Forgiving Yourself When Someone Has Hurt You

In this meditation, you'll take a counter-intuitive approach to forgiveness. Instead of forgiving the other person for the hurt or pain they caused you, you're going to focus on forgiving yourself for holding on to the pain and the hurt that was inflicted upon you by them -- and you'll tap into your natural capacity for compassion to help you see things as they truly are.

Transcript

Welcome to this meditation,

Forgiving yourself when another has hurt you.

In the spiritual world,

Forgiveness is a really popular topic.

It's right up there with gratitude and self-love.

We're taught and we're told that it's really important to forgive others.

However,

The problem arises when forgiving others feels more like an obligation or something that we should do because it's the right thing.

Even though we know that forgiveness is a necessary step on the spiritual path,

There's something inside that resists,

That wants to stay clenched and not let go.

Maybe it's because we think that by forgiving,

We'd be giving the other person a free ticket out or letting them off the hook.

There's a part of us that wants them to take responsibility.

Or maybe it's because we think that by forgiving,

We're in some way being complicit with or condoning their behavior.

True forgiveness isn't about the other person though.

It's all about us.

When we don't forgive others and we hold on to anger or resentment towards them,

We give our energy or power away to them.

So in this meditation,

We're going to take a counter intuitive approach to forgiveness.

Instead of forgiving the other person for the hurt or pain they caused you,

You're going to focus on forgiving yourself for holding on to the pain and the hurt that was inflicted upon you by them.

And we're going to tap into your natural capacity for compassion to help you see things as they truly are.

So let's begin.

So just allowing yourself to get settled in your chair or if you're sitting in meditation position on the floor,

On a cushion.

And as you get settled,

Just notice all the different places where the surface underneath you meets the different parts of your body.

And just taking a breath.

And as you do,

Noticing where your breath goes as you breathe in and where it goes as you breathe out.

And as you bring your awareness to your breath in this way,

Just allowing yourself to notice how your breath can be like a bridge between your outer world and your inner world.

And allow yourself with each breath to begin to draw a little more closely into your inner world.

And into that place where everything that you've ever known or sensed or felt or imagined or dreamed or experienced is recorded.

And as you come into this place,

Just allowing all of your inner senses to begin to open.

Your senses of sight and sound,

Taste,

Touch and smell.

But especially allowing your sixth sense,

Your intuitive sense of just knowing to begin to open quite widely now.

As you bring to mind a time when someone did something to you.

Something that hurt you or caused you pain.

And just recalling the specifics of this incident.

And as you recall this incident,

Just noticing how this person hurt you and caused you pain.

Just allowing yourself to stay with this reflection for a few moments knowing that you're safe.

To feel into this incident,

To recall it and to experience it with all of your inner senses.

But especially opening up to your intuitive senses.

You may be experiencing any number of impressions right now.

And as you recall this incident in this way,

Consider the idea that whatever this person did to hurt you,

That underneath their action was an unmet need.

You may not know what that unmet need was,

But you can know that they had a need and that their need wasn't being met.

And so they acted in an unskillful way to get that need met.

And regardless of their action,

Their need in fact was legitimate.

So just reflecting on this and staying with it for a moment.

And allowing yourself to fully experience whatever feelings are arising in you right now.

Whether it's anger,

Hurt or betrayal.

Or maybe even some compassion with this awareness,

Whatever the feelings are.

Just letting those feelings arise without trying to avoid them or trying to do anything with them other than feel them.

So as you feel these feelings,

Notice where in your body you're holding these feelings.

Just scanning your face and neck,

Shoulders and arms,

Chest,

Hips,

Legs and feet.

And just becoming aware of where these physical sensations are being held in your body.

Where these feelings of hurt or anger,

Resentment,

Betrayal may have been hiding out.

And as you locate where you may have been holding or may be holding these feelings in your body,

Just notice if there's any word or image associated with the feeling.

If the feeling has a shape or a color in addition to the location in your body.

And just noticing without trying to do anything with the feeling and any possible images or colors or shapes or even temperature that might be arising.

Just letting it be.

And now knowing that it's safe to move a little closer to this feeling so that you can release it from your body.

Just using your breath now to breathe into this feeling and any images or colors or words that might be associated with it.

And allowing your breath to slowly and gradually begin to dissolve this feeling or these feelings in your body.

Perhaps sensing that the breath is bringing in a clear light to heal the feelings.

To heal the unprocessed,

Undigested feelings that are being held in your body at a cellular and molecular level.

Just allowing any contraction,

Tension or tightness that you might be holding in your body in this particular place that's associated with these feelings to begin to dissolve,

To melt away.

This is the hurt or the pain that this person has caused you,

That you've held in your body and it's taken up space,

Unnecessary space in your physical,

Mental and emotional bodies.

And you can continue to use your breath to dislodge the hurt,

To dislodge the pain and let it go.

And as you sense or feel the release of this hurt or this pain in whatever form that it takes in your body,

Just silently repeat to yourself,

I forgive myself for holding on to this pain and hurt longer than I needed to because it doesn't serve me.

So I'm letting it go now.

I forgive myself for giving my power away to this person by holding on to this pain.

I forgive myself for staying in a state of powerlessness for all this time when I didn't need to.

I forgive myself for using the hurt that I incurred to close down,

To use it as a protection mechanism to close others out of my life.

I forgive myself for staying the victim.

I give myself permission to let go of this pain now.

And just sense or feel or imagine that you can begin to draw in life force,

Energy,

Prana,

Power back into that area of your body that had been holding the pain and filling that part with your life force,

With your power,

With your prana,

Knowing that you're healing at a cellular and molecular level,

That you're healing physically,

Mentally,

Emotionally,

And spiritually.

And just allow yourself to let this healing take place for a few more moments.

And just allowing this practice of self-forgiveness to take root on every level of your being.

For being physically,

Mentally,

Emotionally,

And spiritually.

And for this practice of forgiveness to take root deep in your consciousness,

Knowing that this practice will continue to affect you over the rest of this day and into the coming days and weeks and perhaps even months ahead.

And whenever you're ready,

Just bringing your awareness back to your breath.

Allowing your breath to be a bridge between this inner world back out to your outer world.

With each breath slowly resurfacing and bringing with you this newfound forgiveness and this new sense of energy and power as you find yourself surfacing and coming back into the room,

Wiggling your fingers and toes,

Maybe stretching a little bit.

Feeling a sense of freedom,

Of lightness in this practice of forgiveness.

Coming back fully into the room whenever you're ready and opening your eyes.

Namaste.

Reviews

Very helpful, thank you 🙏

This was very powerful.... thank you! 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻

I saw my sister who has recently passed. I know better than to touch her in my dreams because she will disappear. But the temptation was too great and I got to hold her face in by hands. She was laughing so hard and was so happy in all her stages of life before my eyes. I needed this 🙏🏽thank you

Excellent track for “getting in there” with difficult, painful feelings and softening them. Opens up a helpful, more objective observation point to reground with more personal strength. So worthwhile! 🙏🏻

The most helpful meditation I have practiced so far. Very old resentment that I had tried to get rid off in so many ways resolved in an instant! Thank you!

Excellent exercise, helpful, to be repeated. Thank you.

There's an element of releasing the hurt in this that is so important for healing.

Thank you.. I needed that

very powerful

This is one of my favorite meditations. I plan on doing it again as needed. And sharing it with others. So powerful.

I’ve been doing parts work for some time, and breaking through the barriers of protection of the most scared and hurt parts of myself outside of therapy is always a challenge. Even in the beginning of this I felt hard. But this meditation helped to break me wide open allowing for that part to be seen, approached, and shown Love. It certainly hurts, but in a healing way. Thank You

Another powerful practice. Thank you so much, Lisa! ❤️🙏

Thank you 🙏🏼this meditation is helping me so much to deal with the relationship I have with my sister. I feel that works in a deep level, it cures me and it frees me. ❤️❤️❤️

Beautiful. Thank you 🙏🏼

I felt a shift, thank you. I’ll practice this meditation again 🌸

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS MEDITATION!! It is incredibly powerful and I am doing it multiple times a day to release the anger that I feel from the micro-aggression/racism that is so prevalent right now! You are an angel! Thank you again! 🙏😇💖❤️💚💙💜💛

That was wonderful! Thank you so much 🙏💜

I love this. Its a good healing, and letting go of hurt. And its worked wonders with my recent experience. So thank you