Learning to forgive is an art.
When you learn to truly forgive someone who has hurt you, you are not doing the other person a favor. Rather, you are setting yourself free from the past.
But how can you forgive the unforgivable?
In this episode, you will learn why forgiving is crucial to your emotional and physical health and why it’s an act of self-love. Forgiving does not mean that you are okay with what has happened. Rather, it means letting go of resentment, pain and anger order to set yourself free.
Katharina will not only share the ten steps to true forgiveness with you but also help you see your past in a completely different light.
Through a powerful guided healing exercise, you will be able to feel compassion not only for yourself but also for the person who has hurt you. Regardless of your unique circumstances. This experience will open your heart and will help you to let go and forgive.
10 Steps to Truly Forgive Someone Who has hurt You
- 1Don’t force yourself to forgive. (min. 6:03)
Just because it sounds good to say “I have forgiven” doesn't mean you need to force yourself to forgive. In fact, it is impossible. If you still feel strong negative emotions towards the person who has hurt you, you first need to work on releasing these feelings. For now, just realize that this is where you are at and work on the steps below until you are truly ready to forgive. - 2Release anger, pain and hurt. (min 7:18)
Strong emotions like anger, pain and hurt keep you chained to the past and make it impossible for you to move on. Work on releasing these emotions with the help of energy medicine. Contrary to conventional talk therapy, you don’t need to revisit the past and talk about it. Rather, you are releasing the lingering energetic and emotional charge of the past event, which can be done very quickly. I suggest you learn tapping. I can also help you and work with you one-on-one in a Rapid Emotional Clearing session. - 3Come to terms with the facts with what has happened and realize that you might never experience “justice”. (min 10:20)
Wishing things to be different than they are is a surefire way to chain yourself energetically to the past. Of course, it is understandable for you to wish for things to be different. However, the sooner you accept the facts of the situation, the quicker you will be able to move on. This also means realizing that you might never experience “justice” as you see fit. Know that It doesn’t need “justice” for you to free yourself from the past. - 4Realize that each person can only act upon their level of consciousness at any given time. (min 11:40)
In my opinion, this is one of the most important steps. When you truly realize that each person (including yourself) can only act upon their level of consciousness at any given time, it becomes easier to forgive. Most likely, the person who has hurt you acted out of fear. Fear is the absence of love and when it is present, people resort to emotional and physical violence as these actions mirror the consciousness of fear. Usually, people who experience deep fear have a history of emotional trauma. Of course, this is not an excuse but rather, it serves as an explanation and might foster deeper understanding and healing.
Like everyone else, I am sure you have said or done things in the past that you now would do differently. Maybe in the heat of an argument, you said hurtful things that you now wished you could take back. At the moment when you regret your actions, you have changed your consciousness. You have moved from fear to understanding. You are now understanding how your actions impacted another person. In that sense, you have changed your consciousness and now your actions resemble and mirror your higher state of being. This of course also applies to other people, including the person who has hurt you. - 5Find compassion for yourself and for the person who has hurt you. (min 16.18)
The definition of compassion is the ability to understand the emotional state of another person or oneself. As an added element (and often confused with empathy), compassion also includes the desire to help alleviate or reduce the suffering of another. Once you have understood that each person can only act upon their level of consciousness at any given moment (see step 4), it is easier to find compassion for yourself and maybe even for the other person. In an energetic sense, compassion is felt as an opening and softening of the heart. In such a state, resentment, pain, and hurt can no longer be present and forgiving comes more naturally. - 6Think about how the experience has helped you grow. (min 17:47)
When you have more energetic and emotional distance from the experience (and possibly also to the other person involved) you can start to view your experience from a higher consciousness and perspective. If you think about it in terms of growth and experience (vs. something that was only bad), you can ask yourself how this experience has helped you grow. What are the lessons you have learned? What would you do differently next time? These are very important questions that will not only help you avoid a similar situation next time but also help you grow spiritually. - 7Release Victimhood (min 19:10)
When you experience emotional or physical violence, it is natural to feel like a victim. However, as time passes and you have worked through the steps above (possibly also with the help of a licensed psychologist) it is important to release the notion of yourself as being a victim. When you see yourself as a victim, you will feel small, experience anxiety and it will not be easy for you to trust again. However, when you can see the experience in terms of growth, realizing what you have learned and how the experience has helped you become the person you are today, you can emerge from the story of the past as the hero that you are. - 8Don’t expect an apology! (min 21:52)
Just because you are working on forgiving the person who has hurt you, doesn’t mean you will get an apology of any kind. Realize that you don’t need an apology in order to start feeling better. If you do, you give your power away and the other person might never try to make up for things he/she has done. Don’t chain yourself again to the other person and wait for an apology. Forgive and set yourself free! - 9Do an energy healing on yourself and the person who has hurt you! (min. 24:19)
Do this only when you have worked through the steps above! This is a very powerful method to release yourself and the other person from the chains of the past.
Center yourself inside your heart.
Find the place inside where you can feel compassion for yourself. Once you feel it, picture the person who has hurt you as a young child. Most likely, he/she was hurt at a young age and didn’t get the love or attention he/she needed. This wound is the cause for him/her acting out on you. Wait until you can feel a softening of your own heart
Send the child love.
Now send the healing energy of love from your heart to the heart of the little child. Do so until you feel complete. - 10Let the past be the past (min. 35:17)
Make a commitment to yourself to let the past rest for good now, so that you can finally forgive and move on!
Highlights of this Episode
A Wonderful Healing Exercise to Find Compassion for Yourself and the Person Who Has Harmed You.
Let Katharina guide you through a healing exercise that will help you to forgive and let go. Regardless of what has happened and how much you were hurt. Find peace, compassion, and healing. (min. 24:19))
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Links mentioned in this episode:
Tapping to help release negative thoughts and emotions.
What do you think?
Leave your comment or question below and I will get back to you.
Much love,
Number 6 is my favourite. Any experience good or bad has its negatives and postives. We need to focus on the positives and see how the experience is or will be helping us in the future. It will also help us create a habbit of seeing the better side in other life aspects too if we learn to forgive the person that has hurt us in the past. Then of course, the hardest but maybe the most relieving is to feel grateful for that person because she or he gave the oppurtunity to grow and learn something new.
Katharina, thank you so much for this practice. I needed to forgive myself as much as the other person, relieving guilt, and trying to understand why he acted the way he did. The “child” exercise really helped with that. I had to resist feeling even more guilty thinking of him as a child who only wanted love, but I tried to release that guilt too. This helped a lot! Thanks again!
Wonderful to hear Rebecca!
Dear Dr. Katharina,
I thought this podcast was simply brilliant and packed full of energy healing. I think the techniques that spoke the most to me were accepting that I am not going to get an apology from this person and being okay with that. Understanding that the injustices that were done were perpetrated by someone with a childhood level of trauma consciousness themselves and they are probably oblivious to the injury they caused simply because they do not have the insight. Then your compassion for yourself for what has occurred and compassion for the other in child form. That piece was so powerful because I could really visualize this person as a 6-7 year old and of course it was much easier to find compassion for the child than for the “adult” that hurt me. And the last piece, which I am hoping now that I was able to do the other steps won’t be such.a challenge is leaving it in the past where it occurred. To add onto that, since I cut off ties with that person several months ago, that whole relationship and those 2 people who were in that relationship does not exist any more. Releasing the need for the apology knowing that it will not come truly is so empowering. Thank you so much for this healing. I have been trying to forgive even before I cut off ties, and I kept making progress until it kept appearing and reappearing and I kept wondering why is this still a thing, I want to be done with it. I think with your steps I will be able to get there. 🥰
Thank you so much Sippora for your thoughtful comment!
I am very happy to hear you found the podcast episode to be helpful.
Thanks for sharing so much practical wisdom and insight. These are tough times and it’s uplifting and empowering to connect with such positive energy.
Hi Catherine,
Thank you for your kind words and I am happy to hear you are finding the article valuable!