“I Don’t Know How to Let It Go”: Forgiveness Skills
Bruce came for a therapy session to talk about his fourteen-year-old son, Ian. As soon as the door of my office was closed, he said in an angry tone of voice, “I hate all this, I can’t believe how ungrateful he is after all I’ve done for him. I have put my life aside for him; it makes me sick to my stomach to realize that I have actually raised a person like this.” He went on, “When I saw his suicidal note on Facebook, I was so angry that I couldn’t stop thinking about it. What’s wrong with him? He posted on Facebook that he was going to kill himself on his birthday, and guess what, I received all types of e-mails and phone calls from his friends, their parents, and my friends. I don’t know if I’ll ever forgive him for putting us through all this awkwardness. It’s unbearable at times, and even his younger siblings are affected by all this: they know they cannot leave him alone.”
Parent and teen relationships are complex, and they inevitably bring moments of frustration, struggle, and disconnection. Holding on to anger, guilt, or resentment will often lead you and your teen to more anger, sadness, and hours of rumination in which both of you are replaying the angry memory in an endless loop, either within your minds or with someone else. Do you want to get out of that vicious cycle of conflict with your teen and its related cousin, anger? If you do, then this chapter is for you. Having an adolescent struggling with emotion dysregulation problems is an invitation for you not only to learn a specialized set of parenting skills but also to truly love and forgive, as any relationship we care for invites us to do.
What Are Forgiveness Skills?
In ACT, learning forgiveness skills in some ways is learning to live by your values; even though you may have not chosen forgiveness as your individual value, there are parenting values that are universal for any parent, and forgiveness is one of them. Can you imagine that being the parent you want to be, you would hold on to resentment or anger toward your teen? Quite likely not.
What is forgiveness? It’s a personal decision you make for yourself to pause from holding anger and grudges, and it’s a behavior you can show toward yourself or your teen.
There are two important points that need to be highlighted: first, forgiving is a personal choice that no one can make for you; you make it for yourself and not for someone else. Second, forgiveness, as a behavior, is a skill that you can learn, and like any other skill, it will require practice.
Sometimes parents are fused with misconceptions about forgiveness. So, let’s clarify that
- Forgiving is not about dismissing the fact that your teen has hurt you by saying or doing upsetting things, such as making threats or screaming at you.
- Forgiving is not about forcing yourself to reconnect with your teen after the door was slammed in your face.
- Forgiving is not telling yourself it’s okay that you called your teen names because you were angry with him.
Forgiveness, in a nutshell, is letting go of the past for your own well-being and as a personal choice. You have done your very best up to this point, but if you’re like many parents who find themselves with innumerable challenges raising a teen struggling with emotional reactivity, it’s quite likely that those ongoing cycles of conflict between the two of you have led you to hold on to resentment toward either yourself or your teen. Chapter 14 on conflict management and chapter 15 on anger showed you how you can make a shift in those rocky moments; the next pages will show you how to continue making that 180-degree turn away from reactive parenting toward values-based parenting.
Are You Ready to Forgive?
Are you willing to learn forgiveness skills? Pause, look within, and check your response. It’s okay if you are not ready to forgive either yourself or your teen. This book is about helping you to be the parent you want to be, but no one can force that process on you. If you’re not ready, go to the section entitled “If You’re Not Ready to Forgive…” at the end of this chapter.
Exercise: Painful Memories Inventory
Pick up your parenting journal and take a couple of minutes to make an inventory of those memories of moments in which your teen has said or done something that still hurts or makes you angry despite your best efforts to let those memories go. Don’t worry if what comes to mind is something that happened months or even years ago; the most important thing for this exercise is to write down all the memories you haven’t been able to put behind you. Next to each memory in your inventory, write down all the emotions that come along with it.
For instance, when Bruce wrote his inventory about his painful memories of his son Ian, his inventory looked like this:
| Painful memories about my teen that I cannot let go |
Emotions |
|
Receiving a call from the school because Ian was found smoking marijuana in the bathroom
|
Shame, anger, frustration, sadness
|
|
Finding Ian’s cutting kit in his bathroom
|
Fear, sadness
|
|
Discovering a suicidal note in Ian’s backpack along with a bottle of pills
|
Fear, exhaustion, anger, sadness
|
|
Reading Ian’s post on Facebook about how awful his parent treats him and his denying that he receives any respectful treatment by me
|
Disappointment, embarrassment, sadness, confusion
|
After you have completed your inventory of hurtful or angry memories that are difficult to let go, it’s time to switch directions. For this second part, write down a list of those memories you regret about things you have said or done to your teen and the emotions that come with it. Make this list even though you may have had the thought at the time that I’m the parent, and I am entitled to discipline my teen. This second part of the exercise may be difficult because it’s hard to acknowledge that, despite your efforts, you may have made parental mistakes, sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally.
When Bruce completed the second part of this exercise, his responses looked like this:
| Painful memories about things I regret |
Emotions |
|
Dropping Ian at school and ignoring his request when he said, “Please don’t drop me off at that corner. Some of the kids that tease me are standing there.” In that moment, I simply told him, “Man up.”
|
Shame, sadness
|
|
Screaming at Ian, “I can’t take it anymore; I never knew that having a teen was going to be so difficult. If you think you don’t need us, the door is open. You can march out and go any place you want.”
|
Irritability, sadness
|
|
Telling Ian, “I don’t care if your music equipment doesn’t work. I only care that at least after 8:00 p.m. no one makes noise in the house, so we can rest.”
|
Frustration, sadness
|
What were your reactions after completing this exercise? Were your reactions in the first and second parts similar or different? Feel free to jot down any reactions you may have had in your parenting journal.
Now, moving forward after identifying these painful memories, the next step is forgiveness in action.
Exercise: Forgiveness in Action
To start incorporating forgiveness in your parenting behaviors, do your best to complete this visualization exercise. First, read the instructions aloud and slowly, recording them in your cell phone or other device, and then play them back to yourself.
- Choose a painful memory to focus on, either about forgiving yourself or forgiving your teen. It’s better to pick a memory that is only mildly charged, since you’re just beginning to practice forgiving skills.
- After selecting the memory you wish to work on, ground yourself: press your feet really hard against the floor like the trunk of tree.
- Take slow and deep breaths. Do your best to fill your belly with air, and then completely release the air through your nostrils.
- Bring into your mind the memory you are working on as clearly as possible. See if you can visualize all the details of that painful memory, such as the colors, the sounds, the location, and the time of the day. Try to even hear the words that were said during that particular painful scene.
- While holding this painful memory in mind, shift the focus of your attention to your body and see if you can notice any sensation or physical reaction you may be having at this moment.
- Slowly and with intention see if you can name the feeling that is coming along with this painful memory. Can you make room for it? Can you notice the uniqueness of this emotion? Describe this feeling to yourself for what it is, a feeling, notice how it feels in your body, whether it’s moving or not. If there are any judgments about this exercise, such as good or bad, kindly name them as judgments. If anger or resentment shows up, see if you can notice how anger or resentment feels in your body. What type of sensation shows up with anger or resentment? What’s the quality of these sensations? Notice if there is any wish to push the anger, resentment, or any other emotion away.
- Is your pain coming from the event itself or from holding on to the memory of the event? Is it possible that the memory of the event is the trigger to your pain? See if you can notice the pain that comes from holding on to this memory, dwelling on it, and replaying it over and over. The harder you hold on to it, the more waves of pain you go through.
- See if you can become an emotion detective and explore other feelings or sensations that are showing up in this exercise as they come and go. Are you willing to notice how your emotions shift while you continue to work on this painful memory? Is the same emotion present? Is it a different one? Is the emotion as intense as the first one you recalled, or does it have a different intensity now? Can you simply notice the shift from one emotion into another from the beginning of the exercise to this point? Can you notice the shift in physical sensations from the beginning of the exercise to now?
- See if you can offer yourself forgiveness by saying a forgiving phrase for what you have done, intentionally or unintentionally, wittingly or unwittingly.
- Slowly bring your attention back to your breathing and stay with it for a while. Let your emotions settle into the spaciousness of your breath and awareness.
After finishing this exercise, jot down in your parenting journal any reflections you have; take your time to reflect on the experience. Finally, see if you can answer the following questions:
What’s the payoff for forgiving my teen or myself in this moment? And is there something for me to learn from letting go of my resentment toward my teen or myself?
See if you can repeat this exercise at you own pace with each one of the memories you wrote down in the painful memories inventory. Forgiveness requires patience because it’s an invitation to face the raw pain you have been carrying around. Are you ready to let go of your anger, resentment, and grudges toward your teen or yourself?
If You’re Not Ready to Forgive…
No one said that forgiveness is an easy decision; in fact, it’s one of the most difficult ones in any relationship. If you’re not ready or you don’t want to forgive for any reason, it’s understandable. No one can force you to forgive—it’s a personal choice—and certainly this book is not about that. The following questions and recommendations will help you to work through your ambivalence or stuckness with anger and resentment.
- Is your mind ruminating or dwelling on the past? Is your mind bringing up to you all types of images and thoughts about those past painful memories? If your answer is yes, please go back and read chapter 15 on anger; you will benefit from completing those exercises again.
- Are you experiencing a strong emotional reaction when bringing to mind those painful memories? Is it to the point that those feelings take over the moment? If that’s the case, reread chapter 7 and go over the exercise called “Your Feelings” to practice how to handle an intense emotion.
- After completing the exercises in this chapter, did you experience a strong sensation or sensations in your body to the point that your reactivity meter got elevated really quickly? If so, return to chapter 15 and revisit the exercise “Preparing to Catch Anger Before It Catches You.” Physiology could easily betray you when your body reaches a place of high activation and you become a prisoner of your hormones and neurochemical reactions.
If you do not feel trapped by past thoughts or images or are not going through a chain of emotions or physical sensations, and you’re still struggling with forgiveness, then answer the following questions in your parenting journal:
- What’s the payoff of holding on to anger and resentment toward your teen or yourself?
- What is holding on to that upsetting memory really doing for you?
- What would happen if you were able to forgive your teen or yourself in this precise moment?
- Does being resentful and angry change what happened in the past?
- What happens to the relationship with your teen if you continue to hold on to this resentment?
Answering the above questions will give you an insight into whatever is blocking you from forgiving. Forgiveness is a personal choice you make for yourself and no one else, when you’re willing and ready to do so.
Summary and Looking Ahead
Holding on to resentment, anger, or shame is one of the most natural reactions when you have been hurt or when you have hurt another person. But, what’s the payoff of holding on to those emotions? More anger, resentment, hours of dwelling, replaying over and over a past event in your mind, and at the end, more struggle. People will disappoint you, and you will disappoint them as well; that’s the nature of all relationships. All relationships come with the sweet and the sour together, both sides of the coin. Parenting a teen suffering with high emotionality is learning to love and forgive him and yourself. Practicing forgiving your teen and yourself paves the way for both of you to begin to respond to painful experiences as a personal choice instead of allowing the pain to choose those responses for you or your teen. No one can make this decision for you or force you to forgive. In the end, this is another personal choice you make for yourself and not for someone else.
Here are suggestions for you to continue to practice forgiving behaviors: write a forgiving letter for yourself. Write a forgiving letter for your teen.
If, in this moment, your mind comes up with other thoughts, such as I made mistakes, but that’s nothing compared to what my teen has done to me and the family or Parenting is about disciplining, and I shouldn’t be questioned by him, then I invite you to name those thoughts for what they are (comparison thoughts, angry thoughts, to name a few) and check what their purpose is in this precise moment. What are those thoughts pushing you to do right now? Will acting on those thoughts take you toward or away from the parent you want to be? After answering those questions in your parenting journal, make a choice.