The 4 Types of False Forgiveness (How To End Denial and Repression)

Hey guys, David here, and there's nothing that's less well understood or misperceived than the word forgiveness to forgive something or someone in your life, and I'm going to talk in this video about four types of forgiveness That are not really forgiveness at all. They are nice sounding in theory But when it gets down to it, it actually doesn't move anything. You know, real forgiveness in healing work is to look at a situation maybe from your past or a person from your past and to hold literally no ill will, to emotionally have moved on from that. So one of the ways you know that you haven't really forgiven something is that you're still Disturbed by it on an emotional level. There's still something there, a little twinge of upset when you think about that thing Now the problem with this whole thing of fake forgiveness is that we don't like to think of ourselves as People who are not forgiving, people who hold on to grievances. It's kind of like a persona We have to be forgiving, forgiving people, which is why I'd way prefer People to just say actually no, I haven't forgiven that person I'm very angry about that still. Being in that, allowing ourselves to go through that phase of anger and not being in denial about that Or it will come back to you, and repression is another one as well Which is usually hugely important in this whole process of real forgiveness So real forgiveness is when you actually let go So what are the four fake types? Well, there's the first one here is forgive the sinners Now all of these are you could call them egoic forms of forgiveness and The goal as with anything When the ego is involved is to maintain Separation. Me and you. I'm a separate self and you're over there. You're those people So to forgive the sinners is when you look on people and you say to yourself They did something horrendous and very very bad, but I am going to Be the bigger person Okay, and I'm going to forgive them. Now really what it's doing is it's creating You know, I have this sense of righteousness and they are not righteous, but I'm going to be more evolved than them So this is not true forgiveness by any stretch of the imagination. Now, it's very very common We talk about forgiving the evildoers or the people who have done us wrong But that's not really what forgiveness is because if that's the case you're going to still be holding on to that resentment and that anger The second one is me too, so that's when We allow ourselves to sound gracious The ego likes to think of itself as being gracious. Me too is when You look at someone else who has done something Not good and you say well, I'm no better than that person Now really, you know that makes you sound like you're very humble and everything But really you're just condemning yourself when you're doing that as well. Now, that's a very common one Okay, especially people who have been doing some inner work on themselves and they start to reverse some of their projections. Now they do They say well I do those things and then but they leave it at that. The whole point of reversing a projection is To forgive yourself, to own it in yourself and realize okay I think I'm guilty of that as well and just let yourself go, let yourself off the hook Start to drop a lot of that guilt story. That's that we have inside of us So it's not it's no good, you know Throwing yourself under the bus either That's not really what true forgiveness is Now the third one is by far and away the most common one and the worst. It's the worst of them all. It's to be the martyr Especially when people do work on themselves and they figure out Okay, I'm getting triggered by an awful lot of things in my life I need to figure out what's going on and they do some work on themselves And then all of a sudden what starts to happen is they stop getting triggered or they're able to shut down The process that happens when they get triggered And if they do that often enough they begin to realize I cannot react. I can stop myself from reacting So it's called the martyr because Somebody does something and you get upset but you hold it inside Okay, you sit in silence while another person has done something that has triggered you Now this is very very unhealthy Again, I'd much prefer if a person just came out and said what they felt in the moment It's far healthier and it's more honest than this approach of okay. This is my issue I'm just gonna sit here and pretend like everything's okay But not deal with the actual feeling it's actually repressing the feelings down so you sit there in silence and Nothing actually gets resolved Now this makes it again. It allows you to feel like you're evolved somehow. You're not reacting. You're great Okay, those other people are unhinged. They're unstable. But here I am. I'm very very stable and I don't react to things When in inside you're building up a lot of resentment and a lot of rage So being the martyr is definitely not an approach we need to take okay watch if you are holding on to Or if you're if you're telling yourself I can't I'm not reacting to things anymore. That is definite denial and repression We will react to things for a long long time. Okay, the problem is not that we react It's how we process the reactions. We have to be honest about the fact. Yeah, I don't like that. Okay, I annoys me Really upsets me that person let me down that person betrayed me rather than pretending like okay, this is my issue I need to I need to just be positive here. I can't I shouldn't be the one reacting who said you shouldn't react Now I'm not saying to act from that anger or that resentment or that upset that comes along But to be honest with yourself about the fact that yep, I am still very angry about this Now the last one of course is very common as well, especially in relationships. This is forgiveness Depending on certain conditions. It's really another word for this is bargaining So, okay that person betrayed me that person cheated on me. I will forgive if X Y & Z happens. Okay, they need to earn my trust again now If there are conditions in place for it, it's not really something you could call forgiveness There's nothing necessarily wrong with this. Okay, but to call it forgiveness is not true because it isn't forgiveness It's basically just It's like an exchange. Okay to be honest and There may be a time in a place for that in relationships But to say that I've forgiven this person as long as they don't do this is not forgiveness at all Because it means you haven't really Let it go you haven't processed the upset within yourself now true forgiveness. I mean, it's a tough one to To define really what true forgiveness is But a way of helping is that to realize it's none of these things. These are so common My personal favorite is this one. This is the one I dislike the most because In a country like Ireland, for instance, everyone is just so nice and so friendly all the time that We were in complete denial about the fact that you know what that person really drives me up the wall Getting real about this, you know is the first step in actually true forgiveness So when you have that triggering or that upset it's to realize I am upset. I am totally upset about this It's not to deny it or bury it and then it's just to bring it back remove the other person externally And see I'm left with a feeling Okay, and this is something that isn't within myself It's usually something I'm judging myself for that aspect And to then just say okay, is this true or not invariably it isn't true But you have to go through that process of inquiry not just automatically dismiss it. Okay, there's work to be done It is a process of forgiveness so true forgiveness Requires reversing projections Not being in denial not bargaining or haggling or coming to some kind of an agreement Okay, not throwing yourself under the bus and also not labeling others separate from yourself It's worse than or better than okay, so it's none of those things So forgiveness, you know, it's obviously got a lot of biblical Associations, but really forgiveness is just something that you can do for yourself and You start to have less of a self-destructive Self-critical narrative if you want to put it that way and it's also a tendency the more you forgive yourself The less likely you will be as a mode of being or as a habit to really attack yourself and judge yourself so forgiveness is a hugely important part of life and Genuinely being able to move on from something that has been holding you back I mean sometimes people hold on their grievances for years and years decades of their lives Because they think they've done it properly, you know, but yet if they're really honest They're still having the emotional reactions So finding out what true forgiveness is and being brutally honest about how I feel not being in denial is the key to real forgiveness Guys I hope you enjoyed this video. If you'd like to talk with me, you can visit my website. Dr. Dave Maloney.com Please like the video and subscribe below if you enjoyed this content and it helps me reach other people So thanks so many for watching guys, and I'll talk with you again soon. Bye you