The Power and Meaning of FORGIVENESS

Getting to forgiveness is perhaps the most challenging thing that we can do to go "beyond ourselves." This is especially hard to do when we are at work because our emotional ties may not be as strong, and therefore neither is the motivation to forgive.

Forgiveness means letting go of our suffering. It has much more to do with our own well-being that that of the person we forgive. When we hold on to our suffering--our resentment, hurt, anger--we are inside ourselves with self-pity. It becomes a veil through which we see ourselves and others; it becomes something we have to feed, keep alive, and justify. If we don't, we think we allow the other person to be "right" in their unjust treatment of us.

But forgiveness can be one of the most powerful things we do. Like any muscle, however, it has to be exercised to work well. Forgiveness can be complicated. Sometimes we think that it equates to forgetting, diminishing, or condoning the misdeed, but it doesn't. It has much more to do with freeing ourselves from its hold. Our ability to live our lives with love and generosity is impeded when we don't forgive. It doesn't mean that we have to love and be generous to the woman who was disloyal to us at work or the man who belittled our ideas at a staff meeting. It means we forgive them and liberate ourselves from further captivity. Love and generosity will return in their own time (the same holds true for things that happen to us in our personal lives).

Importantly, when we go beyond ourselves--whether to forgiveness, unselfishness, thoughtfulness, generosity, and understanding toward others--we enter into the spiritual realm of meaning. By giving beyond ourselves, we make our own lives richer. This is a truth long understood at the heart of all meaningful spiritual traditions. It's a mystery that can only be experienced. And when we do experience it, we are in the heart of meaning. We are no longer prisoners of our thoughts.

[For more information about the Logotherapeutic Principle of Self-Transcendence, that is, "Extend Beyond Yourself," see Chapter 10 of my book, Prisoners of Our Thoughts: Viktor Frankl's Principles for Discovering Meaning in Life and Work (http://www.amazon.com/Prisoners-Our-Thoughts-Principles-Discovering/dp/1576754065/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/002-4534362-5325643?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1187834303&sr=1-2)]