heard and affirmed. The best way to do this is to not argue the facts of their stories or the ways they are hurting. If your spouse says you lied last Wednesday, and you lied to them last Thursday, it will not help rebuild the trust by arguing the date of the offense. If your child says, “You did not show up to my football game, and you are never there for me,” it does not serve a healing purpose for you to counter with all the other football games you have attended as irrefutable proof you are there for your child.
When people are hurting, they cannot be cross-examined out of their pain. We all want our pain to be acknowledged and understood. We all want to feel safe to express our hurt feelings in all their various forms and textures. If you argue with the person you have harmed, that person will not feel safe, nor will that person feel understood. When someone is hurt, that person wants his or her pain to be understood and validated. Without that understanding, the forgiveness process will stall and you will both remain trapped in an endless loop of telling the story and naming the hurt. Empathy is the gateway to forgiveness for you and for the one you have harmed.
— Desmond Tutu and Mpho Tutu, The Book of Forgiving, p. 178-179
I have to believe that a real higher power is struggling in this as much as we are. But horribly, if healing and care are going to get done, it will be love working through us. Us! In our current condition, not down the road, when we are in the fullness of our restoration, in wholeness, compassionate detachment, patient amusement. Us, now. It has taken years for me to get this well, which is to say, half as reactive and a third less obsessed with my own neurotic disappointing self. I don’t agree with the pace of how slowly we evolve toward patience, wisdom, forgiveness. Anyone would understand if we gave up and settled, the way people settle for terrible marriages. But these are our lives. So we try, we do the work of becoming saner and more authentic, which is hard enough without truly monstrous people crashing into our lives, often — not always — through marriage, although I am not going to name names. Well, maybe just one. . .
— Anne Lamott, Small Victories, p. 268
Forgiveness is release from me; somehow, finally. I am returned to my better, dopier self, so much lighter when I don’t have to drag the toxic chatter, wrangle, and pinch around with me anymore. Not that I don’t get it out every so often, for old time’s sake. But the trapped cloud is no longer nearly so dark or dense. It was blown into wisps, of smoke, of snow, of ocean spray.
— Anne Lamott, Small Victories, p. 118
Forgiveness sure doesn’t begin with reason. The rational insists that it is right, that we are right. It is about attacking and defending, which means there can be no peace. It loves the bedtime story of how we’ve been injured. The rational is claustrophobic, too. The choice is whether you want to stay stuck in being right but not being free or admit you’re pretty lost and possibly available for a long, deep breath, which is as big as the universe, stirs the air around, maybe opens a window.
— Anne Lamott, Small Victories, p. 114
Left to my own devices, I’m a forgiveness denier — I’ll start to think that there are hurts so deep that nothing can heal them. Time alone won’t necessarily do the trick. Our best thinking isn’t enough, or we would all be fine, instead of in our current condition. A lack of forgiveness is like leprosy of the insides, and left untreated, it can take out tissue, equilibrium, soul, sense of self. I have sometimes considered writing a book called All the People I Still Hate: A Christian Perspective., but readers would recoil. Also, getting older means that without meaning to, you accidentally forgive almost everyone — almost — so the book would not be long.
— Anne Lamott, Small Victories, p. 105-106
No one can prove that God does or doesn’t exist, but tough acts of forgiveness are pretty convincing for me. It is so not my strong suit, and I naturally prefer the company of people who hold grudges, as long as they are not held against me. Forgiveness is the hardest work we do. When, against all odds, over time, your heart softens toward truly heinous behavior on the part of parents, children, siblings, and everyone’s exes, you almost have to believe that something not of this earth snuck into your stone-cold heart.
— Anne Lamott, Small Victories, p. 105