If You Forgave Me, Why Are You Upset?
The words “I Forgive You” are always a lie, in relationships. Things can’t go back to how they were before. Emotional states are pre-rational.
A dog that’s been hit with brooms will react with fear around any wielded broom, and you can’t explain to the dog that when you hold it, it just means the floor needs sweeping. Our bodies are the animals we have to care for our entire lives, and they are just as pre-rational as every other animal.
If you’ve adopted an abused animal, you’ve found that eventually they will learn to stop fearing the brooms. Every time you use the broom you let the dog run away and hide, and you calmly sweep the floor and put the broom away. After a while the dog will start checking up on you while you’re sweeping. Then it’ll start coming closer. It will run when you turn or walk towards it. Less over time. Eventually the fear goes away entirely. The broom is a cleaning instrument now.
Our bodies learn the same way. They will adjust to not being hurt.
A plea for forgiveness is a request that one put their emotion-animal close to the broom, to speed up the process. “Yes, I know the broom is scary, and hurt you before. There’s a lot to get done in life. Work that needs doing. The kids are growing up. Come closer to the broom than feels safe. Ignore your animal reaction, and open yourself be being beat. I promise you won’t be. The healing will happen faster this way, if you skip every other step.”
The words “I Forgive You” are a lie, because words aren’t magic and cannot make the healing happen. But, properly given, they can be a promise. They are a promise that one will get closer to the broom than is safe. One will be afraid, and one will be less guarded and less defended than one can stomach, but one will do this anyway. Time is burning.
Being “forgiven” is not a reversion to the past. The Other is still afraid, they will not treat you like they did before. Their animal is still cowering. Being “forgiven” is being given an opportunity to provide up-weighted data.
When one is Forgiven For Real — when the body of the Other no longer instinctively winces in expectation of pain — the words are superfluous. No one needs the words to see the reality.