One of the most powerful hours of television I ever saw was the Oprah Winfrey Show with the theme of forgiveness. Parents whose children had been killed by reckless drivers forgave unconditionally. Families reached out to hardened criminals who had killed their dear ones, helping them to deserve freedom or be at peace in prison.

By forgiving them, were the families condoning their actions? No, said the grieving family members, the killers were responsible for their actions, and they had to answer for them to God. They had to live with their choices; true peace of mind would be hard for them. They may have rationalized what they did, but that didn’t concern the forgivers. Those who make the decision to forgive don’t need the guilty person’s cooperation or apology. Through forgiveness, these amazing people felt that they were taking back their power from a lifetime of anger and regret.

People who’ve been physically and mentally violated far beyond normal experience have forgiven. Learn from Dave Pelzer, whose tale of appalling abuse by his mother is detailed in A Child Called It. Like him, you may have to forgive the same person over and over again. But do it, because feeding and caring for that grudge will poison that sweet juicy strawberry of the rest of your life. An examined life is important, but a life of repetitively re-examining the same patch of grass is irrelevant. Time to get a life, forgive, accept, and move on!

Instant Forgiveness – Kicking it up to the stars!

I have a new concept that I’m really getting a kick out of – instant forgiveness! We have instant microwaved food, instant Internet access, instant satellite positioning – why not instant forgiveness? Your father embarrassed you by getting belligerent with a waiter? The whole family agreed in advance to laugh about it, he does it all the time, and you’ve forgiven him in advance. You can always count on your sister to compare your kid unfavorably with hers? Instead of clenching your teeth and not believing “she’s doing that again,” you all get a huge kick out of it because you’ve shared the observations and you forgave her before it came out of her mouth. You embarrassed your daughter by repeating a confidential story? You apologize, pick up your foot, and wiggle your toes in your mouth, because you’ve already forgiven yourself!

Instant forgiveness has given me so much freedom, because everything is “like water off a duck’s back” – it rolls right off and you never dwell on it. I’m sure people who value worry and picking out the negative aspects of everything think I’m just stupid, but I’m so happily stupid! Things that used to bother me are now like wind beneath my wings, as I fly with power and vision above the junk that used to fill my mind and focus on the sweet unseen spirit beneath the irritations of life. What a rush, when you blink and the stink is gone! Try it!