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Forgiveness

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Forgiveness is being able to let go of harm done. It is relinquishing a sense of injured entitlement or tit-for-tat. Forgiveness releases us from resentment or bitterness and lets us reclaim our energy and sense of balance.


Sometimes we feel like we cannot forgive without remorse or propitiation on the part of the other person, but the power of forgiveness lies within us, not in the actions or attitudes of others. Speaking our truth and taking steps to protect ourselves from future harm can help us to move on. The more we understand the person who has harmed us, their feelings, frailties and external pressures, the easier it is to forgive.

Forgiveness

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Forgiveness
Forgiveness and reconciliation are not just ethereal, spiritual, otherworldly activities. . . . They are realpolitik, because in a very real sense, without forgiveness, there is no future.

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Forgiveness
What we forgive too freely doesn't stay forgiven.

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No source entered for Contribution #4293


Forgiveness
When you hold resentment toward another, you are bound to that person or condition by an emotional link that is stronger than steel. Forgiveness is the only way to dissolve that link and get free.

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No source entered for Contribution #4292


Forgiveness
Something of venge3ance I had tasted for the first time; as aromatic wine it seemed, on swallowing, warm and racy: its after-flavor, metalic and corroding, gave me a sensation as if I had been poisoned.

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No source entered for Contribution #4291


Faith - Trust - Forgiveness
Never attribute to malice that which can be adequitly explained by stupidity

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No source entered for Contribution #4195


Balance - Discernment - Citizenship - Forgiveness
Even in abundance, human beings create willful scarcity; even in life, human beings create mindless death.

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personal reflection
Contribution #4146


Fairness - Friendliness - Integrity - Kindness - Respect - Forgiveness
For every person sitting, I will stand for every elder standing.

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Own Source.
Contribution #4140


Common Sense - Forgiveness
forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.

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No source entered for Contribution #4119


Forgiveness
holding on to resentment is like letting someone you despise live rent-free in your head

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No source entered for Contribution #4109


Forgiveness
When we forgive evil we do not excuse it, we do not tolerate it, we do not smother it. We look the evil full in the face, call it what it is, let its horror shock and stun and enrage us, and only then do we forgive it.

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No source entered for Contribution #4077


Courage - Repentance - Truth-seeking - Forgiveness - Honesty
Redemption is invented by the sinner.

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Source type: Book
The Book of Negroes (Someone Knows My Name - USA)
Published in 2007
http://
Contribution #4068


Acceptance - Caring - Forbearance - Love - Forgiveness
Each one of us here today will, at one time in our lives look upon a loved one who is in need and ask the same question. "We are willing to help, Lord, but what, if anything, is needed?" It is true we can seldom help those closest to us. Either we don't know what part of ourselves to give or more often than not, the part we have to give is not wanted. And so it is those we live with and should know who elude us, but we can still love them. We can love completely, without complete understanding.

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Source type: Book
A River Runs Through It
Published in 1976
http://
Contribution #4067


Forgiveness
When I accuse my neighbor, I may be wrong, but never when I forgive.

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No source entered for Contribution #4049


Forgiveness
Am I not destroying my enemies when I make friends of them?

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No source entered for Contribution #4014


Forgiveness
To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.

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No source entered for Contribution #4013


Forgiveness
When we forgive evil we do not excuse it, we do not tolerate it, we do not smother it. We look the evil full in the face, call it what it is, let its horror shock and stun and enrage us, and only then do we forgive it.

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No source entered for Contribution #4012


Forgiveness
Forgiving does not erase the bitter past. A healed memory is not a deleted memory. Instead, forgiving what we cannot forget creates a new way to remember. We change the memory of our past into a hope for our future.

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No source entered for Contribution #4011


Forgiveness
Not to forgive is to be imprisoned by the past, by old grievances that do not permit life to proceed with new business. Not to forgive is to yield oneself to another's control... to be locked into a sequence of act and response, of outrage and revenge, tit for tat, escalating always. The present is endlessly overwhelmed and devoured by the past. Forgiveness frees the forgiver. It extracts the forgiver from someone else's nightmare.

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No source entered for Contribution #4010


Forgiveness
We are all on a life long journey and the core of its meaning, the terrible demand of its centrality is forgiving and being forgiven.

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No source entered for Contribution #4009


Forgiveness
A happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers.

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No source entered for Contribution #4008


Forgiveness
We are told that people stay in love because of chemistry, or because they remain intrigued with each other, because of many kindnesses, because of luck . . . But part of it has got to be forgiveness and gratefulness.

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No source entered for Contribution #4007


Forgiveness
Forgiveness is the answer to the child's dream of a miracle by which what is broken is made whole again, what is soiled is made clean again.

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Forgiveness
To err is human; to forgive, divine.

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No source entered for Contribution #4005


Forgiveness
Always forgive your enemies--nothing annoys them so much.

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No source entered for Contribution #4004


Forgiveness
Never does the human soul appear so strong as when it foregoes revenge, and dares forgive an injury.

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No source entered for Contribution #4003


Forgiveness
Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heal that has crushed it.

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No source entered for Contribution #4002


Forgiveness
Forgiveness is me giving up my right to hurt you for hurting me.

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No source entered for Contribution #4001


Acceptance - Humility - Forgiveness
It is very easy to forgive others their mistakes; it takes more grit and gumption to forgive them for having witnessed your own.

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No source entered for Contribution #4000


Forgiveness
Not the power to remember, but its very opposite, the power to forget, is a necessary condition for our existence.

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No source entered for Contribution #3999


Forgiveness
Many people are afraid to forgive because they feel they must remember the wrong or they will not learn from it. The opposite is true. Through forgiveness, the wrong is released from its emotional stranglehold on us so that we can learn from it. Through the power and intelligence of the heart, the release of forgiveness brings expanded intelligence to work with the situation more effectively.

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No source entered for Contribution #3998


Forgiveness
Forgiveness is giving up the possibility of a better past.

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No source entered for Contribution #3997


Forgiveness
Sincere forgiveness isn't colored with expectations that the other person apologize or change. Don't worry whether or not they finally understand you. Love them and release them. Life feeds back truth to people in its own way and time—just like it does for you and me.

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No source entered for Contribution #3996


Forgiveness
Resentment is like a glass of poison that a man drinks; then he sits down and waits for his enemy to die.

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No source entered for Contribution #3995


Compassion - Humility - Forgiveness
The act of self-denial seems to confer on us the right to be harsh and merciless toward others. The impression somehow prevails that the true believer, particularly the religious individual, is a humble person. The truth is that the surrendering and humbling of the self breed pride and arrogance. The true believer is apt to see himself as one of the chosen, the salt of the earth, a prince disguised in meekness, who is destined to inherit this earth and the kingdom of heaven, too. He who is not of his faith is evil; he who will not listen shall perish.

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Source type: Book
The True Believer
Page 93
http://
Contribution #3971


Growth - Forgiveness
Mistakes are the portals of discovery.

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No source entered for Contribution #3958


Peacemaking - Forgiveness
I have never gone to sleep with a grievance against anyone. And, as far as I could, I have never let anyone go to sleep with a grievance against me.

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No source entered for Contribution #3884


Forgiveness - Virtue
The pearl whose possession separates man from beast, the pearl which is the rarest find – the best among virtues – is forgiveness.

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Source type: Website
Selected Works of Kedar Joshi
Kedar Joshi
"Quotations – General"
http://works.bepress.com/kedar_joshi/23/
Contribution #3835


Forgiveness
It isn't always enough to be forgiven by others. Sometimes, you have to learn to forgive yourself.

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No source entered for Contribution #3739


Forbearance - Grace - Insight - Mercy - Peacemaking - Forgiveness
An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind

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Contribution #3666


Forgiveness
The balm of Forgiveness precedes all Healing.

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A lesson learned from my Dad
Contribution #3632


Discernment - Forbearance - Grace - Idealism - Forgiveness - Justice
Forgiveness demands not Justice and Justice demands not Forgiveness.

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Contribution #3624


Acceptance - Contentment - Courage - Humility - Insight - Forgiveness
The same lesson keeps presenting itself to me. As soon as I rebound, I will be presented with the same lesson.

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from me
Contribution #3622


Adaptability - Tolerance - Forgiveness - Openness
Feelings of worth can flourish only in an atmosphere where individual differences are appreciated, mistakes are tolerated, communication is open, and rules are flexible -- the kind of atmosphere that is found in a nurturing family.

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No source entered for Contribution #3544


Acceptance - Balance - Compassion - Forbearance - Wisdom - Forgiveness
If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.

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No source entered for Contribution #3292


Love - Forgiveness
Forgiveness is choosing to love. It is the first skill of self-giving love.

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No source entered for Contribution #2946


Love - Forgiveness
We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.

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No source entered for Contribution #2942


Forgiveness
The sage said, "The best thing is not to hate anyone, only to love. That is the only way out of it. As soon as you have forgiven those whom you hate, you have gotten rid of them. Then you have no reason to hate them; you just forget.

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Source type: Book
Spiritual Dimensions of Psychology
http://
Contribution #2928


Mercy - Forgiveness
God will not call you to account for thoughtlessness in your oaths, but for the intention in your hearts; and He is Oft-Forgiving, Most Forbearing.

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Source type: Sacred Text
Koran
The Cow 2:225
http://
Contribution #2691


Peacemaking - Forgiveness
Do not say, ‘I will do to him what he did to me; I will pay the man what he deserves.'

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Source type: Sacred Text
Tanakh
Proverbs 24:29
http://
Contribution #2677


Peacemaking - Forgiveness
You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your countrymen.

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Source type: Sacred Text
Tanakh-Torah
Leviticus 19:18
http://
Contribution #2675


Humility - Forgiveness
An unrevengeful spirit, never given to rate itself too high;- such be the signs, O Indian Prince! of him whose feet are set on that fair path which leads to heavenly birth!

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Source type: Sacred Text
The Song of Celestial
16:3
http://
Contribution #2674


Serenity - Forgiveness
Anger is contagious.

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Starbucks - The Way I See It #276
http://www.starbucks.com/retail/thewayiseeit_default.asp?act=0&first=51
Contribution #2604


Compassion - Joyfulness - Responsibility - Forgiveness
We frail humans are at one time capable of the greatest good and, at the same time, capable of the greatest evil. Change will only come about when each of us takes up the daily struggle ourselves to be more forgiving, compassionate, loving, and above all joyful in the knowledge that, by some miracle of grace, we can change as those around us can change too.

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No source entered for Contribution #2491


Mercy - Forgiveness
I have always found that mercy bears richer fruits than strict justice.

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speech in Washington D.C., 1865
Contribution #2445


Mercy - Forgiveness - Honesty
I have made up my mind that if there is a God, he will be merciful to the merciful. Upon that rock I stand. That he will not torture the forgiving. Upon that rock I stand. That every man should be true to himself, and that there is no world, no star in which honesty is a crime. Upon that rock I stand.

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Source type: Book
What's God Got to Do with It?
by ed. Tim Page
Page 133 ("How to Be Saved" 1880)
Published by Steerforth Press , Hanover, NH , 2005
http://www.amazon.com/Whats-God-Got-Ingersoll-Separation/dp/1586420968/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1224970457&sr=8-1
Contribution #2294


Forbearance - Forgiveness
How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.

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No source entered for Contribution #1966


Acceptance - Forgiveness
This is certain, that a man that studieth revenge, keeps his own wounds green, which otherwise would heal, and do well.

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"On Revenge" -- full essay at:
http://www.rjgeib.com/thoughts/revenge/revenge.html
Contribution #1741


Compassion - Forgiveness
Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return.

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No source entered for Contribution #1739


Forgiveness
The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.

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No source entered for Contribution #1674


Forgiveness
If you haven't forgiven yourself something,
how can you forgive others?

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No source entered for Contribution #1546


Acceptance - Forgiveness
Show me a person who has never made a mistake
and I'll show you somebody who has never achieved much.

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Forgiveness
What antidote can there be for an idea that popular and poisonous? Revenge provides revenge, which is sure to provide revenge, forming an endless chain of human misery.

Here's the antidote:

Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.

Amen.

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Commencement Address at Agnes Scott College
http://www.tinyrevolution.com/mt/archives/001784.html
Contribution #1520


Forgiveness
Forgive and be free.
Forget that you have forgiven and be freer.

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Source type: Book
Heart of a Buddha
by Amita Society
Published by Amitabha Publications , Temple City, CA , 2003
http://
Contribution #1438


Acceptance - Creativity - Forgiveness
With the stones we cast at them, genius build new roads for us.

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No source entered for Contribution #1304


Forgiveness
Happiness is good health and a bad memory.

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Source type: Website
Ingrid Bergman
http://www.ealasaid.com/quotes/a-c.html
Viewed on May 14, 2008
Contribution #1280


Forgiveness
Only the brave know how to forgive; it is the most refined and generous pitch of virtue human nature can arrive at.

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No source entered for Contribution #1190


Acceptance - Forgiveness - Justice
Living well is the best revenge.

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No source entered for Contribution #1050


Friendliness - Love - Respect - Tolerance - Forgiveness
The best thing to give to your enemy is forgiveness; to an opponent, tolerance; to a friend, your heart; to your child, a good example; to a father, deference; to your mother, conduct that will make her proud of you; to yourself, respect; to all men, charity.

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Source type: Website
Arthur James Balfour, Conservative politician and statesman, 25 July 1848 – 19 March 1930
Viewed on April 14, 2008
Contribution #697


Acceptance - Mercy - Forgiveness
Amnesty is as good for those who give it as for those who receive it.   It has the admirable quality of bestowing mercy on both sides.

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No source entered for Contribution #289