Is forgiveness weakness

Religon teaches most of us, if not all that forgiveness is very inportnant
Recently i was put in a situation that shall we say. got to me.
Not by any means a trivial mater, for example lets say a friend or a family member saying something in a drunken arguement.
That would not bother me i would just let it go. words really are cheap.
But as i get older i am finding more and more difficult to forgive.
i have not spoken to one of my brothers in seven years
Over a financial mater, He refused to help when i was in serious financial difficulties even though i had helped him numerous times Financially previously. This i found unforgivable as he more then had the means to help at the time.
My Wife and kids say i am stubborn and pig headed sometimes. this may well be true on occasion.
But to me forgiveness in certian situations is weakness.
I watch a lot of real life crimes shows and i am always taken aback when you see the parants or partner of a murder victim say they forgive there killer.

So what do you guys think is forgiveness the key to moving on or just weakness of will.

It is IMO, perhaps the most important thing to enable you to move on. I find the opposite, as I get older it's easier to forgive rather than waste heartbeats and brainbytes on something like that. As far as your crime show example, never. That is something entirely different.

Forgive but learn.

Sometimes, you forgive them not for them but for you. Not forgiving someone puts you in a really negative situation that only really poisons you; the other party does not know or does not care about doing wrong to you so you just sit there in your negativity getting drained of life and will. So forgive and let it go.

Do note that forgiveness does not mean forgetting. You may forgive your brother for what he has done, but do not forget the lesson you've learned, ie he's not good with money or with paying it back so do not lend him money again unless you're "lending" him the money as a handout and you don't care if you get paid or not.

Lastly, it takes strength to forgive. People today like to "one-up" the other side; "I won't rest until I get my revenge," that sort of thing. Personally, I find that very petty. I've got other things to do with my time, better things to do, things that will help me, make me grow, expand my boundaries. Being able to realize this and learning to "let go" of other people's wrongdoing, that to me takes strength.

So forgive, move on, and live.

Personally I don't understand this "forgiveness" thing. I can't even relate to the moving on problem.

For example, there was a time when I was really in a bad position and all my highschool friends instead of supporting me, made fun and relished my suffering. They would joke about my problems in facebook and would tell me to "go ahead, kill myself". It wasn't a trivial matter and some people here will remember my meltdown back then.

What I did was to get rid of them and started from scratch surrounding myself with people who really cared.

Now if you ask me, do I forgive them? I haven't thought about them. I just forgot about them and moved on. In fact right now I have to think for a few seconds just to recall their names (I have this talent for erasing people from my mind).

So, no desire to get even from my part. However, I have no intention of talking to them for the simple reason that I've decided they're people I don't want to be with. It's as simple as that. Now if someone is going to come up to me and say that I must "forgive them" by establishing contact with them, put them back in my life for spiritual enlightenment, I'd say #%&*$# off.

There are a lot of important things I have to do than putting people in my life who are there to harm me. My life has been very peaceful the past few years I ceased contact with them.

Society is odd. I knew that someone will say forgiveness is a sign of strength and it's the antithesis of other's experience that it's a sign of weakness. Both may be right depending on the person's background and the type of society you're living in.

Whatever your decision, my suggestion would be to never, ever do it to please other people. Don't forgive to please other people.

I don't think I've ever really "forgiven" anyone for anything. I just forget about it, unless it's really bad in which case I can't...so I don't.

In other words, if the slight was small enough that I can forget about it, it is forgiven by default. If I can't forget it, it is never forgiven. That has happened rarely enough, though.

There are exceptions. For instance, if I had to push a button to prevent the people who I went to elementary school with from dying a horrible death...I wouldn't bother to push it. It's been over 30 years but I still remember how they treated me. I will literally not lift a finger to help them. Whatever excuses they might offer for their behavior at that time are irrelevant, the damage they caused has never healed.



The Jedi Master

+1. That's me. During my life I've met people I'd pretty much do anything for, people I just get along with, and people I would not cross the road to help. Fortunately the last group is pretty small.

After a couple of experiences where I learned what "real" forgiveness is about, I've arrived at what Ice has said so well here. You don't forgive to make the other person feel better. It's not the same as accepting an apology or just getting over something rather than dealing with it. At the level of real STRUGGLE, you do it, or try to do it, for yourself, not them. Because YOU deserve it.
It's still hard. It isn't just a decision to forgive, it isn't just knowing that you need to forgive or even saying the words. Internalizing it and accepting it is friggin HARD. There are some issues I want to forgive but still can't. I know it's right though. My weakness is my inability to completely go through with it. Strength would be the ability to accept it and move on and to be relieved.

Forgiveness has nothing - at all - to do with the person being forgiven. It has EVERYTHING to do with the person forgiving -- your -- well-being and happiness.

Forgiveness doesn't mean the forgiven escapes justice (that wouldn't be your situation anyway). It just means you, the forgiver, are happier because you put it behind you.

If you want to be happy, you'll forgive. It really is that simple.

Y'all need to learn the most powerful thing you can do... forgive someone.

Letting go not only shows mercy to those that may not deserve it, it also frees you from any hold that they may have over your heart/mind/soul.
If you forgive them, that wound can't be reopened.

This is a KEY ELEMENT of Christianity. (C'mon, if you know it Christ died that you could be forgiven)
But even if you don't believe in that, you should learn how to do this to keep from being bitter.

That will ruin your life.

This is typical, don't worry about it too much - or more to the point, know that it's how it is, and that you need to reflect more on forgiving someone and letting go.



I agree that in some situations it is a weakness, but not here.
Like others have said, forgive so that you can move on. It's your brother. Your expectations were violated and you were betrayed. It might help to find the reason (sometimes you might find out something surprising) - in the end, family is 'everything', and that expectation has been violated.

What it comes down to is that actions speak louder than words: You helped him, he refused to help you. Only got your side of the story to go on, so you may want to do some digging of your own to perhaps get a better picture.
But again, based on what you've said alone:

He's your brother, but for whatever reason he's unreliable or unwilling to help. Ok, learn from it, don't ask him for help any more...whether you decide to help him ever again is on you, or to talk to him or whatever.

Learn to forgive, but do not forget.

Had situation where I ask my brother for a small favor and he refused.I was hurt,he had lived with me for a while after he came home from Nam.Used my car and slept on my couch.I just gave him a home until he got his life going.

Still as time past the hurt eased and I forgave him,I never mentioned it to him and we got to be as close as brothers could be.He's dead now and it hurts my heart to think of him gone and we can't talk and bulls--- each other like we did.I miss him just as much now as I did the day we placed him if the ground.

He was my baby brother.

Forgiveness is not about the other person it's about us.If I couldn't forgive my brother it would have been my loss and I'm thankful that I could.

Have not talked to my brother for over a year after my wife had her stroke.
He called while I was trying help her at the hospital. We had not talked in close
to 5 years. I cut off all communication after he started demanding that we take
time off work to come visit. Not so easy in our line of work. He gets all pissy
and tells us to find new jobs. That was the final straw, he had been telling me
what to do for years and it was upsetting me. Never felt better not having to talk
with him now. Have not seen him since 2008. He drove his daughters away right out
of high school. He always wanted a boy, we had one and he drove a wedge into my
son in 2007. We were up fishing with cousins and they were all so drunk and falling
down stupid my son never wanted to see any of them again. He was 13 at the time.

Forgiveness won`t work in this case. Nor do I feel it necessary.

I do have close contact with my nieces though, they come visit and call
all the time. They never talk about their dad.

I find forgiving others is as hard or easy as it is to need someone else's forgiveness. i have lots of weaknesses and try to remember that those who wrong me may have bigger troubles than I know. Part of forgiveness can be giving freely of your kindness to those who need it. We are not all strong alone, but together we move mountains.

I don't forgive as much as forget. I don't try to second guess someone who might have wronged me, in my eyes.

Life is far to short to sweat most things like that and as the years pass, they often seem far less important than they once were.

My only brother, and I, have had many differences over the years, but when the feces hits the rotary air mover, we come together and deal with it. We still vehemently disagree on many things but when it gets down to the really important things, we back each other 100%.

Forgiveness it not a weakness, it is more of a way of moving beyond the incident from the past and living the rest of your life, without the baggage.

+1 well said Ice

Like most things inter-personal, I think of it a bit differently.

I don't forgive in the classical sense, or at least I don't think I do.

I accept bad things people do towards me or my loved ones as bad things they've done. I don't hang on to it too tightly; I wasn't the one screwing up, after all.

Then again, I rarely forget and file it away as a metric on how they'll act in the future, adjusting to fit the facts.

Sometimes that means not ever interacting again with them. I'm not carrying around anger, I'm just not engaging them for any reason. They are strangers to me.

Or I might put a time limit on it. I once told a family member that because of their actions I would not speak to them for a year. And so it was. When I called them they were very happy and the first words were "I knew the year was up, but wasn't sure if I was supposed to call you or not."

I never lend money to friends with the idea they'd ever pay me back. Sometimes they actually do, which is a nice surprise. With relatives I snort at the pro-forma promises and tell them we can skip the kabuki dance and save ourselves a lot of anger later on...if they've hit the point where they're asking for money from my shallow well they clearly don't have the means to pay it back. They have never surprised me with cash.

I'm a firm believer that while bad things happen to good people, bad people are just beat to death by misfortune. I've never met a mean or backstabbing person that wasn't miserable all the time.

I'm not vinctive by nature. There are only a few people that if their heads were on fire I wouldn't piss on to put it out.

I think every situation is different.

Some things people do are 'unforgivable'.
Some I can get over, if I believe the person has seen his mistake, and has truly learned.

Some people just continue to hurt one human after another. They literately feed on it.
It's 'who' they are. And they enjoy it.
Looking at the damage they've done, picking up after them, and hundreds like them, hardens the heart.
The 'hunt' goes on, sometimes for years, to stop them.
So much grief in the world, caused by each one.

Forgiving them, would be a serious mistake, IMHO.

I do applaud the humans who can forgive.
I've met many of them. They're beautiful people inside.
It's not weakness. It's just naive, IMO.

Some people forgive by default, always every time. Blanket forgiveness. That MIGHT be weakness... or not. Depends on what the person is thinking. Personally an automatic forgiveness doesn't work for me.

Forgiveness I think should be earned, just like respect is earned, and I do think they are closely related.

But if you consider the person, the past, what was done, and can then say to yourself "I think I can forgive them now"... THAT is most certainly not weakness. Not at all. I'd even say that it's a strength, that you can dredge up the wounds of the past, and reconsider their acts, giving them the time of day again, that's not weak, that's strength, mental toughness. Discipline.

NEVER EVER forgiving, that I think indicates a weakness of one's own character. The inability to empathize with others, put yourself in their shoes.


I guess I'm in between... forgiveness for some, and definitely not for others. A weakness? Maybe. But with strength too. I guess I'm trying to thread the needle between being a doormat and a hardass, but it's really not too difficult!

I do find that some things are becoming easier to forgive, and other things much more difficult to just wipe the slate clean.

The older I get, the more I try to let go of past resentment. I really don't want to become a bitter old person, I want to become the mellow old dude that my father has become (his rare moments are comical now ). I'm not sure if my older brother will ever see it this way, there's still friction between them, but he got it worse.

I wonder if alcoholism and being a piss-poor father are genetic/hereditary or purely environmental?

Two of my father's brothers (very good people) have been at my home frequently, building cabinets for the addition. I overhear their recollections of growing up and it doesn't surprise me one bit that not a single person cared when their father passed (including their mother). They don't really talk bad about their father, I think they'd rather just not talk about him at all.

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I still have allot of making up to do for my own transgressions (and enjoying every moment of it). Mine were wife related, not automatic marriage deal-breakers (I never cheated or got physical), just lots of verbal abuse, poor decisions, a really shi**y attitude and years of neglect. I believe I've been forgiven, but I'll keep working on it anyway.

"and it doesn't surprise me one bit that not a single person cared when their father passed (including their mother). eek They don't really talk bad about their father, I think they'd rather just not talk about him at all"

ugh - sad !

My dad was a pretty rough character himself and rough on me but i do know he loved me. That cannot make up for all his short comings of our relationship but love counts a lot.

I hope my boys remember me in a better light as I know i spared them the things of the past with my father that are not the best memories. As the years went by i understood why he was the way he was. I forgave him. One night he called me while i was far away on active duty in Virginia and said to me, " I know I wasn't the best father to you and I'm sorry for that"

I lost my dad to cancer suddenly in January this year whilst in hospital for a routine checkup....we had always got on brilliantly but there are still things I wish I'd said to him before he passed away such as how much I loved him and to thank him for all the support he had given to me over the years. I hadn't seen him for 3 months when he passed and when I got the call that he wasn't going to make it through the night I didn't make it to the hospital in time and so didn't get to see him that final time before he passed away. I was 2 hours into a 6 hour drive when I got the call he hadn't made it.

My point here is anything can happen to you or your brother at any time, but don't let something bubble away that could be put behind you both to get the relationship back on track. God forbid if anything did happen to either of you I'm sure you'd both be kicking yourselves for not sorting it out or putting it behind you. I think you should at least talk and both air your feelings, it would probably help to understand each other.

We're only on this planet for a limited amount of time, don't let something waste away that time because you can't get it back....time is precious, and especially spending that time with those that are close to you.

So true Paradaz and especially since each and every day people go suddenly, often from some accident without any chance to hear or to say anything more to family.

Give thanks each and every day and tell your family members you love them

It all comes down to why and how you do it. Could be weak, could be strength. But the important thing is to let go of the bitterness. It will eat at you and reduce the quality of your own life.


The key thing is to find serenity and inner peace and calm. We all do it in our own ways.

I only wish their was some way of letting go of the past not just the incident with my brother.
It makes no sense to dwell of maters that cant be resolved i keep telling my self move the #%&*$# on
But i cant seem to let certain events in my life go.

You have to let things go. Time heals all wounds, as somebody once said.

I lost my father when I was 17 and all but one of my grandparents before that. Now there is only my brother and I, along with some distant cousins. Family is everything so do your best to keep them close, no matter what has happened in the past.

You can make new friends but you can't make a new family.

cichlidfan ...."Family is everything so do your best to keep them close, no matter what has happened in the past.

You can make new friends but you can't make a new family"

so true

Forgiveness isn't for the person being forgiven, it's for the person doing the forgiving. It's how we prevent others from having immeasurable power over our lives. It's necessary for us to forgive, but we do not have to be made fools of. It is equally important to be aware of what's going on around us so we're not placing ourselves in harms way.

There are some things a man just can not forgive, and there is something going on in my life that I just can never forget or forgive. This has nothing to do with some family squabble but something far more sinister that has been done to me over 20 years and is still being done to me today. Never forget, never forgive.

Every situation, is, of course, different and I am sure that some things are hard, or even impossible, to forget or forgive. However, letting it continue to eat at you is not good for your own mental well being. If a major problem in your life has been going on for twenty years then that needs to be addressed in a proactive, not reactive, manner. Otherwise the problem is going to haunt you for the rest of your life, which is no way to live. IMHO.

I just wanted to add a couple more thoughts to what I said earlier before this thread scrolls off into the sunset...

The worst thing about my grandfather, from what I've been told, wasn't the alcoholism, the whores, the money squandering (always wanting to play big shot at the bars, "This rounds on me!") and the violent abuse of his children (even if you believe in not sparing the rod, it can be taken way too far).

It was the fact that he made a very good living at the time (a machinist supervisor for Kaiser Aluminum) yet his wife and 5 kids (including my aunt who helped raise me) depended on the charity of neighbors and store owners for even the basic necessities of life (food and clothing). They literally lived in squander like animals (although my grandmother had her own faults) because the man didn't give a crap about his family and said as much with his last wishes regarding his own inevitable funeral (he got his wishes, there was none and nobody cared). His ashes were taken care of though, thrown into the Mississippi River as he requested.

When it came to building giant detailed replicas of ships out of wood from scratch (oil tankers and cruise ships, some several feet long), the man had crazy skills and lots of patience! His ultimate project was the Carnival cruise ship "Mardi Gras", each room had working lights and furniture, was incredible when you turned off the lights in his workshop and turned on the ship lights. The entire deck railings were meticulously made from of hundreds of toothpics!

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About being mean to my wife (~3rd to 8th year of marriage + ~12 more years of indifference)...

She reminds me that she gave back what she received (don't let the size fool ya, she's spunky) and that I tend to have a distorted view of our past, remembering it as being worse than it really was. She also reminds me that she could have easily left at any time (no kids, pre-house, she being much more successful) but that she didn't because she still loved me and knew there was a better person somewhere inside of me (like the one she agreed to marry).

I dunno, I just remember being really down and out about my business failures and especially my health/weight, how it was eating me up inside. She accepts some of the blame because it was always *my* problem, never hers, and she didn't make trying to live a healthy lifestyle easy for me at all until we got older. Mine are worse but we both have regrets.

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Love these threads, to me they're therapeutic (I hope the OP feels the same way). Should I have sought professional help over the years? Maybe. I didn't because I never truly felt depressed. Down and out maybe, but not what I consider to be real depression, where you question the reason for living.

Humans are fragile and life is a very rough and bumpy road at times, there are very few of us if any that have not had some part of our psyche become damaged merchandise along the way

Forgiveness is never weakness. At times our pride tells us it is--but as the Lord shows us, it is just that pride that is truly the real weakness. Pride strays us from humility. It beckons to our boastful selves we show our hard wrought efforts and hold them high and above our heads like they matter more than him or worse, other folks around us.

The strongest thing any man can ever do is to swallow their pride, place their fears in the hands of our Lord, and not just ask for, but offer forgiveness for our fellow women and men.

But remember, to forgive does not mean we must forget. Forgiveness is a gift to make inroads towards amends. It heals rifts but scars of the heart do still remain. They linger, tear at our insides and pain our inward souls. We carry those scars with us as the wounds heal. They serve as memories we can learn from, and teach others with. But when we forgive, we pledge not to hold it over those who've harmed us. We've agreed to move on.

One of the few things i have learned the hard way is try not to judge people.
I believe in the expression never judge a man to you have walked in his shoes.
I am by no means excusing what your grandfather did or his behavior no man should leave his family with out.
just saying depression and mental illness may have played its part i have seen good men fail for various reasons truth be known i came close my self
At the time of my bankruptcy i nearly gave up. all i had worked and saved for gone the bank was trying to take the roof from over my families head
But i guess i was lucky i still had a spark that would not let me lay down for long i bounced back.
But i have to say i was never the same after it.

Good advice on not judging others, marko1231123.

I can be judgmental sometimes (internally, I never outwardly express it), usually when I'm really struggling with my weight while I see others with the same problem throwing caution to the wind. Must be a self-hate kinda thing. But yeah, you can't know what's going on in someone's head.

About my grandfather, I hardly knew the man so I have no ill-feelings about him personally. I was just told by everyone who really knew him that he was rotten to the core <shrug>. I do know he hated my mom and her family, and my other grandfather (mom's father) was one of the kindest men I've ever known. They were exact opposites.

In any case, I'm glad I don't have such hard feelings with my own father. What resentment I held was softened by the way he's always treated my wife as his own daughter (much better than he treated his real daughter years earlier, although they're cool now). I think one reason I even had the opportunity to experience a marriage renaissance was how close our immediate families have always been, I've seen the opposite help tear marriages apart.

Being able to legitimately forgive is a trait of high character. Mistaking that for weakness is a bad lapse in judgment.

Yea, but to put an end to it may cost me my life. Yes, I have received death threats implying that is what will happen to me if I go public.

Try taking a walk in the woods like I do.

I don't think that I have ever "forgiven" anyone for harm done to me or mine. What does it mean anyway? I have forgotten many things.... it happens as you get older. Another benefit of age is that your enemies die, often before you. That is always satisfactory to witness.

On the other hand I have never actively sought "revenge" as such, though I did once successfully sue someone for defamation. This particular person has a business only 20 meters from my own and I see him almost every day, but I just treat him as if he didn't exist... even to the point of walking at him in the street... he always gets out of the way.

Never forget, never forgive is definitely something I can live with.

Since we do not live in some utopia I do not entirely agree with the following but I think two interesting opinions are expressed:

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