We have all more or less known a painful experience that left in us a tattoo of bitterness, hatred or suffering that we believe to be indelible. It seems impossible to us to forgive the author of these wounds and to turn the page. It would be far too easy, one thinks. And then what is the use of forgiving? To forgive is to forget, to give in, to endorse one’s aggressor. And if paradoxically, forgiveness was the path to recovery and to regained freedom? Olivier Clerc leads forgiveness workshops. In his new book, “Can we forgive everything” (Eyrolles), he opens the reflection to, perhaps, invite us to think differently. Top Santé met him.
You invite us to rethink the term forgiveness, which you think is misunderstood and misinterpreted. What is the true definition of forgiveness?
The word forgiveness is surrounded by considerable vagueness. If you ask the people around you, each will have a different definition and understanding depending on whether they had a religious education, atheist parents or shrinks. In fact, we have to redefine what we mean by forgiveness. Forgiveness is the path to healing wounds of the heart. A wounded heart needs balm to heal and heal wounds from which the emotional poison of hatred and resentment is festering. We use forgiveness as a balm that will help us release from these negative emotions. This release is akin to what I call “a shower of the heart”.
Is forgiveness a question of heart hygiene?
Absoutely. Forgiveness washes our heart of the “emotional cholesterol” that clogs our arteries. With this emotional hygiene, we prevent our hearts from drying out. We relearn how to open up to others without being in a position of vulnerability or a victim. In the end, we gradually manage to regain the capacity to love.
Forgiveness would therefore be a personal process, independent of forgiving the person who may have hurt us?
Entering the process of forgiveness requires reversing our relationship to it. In other words, we do not forgive someone but we ask for forgiveness. This reversal of the forgiveness process corresponds to the approach that I teach in my book and which I call “Gift of forgiveness”. Why ask for forgiveness and not forgive you will say to me? The nuance is important. She insists on the fact that we must free ourselves from the illusion that the other has the power to heal us. In fact, the healing of our wounds depends only on us. To take an example, we are not going to ask the person who injured our arm with a cutter to come and treat us. Asking for forgiveness is a personal process that aims to free oneself from within, from judgment and from pretending to want to forgive.
Is it a necessarily long process?
It varies from person to person. For some it may be instantaneous, for others it will take months or years. This work of forgiveness is personal but can be done alone or with others in forgiveness groups through the forgiveness circles that I have initiated for example. One certainty, the process will be all the longer if we have a bad conception of forgiveness and if we do not identify the obstacles to forgiveness.
What are these main obstacles?
there are several. For example we tend to think that forgiveness is religious. But you can heal your wounds regardless of your beliefs and philosophy. Forgiveness is not praying and hoping for spiritual grace to fall on us!
Another classic obstacle is believing that forgiveness is a gift to another. Or that to forgive amounts to condoning or forgetting what the other has done to us. However, we can completely forgive and begin this work of emotional healing without this leading to accepting, condoning or excusing acts that we consider intolerable.
Forgiveness is like a yoga of the heart, the regular practice of which brings great strength and a lot of courage.
Do you have a simple advice to use on a daily basis to practice this yoga of the heart?
Each day we can do this work of forgiveness by devoting a moment to it each evening before falling asleep. For this, we mentally recap what happened during the day to evacuate all the unspoken, tensions, negative emotions or unresolved problems in our sleep and fall asleep light.
Find more advice on forgiveness methods in “Can we forgive everything”, by Olivier Clerc, Eyrolles editions.
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