We have all felt like victims, one time or another. Humans are all trapped in the illusion of duality — the cycle of good and bad, happiness and sadness. All of us are consequently at the effect of our physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual world. Yet if we acknowledge responsibility for our life situations, we would never see ourselves as a victim, thus, never have the reason to forgive others. True responsibility has nothing to do with blame, shame, or guilt, but it is the ultimate declaration that we are the creators of all our life circumstances. Although this is not always easy to do in many circumstances, it is the key to true forgiveness.
Consider forgiveness as a remedy to relieve past trauma and free ourselves of victimization. We might squirm at the thought of forgiving, as Jesus puts it, “…not seven times, but seventy times seven” (Matthew 18:21–22). Realistically speaking, who can forgive repeated assaults on our being, no matter how harsh or slight? Can you imagine someone harming you repeatedly, and expect that you must continually forgive that person so many times? We cannot be so sure that Jesus meant his words to this extreme. Jesus often spoke with parables — a symbolic language. What we can assert is that Jesus intends for us to transcend our being in a way that is uncommon.
To understand an uncommon suggestion, we must first look at what is naturally common in forgiveness. Webster’s dictionary explains the definition of forgiveness as follows: “to grant pardon or remission of (an offense, sin, etc.); absolve.” In serious situations, it may be difficult to forgive because the anger that heats up inside of us is difficult to let go. Certainly, an angry heart has no capacity to forgive. Perhaps the pain is too great, and the assault too horrible. If this is the case, then we could choose not to give a pardon. How can we forgive when there is no room in our heart to do so? When we live within the parameters of Webster’s definition, forgiveness is nothing more than a commodity that quickly becomes a chore.
The act of bestowing the honor of forgiveness on someone when they have deliberately hurt you has been a common viewpoint toward forgiveness. When defined this way, we seem to view the forgiver as having the right to bestow a pardon. In Rabbi Rami Shapiro’s Guide to Forgiveness, he suggests that “forgiveness is not so much an act as an attitude.” He states that forgiveness happens when we realize that people are not out to get us, but out to take care of themselves. He also asserts that forgiveness is crucial to right living because it frees you from the past that you might engage in the present, both good and bad.
Once we step beyond the common viewpoint of forgiveness, we can take into consideration the key component necessary to truly forgive — compassion. With compassion comes the virtuous humility necessary to realize that we are all doing the best we can for the moment. It allows us to take on a broader perspective, opening our heart to the possibility that the other person may also be hurting and trying to meet the challenges of their life while they struggle with their own limited vision.
Compassion, at its root, is not a sentiment of softness or surrender — it is a profound moment of clarity in which we recognize our shared humanity. The Dalai Lama has long taught that genuine compassion is not pity directed downward, but solidarity felt from within. When we truly understand that the person who wronged us is, like us, navigating a world they did not fully choose and do not fully understand, something in us begins to loosen. The grip of resentment slowly eases. We are not excusing the harm that was done — we are simply refusing to let that harm become the whole story, either of who that person is, or of who we are.
There is another dimension of compassion that is easy to overlook: the compassion we must offer to ourselves. For many of us, the most difficult forgiveness of all is the kind that turns inward — for choices made under pain, for time spent in anger, for years spent carrying a wound that was never ours to carry alone. Just as we begin to extend understanding to others who are caught in the spiral of human struggle, we must also extend that same grace to our own hearts. The ancient Stoics believed that suffering does not arise from events themselves, but from the judgments we place upon them. This is not a teaching meant to minimize what happened; it is an invitation to reclaim our inner life, gently and without blame. Self-compassion is not weakness. It is one of the quieter forms of courage.
Compassion is rarely instant. It tends to grow slowly, the way a seed works beneath the surface long before any green shoot appears above the ground. We may not feel compassionate on the first day, or even in the first year after a deep wound. But if we are willing to hold the intention — if we are willing to wonder, even briefly, what life might look like through the other person’s eyes — compassion can begin to take root. This is precisely what Rabbi Shapiro is pointing toward when he says forgiveness is an attitude rather than a single act. Attitudes are cultivated quietly, day by day, in the small choices we make about where we place our attention, and what we allow our heart to hold.
We are all caught, equally, in the spiral of ups and downs — all at the effect of one another and the world. Jesus of Nazareth reminded us that God is all inclusive, and he encouraged us to, again, step beyond the norm.
To step beyond the norm, as Jesus invited, is to step beyond the transactional view of forgiveness altogether — beyond who owes whom, and who has or has not earned a pardon. It is to stand in a wider field, one where compassion quietly dissolves the walls we have built around our wounds. Understood this way, forgiveness is not something we do for the other person. It is something we reclaim for ourselves — an act of inner sovereignty, a return to wholeness. And perhaps, as each of us finds our own way back to that wholeness, we quietly extend the possibility of it to those around us as well.