Why Is It So Freaking Hard To Forgive?

0:002026 is going to be an awesome year. We got some pretty cool stuff coming up. First off, we got Foundations of

0:06Recovery. This is our flagship program. We're starting it in January. This is for anyone, man, woman, or couple who

0:14wants to come and reclaim their heart from shame, trauma, and betrayal. We start off with an education on all sorts

0:20of principles. Give you the common language. We feed you from a fire hose in terms of all things recovery. It is

0:26such a great start to recovery. And we get to the roots of things, Tyler. This isn't like any other program. Like, this

0:32is our healing journey in process. And Foundations is where we begin. If you

0:37look at the value that you're getting there to kick off a good recovery with all of the right education, all of the

0:42right language, and a team to get you started while also being directed by Brandon and myself through the whole

0:47process. What a deal. So, we if you're interested, if you're struggling, if you've been wanting to do something for

0:53a long time, jump into this. This only comes around every so often and we would love to have you there. Click the link

1:00in the description to sign up for it. And to make it even sweeter, we're also including a raffle for a free pass to

1:07the Radiant Dawn retreat. Anyone who signs up for foundations will be added to the raffle for that free radiant dawn

1:13pass. If you're a man and you sign up for foundations, your name still gets entered and you can give that pass away

1:19if you win it to any woman that you want to. So, what you're saying, Tyler, is if you sign up and participate in

1:24foundations, you could possibly go to Radiant Dawn for free. That's exactly what I'm saying, which is

1:30crazy because Foundations by itself is already an insane value. Man, I sound so salesy,

1:38but it actually is awesome. So, come like come to Foundations. And even if you don't come to Foundations, sign up

1:44for Radiant Dawn. I It's beyond therapy, the best healing experiences that you can have. Click the link below and come

1:51join us. Why is it so freaking hard to forgive?

1:59What's up you guys? Welcome to the Therapy Brothers podcast. I'm Brandon. I'm Tyler. We're brothers.

2:05We're therapists. We're not afraid of your questions. So bring it.

2:10[Music]

2:19What's going on you guys? I'm Tyler Wandering the Therapist here today. I'm on my own. Brandon is out of town on a

2:25retreat in Peru and uh I hope he's having a good time. He's gotten to go and see Machu Picchu and uh some other

2:32things and I hope he's traveling safe and I'll miss him today because this topic is such a good topic. Um before we

2:39jump into uh our question today, there's a couple things I want to cover. The first one is

2:44is that we just want to get a shout out for our uh review for the day. This come

2:51one comes from Arturo and it says

2:56the best therapists in the industry. I've heard a lot of podcasts and work with a lot of therapists and the Patrick

3:02brothers are the best by a mile. Tyler's podcast on surrender is the best I've

3:07ever heard on the topic and the most helpful and instructional advice for someone trying to learn how to live a new life of surrender. Some need their

3:15morning cup of coffee to start each day. I just need a cup of Therapy Brothers podcast to start each day. Well, geez,

3:22Arturo, thank you. That's an awesome review. I wish Brandon was here to hear this one. Um, but thank you. Appreciate

3:28you guys' reviews. The way that you guys can help us if you enjoy the content that we're putting out is to continue to

3:34review, rate, and share these episodes because that's how we reach other people and are able to make a bigger difference

3:40for those who could benefit from the information that we have. So, thank you. Appreciate that, Arturo.

3:46Um, the other thing that I wanted to mention before we get started today is that we are now official. We've got a

3:52live website here for the upcoming men's conference that we're going to be having. It is scheduled for August 19th

3:59through the 21st. It's a three-day event. It's going to be in Cash Valley, Utah. And this is for Christian men who

4:07are looking to reclaim their heart, to get back in touch with the things that are inside of them that God designed

4:13them to be in terms of their masculinity and their masculine heart. This is an

4:18event that Brandon and I have spent a lot of time and energy and effort in. Both of us have a passion in this area

4:25and feel as if it's almost a calling for us to be doing these things. So, we have limited availability. We also have early

4:32bird uh pricing. So, you can get it for half price right now until the end of May.

4:39So, go to rising sunconference.com. Sun spelled as in my child sun. Rising

4:46sunconference.com. Give it a look. And we have limited spots available. So, so grab yours and get it at a really good

4:53price before the price goes up at the end of May. All right, let's jump into our question today. This is a uh a

5:00really good question. It's something that I think every one of us in some way has to deal with from time to time in

5:06our life. It's it's a difficult thing to try to navigate and it's definitely

5:12something that can really tear at your heartstrings. So, let's jump into the question. and I'll read it and then we'll get into a

5:18few thoughts that I'm having on this subject of forgiveness. It says, "I am not healing from the betrayal trauma of

5:25my spouse." How did Christ do it? How did he love

5:31someone even when he knew what what they were going to do to him?

5:37And this is pretty powerful and pretty hard. So, first I just want to say to you uh who who who submitted the

5:42question that I know how difficult it is to be in this spot of betrayal, trauma or other forms of trauma and to know

5:50that in some ways that there are things that we have no control over in what our partner may end up doing or choosing to

5:56do and that those choices have a very significant effect on on our lives and

6:02on the lives of other people around them. This is one of those things that we really struggle with in our in our world. And I know I struggle with this

6:08on my own in my own life is to it makes me cringe at the thought of some of the

6:14choices that I've made in the past and the pain that I've caused others knowing that I might have been ignorant or maybe

6:20when I wasn't ignorant still choosing to do certain things and and hurt other people. So let's talk a little bit about

6:27this idea of forgiveness because I think sometimes there's a a couple of things that get us tripped up on this idea of forgiveness and why it's so difficult to

6:34forgive. One of the first things that I think happens for us with with the process of forgiveness is that we don't

6:41acknowledge the reasons for our lack of forgiveness. And I believe that there's some power in acknowledging those

6:47things. Understanding why it is so difficult and why we don't want to forgive people because some of those

6:54things are valid. And if we understand those things, we can address them. When we are hurt by somebody, one of the

7:02things that we do to self-protect is we slant everything to a negative scale. We

7:07look for reasons to continue to confirm why we wouldn't want to lean ourselves back into the relationship and or

7:14forgive in order to protect ourselves from being hurt again. So, in a sense,

7:19when we're in an unforgiving place, it might just be the very beginning stage

7:24of trying to figure out boundaries. We're trying to figure out how to not get hurt again. And so it makes sense

7:30that it's hard to let it go because until we can understand how to actually protect ourselves, how to actually take

7:37care of ourselves without continuing to be hurt, one of the natural responses for us is to stay angry and resentful

7:45and bitter because those things allow us to be justified in not being vulnerable.

7:51And in doing so, they feel like a form of self-p protection. So it makes sense that we wouldn't want to be forgiving

7:57simply for the fact of self-p protection. The other thing that I think happens with forgiveness and why it's so

8:04difficult is that we live most of us in our own minds from a place of what's called just world theory. And what just

8:11world theory means is is that we all get what we deserve. So, this can be a

8:17really damaging thing for us in some ways when we see something on the news and say, "Well, that must have been something that they deserve because this

8:23or this or this must be going on in their life." Or, you know, in the in the past, I've heard things with people who

8:28have been sexually assaulted. And the just world theorist will say, "Well, they shouldn't have been dressing that

8:33way. They shouldn't have been going to that certain party where that thing happened or that, you know, they they got what was coming to them, which

8:39obviously when you hear those things, it makes your stomach turn inside, right?" Like but somehow we all live from that

8:44place. We all feel like justice must be served. Especially

8:50when especially when we are the ones who have had the injustice served to us or

8:56when our loved ones who are close to us have had the injustice served to us. So,

9:02we hold on to our resentments and our bitterness and our anger and our

9:07frustration sometimes because we feel like that's the only way that we're

9:12going to be able to continue to exact justice and we'll have to hold on to it

9:17until justice has been served. This is a dangerous game because even though it's

9:24natural for us to be in that place, in many situations,

9:30there is no way that true justice can actually be served. You know, several

9:36years ago, I my wife had our, you know, my wife and I had our D-Day with uh my

9:41wife being betrayed by me. And and there are certain things that I did,

9:48certain deceptions that I had going on in my life, mostly for my own self-p protection. I wasn't really thinking

9:53about how it would affect her, but it did. And when she found out about it, it rocked her world. It caused everything

9:59to be thrown into question. It caused her to wonder if I was really the person that I said I was. It caused her to

10:05wonder if she was safe enough to stay in the same house as me. It caused her to wonder if I was not telling other things

10:11in my life. if I was being dishonest in other areas of my life, it caused her to have all sorts of shaky ground. And the

10:18simple truth is is that in the things that I did, ultimately the best that I could do was

10:25try to get myself into recovery, become a better man, become an honest man. But

10:32the truth is is that I was never going to be able to fix the damage that I had done.

10:39And so if my wife is staying stuck in a place of nonforgiveness, waiting for justice to be served, or if she's the

10:45one who has to exact the justice, there's a potential that she could stay stuck in that ultimately for the rest of

10:51our lives and she could hate me and I could never quite fill the gap and she could be justified and I could continue

10:58to work at it and ultimately both of us could continue to stay in our misery until we died.

11:05But but when my wife would stay stuck in that place of needing to play God, where

11:11does the emotional check get cashed? It gets cashed on her. She's stuck with

11:19that bitterness. She's stuck with the resentment. She's stuck with all of the pain. She in essence has to carry that

11:25pain continually until justice gets served. And so unless there's another

11:31way, then that's going to be a continual thing. And that's and that's a natural thing for us, right? So if we can pause

11:38and admit those two things that I am in some ways self-protecting and in other ways maybe I'm the one who feels like

11:44I've got to exact justice because if I don't nobody will. None of us like seeing somebody get away with something.

11:51And I my my wife calls me the moral justice police because I'm the kind of guy who like even in a parking lot if

11:58someone steals a parking spot from a little old lady, I'll be get out of my car and I'll walk over and I'll tell the

12:03person that they were inconsiderate and they should probably move. Um and and it causes some tension once in a while.

12:08Those types of things. I'm I'm as guilty of this as anybody else that none of us

12:14like to see injustice and feel like somebody gets away with it. All of us like to see justice. Think

12:20about the movies you watch. Think about the media you watch. Think about the things that you're looking at on your

12:26social media feeds. And all of us are constantly looking for justice to be served. If you want to see this thing in

12:32action, go to your child's, you know, go to like your 12-year-old child's soccer game and watch how both sets of parents

12:39think the referee is on the other team's side and then every time a call gets made or anytime one of their players

12:45takes some other player out, it's just justice being served. And so everyone can stay justified in their own

12:50bitterness and their own frustration and and ultimately stay in their place of being their own victim, right? There's

12:58got to be a different way. There has to be some way to release those feelings because otherwise we are hosed

13:08into having to hold on to those emotions simply for the sake of doing our part

13:13towards justice. The beautiful thing about this is is that we if we can understand those

13:19things, we can meet ourselves with those things with compassion first. Is it okay

13:24that I have these feelings? Yes. Is it okay that I want justice

13:30served? Yes. Can I can I have some compassion for myself in that situation first?

13:38And that's part of the answer to the question I think today is to get in the act of meeting yourself with compassion

13:44and giving yourself permission to be a work in progress with this process of

13:49forgiveness. Now, how did Christ do it? That's the question.

13:55Well, Christ had some information that I think sometimes we forget. Christ understood

14:03the principle that there needed to be a third party involved in order for things to be set right and to be made just.

14:11Christ understood that in order for there to be mercy for the sinner and justice for the victim, there had to be

14:17a third party. And he happened to understand his true nature as that third

14:22party. He understood that he had to be in that spot where he could hold simultaneously

14:29the mercy for the person who' done the damage, even the people who were doing damage to him at the same time that he

14:35could he could fill the gap for justice, which is exactly what his atonement was for. It's in essence what makes God God.

14:44And one of the things that I think that we can do is that we can continually bring ourselves to the place of meeting

14:50ourselves where we're at. Understanding that forgiveness is actually in some ways in many ways it's the process of

14:56grieving. It's coming to a place of understanding and realizing that things have been done that we wish couldn't

15:02shouldn't wish or shouldn't have been done and yet they have been done. And we

15:08can go through the sadness and the anger and the bargaining and the depression around the fact that those things have

15:14happened to us. And we get a chance to cycle through those things as many times as we want to or as we need to until our

15:20hearts are ready to ultimately give the outcome over to something or somebody

15:26bigger than ourselves. And that can be an ongoing process. And maybe I come to a place where I'm able

15:32to let go for a time and then something happens and I get hurt again or somebody else hurts me or it reminds me of old

15:37things and I pick it back up. And the beautiful thing is is that I get a chance to go back through that process

15:43again until I'm able to fully give it over and surrender it again to something or somebody bigger than myself. Um

15:53that's the process. It's not a linear thing. It's something that is more of an

15:58ongoing work in progress. than it is a stepbystep thing to get there. And I think if we understand that

16:05and give ourselves permission to be in that space, we can immediately alleviate

16:10some of our own suffering in the circumstances that we're in. So, how can

16:16you love somebody even when you know that they might hurt you? Again, this is a really challenging thing. I

16:23think sometimes we we associate forgiveness with

16:28the they you know they say forgive and forget. Well, we also think forgive means trust. Those things are not

16:36connected to each other. Forgiveness is simply the act of letting go. And

16:42ultimately it's the only thing that it's doing is setting the prisoner free. And the prisoner is actually the victim. The

16:49person who has the unforgiving heart is the victim because they're the ones who have to carry the burden of justice.

16:54They're the ones who have to carry the burden of the pain that they felt. And so forgiveness is not even even about

17:00the perpetrator. The forgi forgiveness is for the person who needs to forgive

17:06so that they can set their heart free again. And and and so looking at it from

17:12those terms, we are now looking for a way to set ourselves free.

17:18and um and be able to liberate ourselves from the the heavy pack that we're carrying. I I love this quote by CS

17:26Lewis. He says, "To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God

17:32has forgiven the inexcusable in you." It's kind of goes back into that

17:37principle of, you know, I often hear in my in my office, I'll often hear somebody say, "There's

17:45nothing that I could do that could make up for the thing that my partner has done to me." In essence,

17:51what they're saying is is that they've done something so terrible and so wrong that there's nothing that I could do

17:57that's as bad as they've done. And they use that as like justification for holding on to the bitterness and the

18:03anger. And I think what CS Lewis is saying here in this quote is he's saying that really all of us all of us fall

18:11short in some way. Maybe mine are a lot bigger than other people's. Maybe other

18:18people's are a lot bigger than mine. If we're stuck in a game of comparing ourselves to the other person, in

18:26essence, it's like we're both diving into the dumpster and getting dirty and then we're com then we're comparing who's more dirty. At the end of the day,

18:33that's not that's not the right solution. The right solution is to climb out of the dumpster to clean ourselves off and to acknowledge that we we're

18:41both dirty. And really, the only thing that I can control is to try to clean myself off. So, here's a tool that I

18:46sometimes teach the people that I counsel with is it's like a mental tool that you can kind of use sometimes to

18:52try to help this thing move a little bit is that when you find yourself in resentment or anger or nonforgiveness,

18:58practice the art of trying to see a bigger picture and realizing that it's not a comparison between how bad you are

19:05and how bad the other person is that's done something to hurt you. The ultimate thing is is that we both need

19:11forgiveness. There are many things in my life that I've done, some of them that I feel are

19:18pretty big, that are in desperate need of forgiveness. And if I need forgiveness for my own

19:26peace of mind, for my own progress, how much more important is it for me to

19:31offer that forgiveness to the next person? How would I how would I feel justified

19:37in accepting the forgiveness that I so desperately need if I'm unwilling to do that for somebody else?

19:44And if I can if I can get in that headsp space, sometimes it's easier to start letting things go. So, I have a little

19:51story here, something that happened in my own past. I I think I've shared this in a past episode or something before,

19:58but when I was in graduate school, I was in a group of six students. And in

20:05that six students, we pretty much did everything together in terms of school work. And there was one particular

20:11faculty member that for some reason didn't necessarily like me. I think I

20:17know the reasons. Um, but ultimately what ended up happening is that I ended up getting a C minus in my ethics

20:25course. And uh, a C minus in our program was the equivalent of getting an F. And if you got an F, then they could counsel

20:31you out of the program. And so I got called into her office and she sat me

20:36down and she said, "Hey, you haven't turned in any of your assignments." Even though I had turned in all of my assignments. and she said, "Due to that,

20:44we're thinking about counseling you out of the program unless you can go and get all of your assignments done in the next

20:503 or 4 days before the semester ends." And um I I was a little frustrated by

20:56that and upset by it, but I got up and I went out to my car and I brought in my assignments and I turned them into her

21:03and uh showed her that I had already done them. And the the issue was that there was

21:09something that was unfair in what was happening there. And so I took it to some other places. I took it to some

21:15higherups in the in the department and we ended up having a meeting. And the meeting I think was intended to go well,

21:21but it didn't go so well. And what ended up happening is it caused more anger and resentment on her side of things. She

21:27ended up calling my boss and telling my boss that she thought I was unethical and that I was going to lose my license

21:33at some point for whatever reasons. And so I had to get called in and talk with

21:38my boss. And in essence, what happened is is that this woman really just tried to make my life a living hell for the

21:44rest of my education while I was at that school. and and I felt an insane amount of

21:52bitterness and anger and frustration because I didn't understand where it was coming from. I didn't understand why I

21:59was being the target of these things and things from my lens seemed so totally

22:04unfair. And I remember just having this bitterness settle into my heart. I felt angry and upset. I felt my jaw clench

22:11every time I went to school. Every time I'd go to class or pass her in the hallway. I could feel my whole body

22:16stiffen up and and it was just causing a lot of havoc in my life to hold on to

22:21those things. And I remember talking to my supervisor one day and kind of

22:28expressing some of my frustrations over this and he brought up the same principle that we're talking about here,

22:34which is that I don't really know what's going on in her life. What she's doing

22:40is not okay. what I was doing to protect myself was fine in doing what I did to

22:45go have the other meetings and things, but at the end of the day, it was on me to let go. Regardless of whether or not

22:52she was going to continue to act the way that she was going to continue, I had to let go to give myself some freedom. And

22:59one of the ways that I could do that was to recognize that I have multiple things in my life that I still hold on to that

23:06I wish I could obtain forgiveness for. Uh, I'll tell you another story. I

23:12remember, this is a little bit of a personal story for me, but I remember as a child, we

23:20lived in a in a really cool place where there were

23:25like 20 or 30 kids that kind of lived on the street or the streets next to us. And the congregating space was over

23:31across the street from my house where there was a church building. And we grew up next to a church building that had a big field that we could play in and play

23:37games in a big parking lot that we could ride our rollerblades and play street hockey and things on. And so the kids would all congregate over there. And I

23:44remember at one point a new boy moved into our neighborhood. And he was different than all of the other kids. He didn't quite fit in. He's a new kid. And

23:51um he kind of became the subject of teasing and getting picked on a little bit here and there. And I remember one

23:58particular day I was frustrated over some things that had gone on at school and in my own house. And I went out to

24:04go play and this kid was over there and really through no fault of his own. And

24:10really through all of my immaturity, I picked a fight with him and

24:16and basically ran him off and

24:23and I never saw him again. He never came back to play at the church building.

24:30He actually never came back to school. I still to this day don't know what happened to him. And in my own process

24:38of attempting to find peace and healing, I've tried to find him online. I've tried to find him on social media. And I

24:46have not been able to this day to find him. And I so desperately hope that at

24:53some point I get a chance to meet him face to face and express my apologies to him. But to this day, I haven't really

25:00been able to have a chance to be forgiven, at least from him. The only place that I can be forgiven from is from a higher power. Now, the only way

25:07that I can try to make rectification here is to try to be a better man each

25:12day. to try to look for ways to stand up for the underdog, which I do. But at the

25:17end of the day, I'm in desperate need of forgiveness. And if I need that forgiveness so much

25:24for being an ignorant, stupid kid who did something mean,

25:31how can I think that I'd be allowed to hold on to my own bitterness towards

25:37this teacher that I had? The truth is is that the only real answer here is to let go.

25:44And if we can remember that we can move ourselves more systematically towards that place of peace and letting go. Uh I

25:51know that this is really difficult. Uh something that can can also be helpful

25:57here with one other kind of idea and tool is that our ability to forgive can

26:03hinge upon a couple of other things. One is that we can find compassion

26:10and if not compassion at least understanding for the person who's hurt us without

26:18being okay with their behavior. It's possible for me to see that this

26:23teacher who wounded me has probably got wounds of her own in some ways. That she

26:28in her own good mind, in her own good faith, is probably doing the best she could. And somehow I got in the way of

26:34her best some sometimes. And if I can understand that, I can at least let my heart let go of needing to

26:41have justice because there's also room for mercy. I

26:47can still be okay with saying what happened to me was not okay, but there's a need for mercy and I need to be able

26:53to learn to be able to let those things go in order for mercy to have a part.

26:58And if I can understand that, when I find compassion for the person who's wounded me, I have a much harder time

27:05staying bitter and angry. The second piece here that helps with forgiveness

27:10is is that I systematically grow myself into healing. As I pick myself back up,

27:16as I get my feet planted, as I take whatever wounds came as a result of the hurt that came and I address those

27:22wounds and I become more fully able to step into who I actually am, I can set

27:30boundaries in my relationships with confidence in knowing who I am.

27:37So I can actually love somebody and because I love them and because I love

27:42myself, I can hold boundaries in my relationships. There's the best boundaries are actually

27:50set and formed with love. So if I'm getting continually lied to and deceived in my

27:55relationships, I'm probably going to eventually set some boundaries in that relationship if I keep the relationship.

28:03And at that point, I can love the person at the level that the the relationship

28:08can tolerate while at the same time holding the boundaries that I need to to protect myself from continually being

28:14used. If I have someone who's coming into my house to steal something and I

28:19maybe it's a family member, I want to love them. I know that if I let them into my house and they're going to steal

28:25something, I'm going to resent them. So, I set the boundary by saying, "I'll go out to lunch with you somewhere. we

28:32could have a conversation with each other and I can love you at that level. Um, but you're not coming into my house

28:38to take my property. Right? In essence, that's what boundaries do is they allow us to love somebody by keeping the

28:44relationship in the space that the relationship needs to be in order to keep our values intact. So hopefully

28:51this is helpful for you guys, something to think about. Think about your own relationships. Maybe both directions

28:59today is the challenge. Is there somebody that I'm holding a resentment towards that I could possibly begin the

29:05process of letting go and emulating Christ and understanding that there can both be justice and mercy, but that I'm

29:11not the one who distributes justice? And is there something that I need in my life to be forgiven of? If you're

29:19listening right now, if that something comes to mind, is there somebody that you need to approach to ask forgiveness?

29:26My challenge to you would be that you don't let it wait. Seek that person out

29:32before it's too late. Express your sorrow. Commit to being a

29:38better person. Do what you can to repair the relationship, understanding that you probably can't totally fix it. And I'm

29:44convinced that in doing so, you'll feel a burden come off your shoulders. You'll feel lighter. You'll have a deeper

29:51understanding of who you are. And you'll have a deeper level of confidence. So,

29:56hopefully this is helpful you guys. Uh, if you like this episode, please share it, like, subscribe, and you guys have

30:03an awesome week. [Applause]

30:12[Music]

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