Forgiveness and Making Amends 101

I found the following passage in Richard Carlson's "Don't Sweat the Small Stuff . . . and its all small stuff," a pithy little book of practical spiritual wisdom. Dealing with reaching out and making amends for so-called "normal people," the topic is doubly applicable to the alcoholic addict for whom addressing resentments effectively and making amends are spiritual imperatives upon which the whole of recovery hinges.

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Be the First One to Act Loving or Reach Out

So many of us hold on to little resentments that may have stemmed from an argument, a misunderstanding, the way we were raised, or some other painful event. Stubbornly, we wait for someone else to reach out to us - believing this is the only way we can forgive or rekindle a friendship or family relationship.

An acquaintance of mine, whose health isn't very good, recently told me that she hasn't spoken to her son in almost three years. "Why not?" I asked. She said that she and her son had had a disagreement about his wife and that she wouldn't speak to him unless he called first. When I suggested she be the first one to reach out, she resisted initially and said, "I can't do that. He's the one who should apologize." She was literally willing to die before reaching out to her only son. After a little gentle encouragement, however, she did decide to be the first one to reach out. To her amazement, her son was grateful for her willingness to call and offered an apology of his own. As is usually the case when someone takes the chance and reaches out, everyone wins.

Whenever we hold on to our anger, we turn "small stuff" into really "big stuff" in our minds. We start to believe that our positions are more important than our happiness. They are not. If you want to be a more peaceful person you must understnad that being right is almost never more important than allowing yourself to be happy. The way to be happy is to let go, and reach out. Let other people be right. This doesn't mean that you're wrong. Everything will be fine. You'll experience the peace of letting go, as well as the joy of letting others be right. You'll also notice that, as you reach out and let others be "right," they will become less defensive and more loving toward you. They might even reach back. But, if for some reason they don't, that's okay too. You'll have the inner satisfaction of knowing that you have done your part to create a more loving world, and certainly you'll be more peaceful yourself.

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The passage above illustrates some truisms: (a) that most of us have a compelling, yet unexamined, need to be right, (b) that some people would rather die than reach out and make amends, (c) that reaching out to make amends most usually heals distorted relationships, and (d) that, even if it doesn't, making amends wherever possible will nevertheless give peace of mind to the person who reaches out and makes the effort.

"The alcoholic is like a tornado roaring his way through the lives of others," we read in the 'Big Book' of Alcoholics Anonymous. "Hearts are broken. Sweet relationships are dead. Affections have been uprooted. Selfish and inconsiderate habits have kept the home in turmoil. We feel a man is unthinking when he says that sobriety is enough."

Forgiving others for harm done, and then reaching out lovingly to make amends for where we have been at fault are first but necessary steps in cleaning up after such "tornado damage." A lifetime of work may remain to fully rebuild some shattered relationships, but "clearing away the wreckage of our past" is a necessity if we are ever to begin reconstruction.

On Resentment and Forgiveness

Resentments, we are reminded over and over, are the number one "killers" of alcoholic addicts. But just what are resentments? The word, itself, comes from the Latin sentiere meaning "to feel." So, quite literally, resentment (which in medieval English was  resentiment) means "to feel again." We think about past events over which we are still upset, rub our supposed 'wounds' raw, and then act on the basis of the resulting feelings.

Thus, the process seems to be "re-think --> re-feel --> re-act." And the usual reaction? Far too often, the reaction of the alcoholic addict is to drink or use again, proving yet again the truth of the Chinese proverb: "Anger is a toxic poison, that corrodes the vessel that contains it from the inside out." "The problem of the alcoholic," remember,"centers in the mind."

So how do we do deal with resentments? Listing the resentments by name, writing down the cause of the resentment, and how it affects us, is a start. We then look rigorously and honestly about what part, if any, we played in the circumstances that set the whole train of wronged emotions in play. In most cases we find that we have played a part, and where we have wronged that individual we forgive and make amends where where that is possible. But what about the deeply held resentments where,quite honestly, we played no part?

The resulting thoughts and simmering anger surrounding circumstances in which we were victimized are just as dangerous and perhaps more so than the instances where we played an active role. Requiring a one-sided true forgiveness, these instances may offer us the greatest opportunites for spiritual growth that there are. Mark Twain remarked, "Forgiveness is the scent the violet leaves on the heel of the boot that crushed it." But just how do we get there? Perhaps the key is in recognizing that the other person, though his or her wrong actions may vary in kind from ours, is nonetheless just like us - human, fallible and thus prone to all the same soul sickness that we are.

The Roman Emperor and stoic philosopher, Marcus Aurelius advised in his Meditations

"Begin each day by telling yourself: Today I shall be meeting with interference, ingratitude, insolence, disloyalty, ill-will and selfishness - all of them due to the offender's ignorance of what is good and evil. But for my part I have long perceived the nature of Good and its nobility, the nature of evil and its meanness, and also the nature of the culprit himself who is my brother (not in the physical sense, but as a fellow-creature similarly endowed with Reason and a share of the Divine); therefore none of these things can injure me, for nobody can implicate me in what is degrading. Neither can I be angry with my brother or fall foul of him, for he and I were born to work together, like a man's two hands, feet or eyelids, or like the upper and lower rows of his teeth. To obstruct each other is against Nature's law - and what is irritation or aversion but a form of obstruction?"

More simply put, in the Lord's Prayer we are advised to ask God to "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. The operative word being "as" in this instance. Thus, so long as our thinking returns to the one-sided wrongs that have been done to us, we can dedicate those thoughts to our Higher Power, recognize our own continuing defects of character, and ask to be relieved of the anger that still resides within us. When true forgiveness comes - as it will if it is sought - we will seldom if ever think of those past injustices, usually only in those instances when sharing such wrongs will help someone struggling with wrongs of a similar nature.

Resentment: Digging One's Own Grave One 'Old Idea' at a Time

Resentment  (or 're-sentiment') is to experience all over again the feelings of anger  - towards someone, something, or some situation  - that we once felt in the past each time that we think such "old ideas" anew.  It is, we read in the 'Big Book' of Alcoholics Anonymous, the "number one" offender, and that "(i)t destroys more alcoholics than anything else," and that "(f)rom it stem all forms of spiritual disease."

"It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. To the precise extent that we permit these, do we squander the hours that might have been worth while. But with the alcoholic, whose hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience, this business of resentment is infinitely grave. We found that it is fatal. for when harboring such feelings we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the Spirit. The insanity of alcohol returns and we drink again. And with us, to drink is to die.

If we were to live, we had to be free of anger. The grouch and the brainstorm were not for us. They may be the dubious luxury of normal men, but for alcoholics, these things are poison."

[Alcoholics Anonymous, page 66.]

At the beginning of the "How It Works" chapter of the 'Big Book,' we read that "many of us tried to hold onto our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely." We cannot afford, it seems, to entertain (or hold onto) the old ideas about people, things or circumstances that still anger us. That may well be the "dubious luxury" of so-called normal people, but nothing will change for the alcoholic addict in recovery unless he or she at least tries to get rid of such old ideas. That is what Steps 4 through Step 9 are specifically designed to do.

It has been said that anger is a corrosive acid that eats away the container that holds it from the inside out. In Steps Four through Step Nine, we list discuss, forgive and make restitution in order to get rid of, or at least neutralize, those corrosive old ideas that continue to crop up as a large part of the painful inner dialogue that is our ordinary 'self' consciousness or 'ego'.

In describing the type of vital spiritual experience that can enable alcoholics to attain and maintain sobriety, Carl Jung noted that "ideas, emotions and attitudes" that are the "guiding forces" of the alcoholic addict are "cast aside." The thoughts of past, future or imagined wrongs that a person, place or circumstance brings to mind are old 'ideas'. The resentments (or 're-sentiments')  are old 'emotions'. And, our vengeful and obsessive thought patterns that are shot through with righteous (or supposedly righteous) indignation are old ''attitudes. We must be free of all these if we are to lead a spiritually awakened life.

"If a man goes out seeking revenge," the Daoists said, "he had better dig two graves." For us, to mentally turn the thoughts of what and who has offended us over and over again in the mind is to seek revenge, if only mentally. If we continue to do so instead of forgiving and making whatever restitution might be necessary to get rid of such old ideas emotions and attitudes, we are obsessively digging and perfecting that second grave.

Thus, revenge, even the imagined mental revenge that we mental 'blowhards' are prone to obsess over, is therefore not a dish best served cold, but a dish not served (or even prepared) at all. Resentments can and have killed many an alcoholic addict.