Forgiveness February 22, 2023 – Posted in: Advice, Confidence, Leaders and Teams, Personal Development, Relationships, Spirituality
Confidence is an inside job and baggage from the past can seriously affect your ability to be a confident person. One of the biggest (but often overlooked) blockers to confidence struggling with forgiveness and blaming other people from the past for how you feel today, which just keeps you stuck in bitterness, resentment and low self-esteem.
Those of us with genuine confidence have learned that we have to forgive the people who have hurt us in order to be free.
I was working with a client recently who had a light bulb moment when I told him that forgiveness doesn’t mean you approve of what they did, it’s that you’ve decided to set yourself free so that you can walk unburdened and with confidence into your future.
My client decided to let go of the people who have wronged him, to let go of his need for fairness and justice, and to let the past be what it was. He emailed me a few days later to tell me how liberated and self-assured he now felt.
So who do you need to forgive?
That teacher for saying you’d never amount to anything? The playground bully who picked on you relentlessly for years? Your father for being overly critical? Your ex-boss for undermining you and your confidence?
Let me tell you something… Only people who are hurting themselves hurt other people. Happy, contented, confident people do not go around picking on others or belittling them or undermining them. Something was wrong with them to cause them to get involved in that kind of power play. It was their own hurt spilling over into your life. It wasn’t personal to you, it was about them and their pain. This is where forgiveness comes in.
How do you forgive someone?
One of the most effective things I’ve found is to write them a no-send letter in which you vent every feeling you have towards them, tell them exactly what they did and how it affected you and then tell them that you have decided you’d like to be free. You end the letter with the words: “I forgive you, I hope you are happy, I set you free, I set myself free.”
And then you burn the letter, watching all the pain and bitterness turn to ashes.
After you’ve done this, every time that person comes to mind you send them a quiet blessing: “I forgive you, I hope you are happy, I set you free, I set myself free” and you go about your day.
It may take a few repetitions but eventually, your subconscious will cotton onto the idea that you are no longer angry with that person and that you are walking a new path.
So do yourself a favour. Forgive the people who have hurt you. Stop allowing them to live rent-free in your head.
Allow the past to be what it was and get on with living your life. Your future-confident-self will thank you for it
By the way, you can find me on Instagram where I share daily confidence boosting ideas like this.