You will achieve more in this world through acts of mercy than you will through acts of retribution. – Nelson Mandela
There are times in life when we feel that we have been wronged, there are times when we feel like things are unfair. The initial emotional reaction we have is usually of hurt or anger. Usually followed by regret; “I should not have done this”, “How dare he do that”, etc. Then we ruminate, we stew, we hold on to these feelings, sometimes for years. It results in us changing as a person. We become untrusting, we become cynical, we become pessimistic, we become defensive, we become risk-averse.
From my personal experience, I find that while we can not avoid the initial response of hurt or anger, we can choose how to react to it. Do we want to be an untrusting, cynical, angry person? I find the above quote from the great Madiba useful more so for my personal well-being than for the effect that my forgiveness has on the external world. Forgiveness allows me to move on unchanged. It allows me to stay positive, to stay trusting, to move forward knowing that while the world is always unpredictable and will throw me difficult challenges, I have a choice (after the initial reaction) to not let it change me negatively.
The creator of Logotherapy, Victor Frankl, talked about two types of people he observed while he was in a concentrating camp during Nazi Germany. The first type would one day just give up, stayed in their beds, wouldn’t move even to do their bodily functions. These people would invariably die within the next few days. The second type, would continue to be cheerful to the point of singing and dancing on the way to the gas chambers. Victor came to the conclusion that while most of the time we can not choose what happens to us, we can choose how we want to react to the situation. He wrote a very interesting, tiny book called “Man’s search for meaning”, if you have a spare few days, get it. It makes good reading. I wonder if Madiba hadn’t forgiven, would he have become the first black president of South Africa.
Drop me a line; let me know what you think.
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