Acknowledging a wound that needs healing is only a first step. You also have to deal with real feelings of anger and at times, betrayal. I often think that the word - FAIR - is a four letter word that should sit unhappily with its other, less decent, brothers. Too many people can't get over just how unfair life is. Such pain, for what? Life is unfair, but it is also filled with potential for beauty, love and grace. The anger over things having been unfair is a product of our immature minds needing to have a balance in nature. Yes, there may be a balance, supervised by God or by nature, but it often has little to do with the narrative that we want to write!

Forgiveness is ultimately a gift to yourself. It allows the wounds to heal. You can forgive God for the hurts that you had nothing to do with, your parents for their blindness, and your siblings for their own deprivations (kids are hurt in so many ways because they are so vulnerable - it is an endless list). But ultimately you have to forgive yourself for holding on for so long. You will be free to better enjoy this life when you accept what happened, vow to not let it happen again, forgive if possible, and move on.

True Forgiveness is a Process, more than a Destination.

We learn from our need to forgive. Even if you were hurt terribly, like with a rape or a financial scandal, there may be a place for forgiveness, if not to the one who hurt you, than to a God that may have watched while it happened, or to a situation in which there was nobody there to protect you. There's always a place for healing and forgiveness can help you heal. Make a difference in the present and the future. If you had been abused, you may wish to protect the world and others from such a fate. This is the next step in forgiving a terrible wrong.

Yet, sometimes you can right a wrong. Let's say you said something on the internet that was disparaging and false.  You can apologize for being a complete jerk and make amends by correcting your bad behavior online. But, even if you can't completely take back what happened, trying to make amends makes the injured party feel like you are doing something. When you have been hurt, you carry a burden of injury, anger and a sense of not being taken seriously. The art of amends making can go a long way to helping a person get over the wound, forgive and move on.

How does Hurt and Forgiveness affect Ongoing Relationships?

Relationships are by nature filled with moments of hurt and disappointment. He shows up late when you made a great dinner. She second guesses you time and again because of her anxiety. He comments on your weight and makes you more self conscious. These things happen every day. Throw in the hard work of making a living, sustaining the household and raising kids and you get endless opportunities to judge each other, become angered or just not be there. These hurts can accumulate like layers on a cake - and a very bad cake at that. Soon, you no longer giving the benefit of the doubt and just expect the worst. Soon, you stop wanting to be touched or you carry resentment that eats away at your love.

Resentment, in my mind, is the poison pill of romance. It is pernicious and takes over a little a time. Who wants to be touched or make love when you feel hurt or dismissed? Who wants to come home on time when you feel judged and scolded, time and again? Some people take the fight to each other. At least they know that something is wrong. Others just take it underground, letting resentment breed a distancing that is hard to stop once it gets going.

Divorce (or a breakup) very often results from an accumulation of these hurts over a long period of time, when the relationship is not tempered by forgiveness or amends making. You are in a relationship with a person and not an idealized man or woman. He or she comes with a past, including wounds, habits and expectations that may rub you the wrong way. Sorry. This is the challenge and great opportunity of love.

Even a successful couple will hurt each other now and then. They acknowledge, forgive and let go. And the hurts they do hold on to are not game changers. Their love is a living field of trust that can deal with disappointment or hurt, like our immune systems can handle minor illnesses.

Some people come with baggage from their family of origin or with psychological injuries from past relationships. Be aware that in reacting to what she is doing, you may really be overreacting because of wounds inflicted well before she came into your life. Ask for forgiveness if you are injuring her for no good reason and do the work to heal yourself. She (or he) deserves your best. I have seen good psychotherapy or couples counseling straighten out many injured relationships.

Forgiving is Important even if you Break-up.

When you break up there is still a need for forgiveness. He may not ask for it or she may be blaming you for everything that went wrong. For sure, a break up may be what's required when hurt or betrayal has destroyed your love. Remember, that forgiving is often more for your benefit than for him or her (link is external).

Even if you were the victim in your marriage, work hard to disabuse yourself of that role. If he abused you, protect yourself. Commit yourself to never letting this happen again; but forgive.  In a case like this, you may have to forgive yourself for having gotten tangled up with such a creep. You may be able to forgive him as well, if you are aware of how he came to be so unhappy and troubled. Forgive, if possible, but don't forget.

There are important lessons to learn in every failed relationship. They may be lessons about your own narcissism or thoughtlessness. They be may be lessons about how you tend to lose yourself in someone else's troubles. They may be lessons about your terrible taste in men or your tendency to be in a relationship with a woman who just can't love you.

Life is a course in life. We are taught by our experiences and no textbook can really do it for us. Learn what each chapter has to teach you. Forgiveness is part and parcel of the emotional work of learning these lessons well.

Conclusion: Forgiveness - an Endless Subject.

There is much more to convey about the power of forgiveness. While it can heal our wounds, forgiveness does not come easily. If we have hurt others, making amends and working on ourselves is an answer that counts. If we have been hurt, make every effort to grieve the loss of innocence or of lost time - forgive in whatever way you can - and move forward. The future beckons.

Some people never forgive and never forget. They remain victims forever, not just victims of the insult that happened, but also to an identification with their wound that may have impact on future relationships and their sense of identity. While I have tremendous sympathy for the hurt and pain of victims (since I am Jewish, I know of this issue from our people's experience during the Holocaust), it can become an injury that never ends. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is a technical term meant to deal with damage of unremitting victimhood (be it from human or non human sources). But you don't have to have PTSD to get stuck in the past. Victimhood, in divorce, marriage or as nations does not help in the long run. We must forgive what we can, grieve when we can't forgive - and yet remember what is necessary. There are always lessons. Perhaps the best one is that you survived to make something new and better.

In the end, our lives are about the stories we live and tell ourselves. Forgiveness is a story about putting the past in its place, letting go with an affirmative change in our hearts and living our present and our future. It has a power that is worth exploring, again and again.

May all my readers have a wonderful and blessed year ahead, filled with health and well being.  May forgiveness be something alive in your life—a forgiveness that is honest and true.

This is a holy thing.

In our current study, we argued that self-forgiveness for procrastinating may play a role in helping people overcome the negative effects of procrastination and encourage a change in behavior. If procrastination is viewed as a transgression against the self and results in negative feelings such as guilt, forgiving oneself for procrastinating should reduce this feeling. By reducing emotional distress associated with procrastination, the individual becomes less likely to avoid the stimulus associated with the feelings in the first place (i.e., studying for an exam). Moreover, because self-forgiveness is typically accompanied by a vow to change one's behavior in the future, this encourages the individual to engage in approach behaviors rather than behaviors motivated by avoidance. Thus self-forgiving for procrastinating may make it less likely that the individual will be motivated to avoid unpleasant tasks like studying and more likely that he or she will approach success by procrastinating less in the future.

Our results
The results of this study indicate that forgiving oneself for procrastinating on a given task is related to less procrastination on a similar task in the future. As predicted, this relationship is mediated by negative affect, such that self-forgiveness reduces procrastination by reducing negative affect. However, the presence of this relationship depends on the extent to which the individual procrastinated on the first exam.

Only at high levels of procrastination on the first exam was self-forgiveness negatively related to procrastination on the second exam. Perhaps the best way to understand this is to consider that low levels of procrastination are unlikely to be perceived as having had much of an effect on one's performance or engender much negative affect. Although procrastination can be still be considered a transgression as self-regulatory failure, if procrastination did not have much effect on performance or produce subjective distress the individual may not perceive the transgression to be particularly serious. He or she therefore will not need to self-forgive to the same extent as someone who procrastinated at higher levels. If self-forgiveness is lower, then the effect on motivation is likely to be similarly small. It is therefore logical that self-forgiveness would not predict procrastination on the second exam at low levels of procrastination on the first exam, as people who are only procrastinating slightly would be able to overcome any negative effects of transgressing against themselves without experiencing the motivational benefits of self-forgiveness.

Implications and concluding thoughts
Strange, isn't it? I think we could find the opposite effect for some people. If they forgive themselves for procrastinating, it would be just part of their "forgive and forget" strategy with "business as usual" (i.e., procrastination) on studying for the next exam. It reminds me of Fuschia Sirois' research on counterfactuals. Students who said things like "well, it could have been worse" after procrastinating on their exams or assignments were less likely to learn from the experience (but they felt better about the situation). These people know how to take care of their immediate emotional experience, but seldom learn anything new. Certainly, they don't acknowledge that something went wrong or won't feel guilt this way, so self-forgiveness may not even be necessary.

Yesterday was Yom Kippur, also known as the Day of Atonement for the Jewish people - one of the holiest days of the year. Jews traditionally observe the day with fasting, prayer, and services. As one of the most significant Jewish holidays, Yom Kippur is observed by secular Jews who may not observe other holidays or attend synagogue any other time of year.