Inner Peace: Why you never have to forgive

Image by crom3am from Pixabay
February 1, 2024

Giving up blame establishes that we are responsible for our lives

By Jim Hatton

Forgiveness has become a multimillion-dollar industry. Numerous books, workshops, seminars and speakers have proclaimed the value of forgiving and how it has changed lives. Indeed, it has.

Forgiving parents (alive or not), siblings, mates, bosses or even friends has been challenging for so many people. But once the process has started and forgiveness has occurred, a sense of peace and freedom can be experienced. Many other benefits can follow.

“Psychologists generally define forgiveness as a conscious, deliberate decision to release feelings of resentment or vengeance toward a person or group who has harmed you, regardless of whether they actually deserve your forgiveness.” — Greater Good Magazine

In most societies, people look to blame someone or something for events that are unwanted, insisting that these undesirable events are the fault of the government, society, the weather, other countries or even God! The news reports in our media are characterized by blame of someone or something. Many of us continue to blame our parents, long into “adulthood,” for the way we act or even think. The list is endless.

But what if we were to give up blame? If there were no blame, there would be no need to forgive. But how can we not blame someone or something for what happened to us? After all, it really looks like the other person did it to us!

The answer lies in the Law of Attraction. This law states that everything like unto ourselves is drawn to us. Like attracts like. No exceptions. What is doing the attracting is our vibration or consciousness. Our consciousness is formed by what we think, say and do. Everything and everybody in our lives are there because of the Law of Attraction.

This means that we are responsible for our lives. This includes things wanted and unwanted. The hard truth is that the Law of Attraction does not play favorites. It is always working impersonally for everyone, all the time. So, when things go our way, we can be happy that we are attracting favorable experiences. But when unwanted things appear, this is a sign that we need to look inside ourselves and find the root cause in our thinking. The thief and the victim are a vibrational match. The person who ran a red light and the person driving the car that was hit are a vibrational match. This applies to any situation.

To forgive someone for something means that we have previously assigned blame and are now willing to take responsibility and release our resentment. If we fully understand the Law of Attraction, we can no longer place blame on others.

More important, from this place of greater awareness and personal responsibility, we can forgive ourselves for a moment of unconsciousness about the effects of the Law of Attraction that led us to place the blame on someone else.

The event that prompted us to place blame is a call, an opportunity to look within ourselves and to change our thinking, actions, and words.

When this is done, and you have taken responsibility for the undesirable experiences that you attracted, I promise you, you will give up blame; there will be no need for forgiveness and your life will change for the better.

The World is not broken, Be in Peace…

Jim Hatton is an author, spiritual teacher and speaker. He makes his home in the Rogue Valley, Southern Oregon. Contact him at [email protected].

Want to contribute? Send 600- to 700-word articles on all aspects of inner peace to Richard Carey ([email protected]).

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