It isn't our job to forgive anything at all for another. It takes away another's higher power and it's between them and their higher power. Just as our forgiveness for ourselves is ours alone for us to manage. We aren't a higher power and can't be for another. Giving up the need to forgive releases us to love and also stops the blockages to connection.
What we think of them and what they think of us is personal to each and none of the others business.
So, give up the need to forgive, it truly won't release you. It's detachment that will do so and what will release you from revenge, bitterness and anger? Letting go. That allows you to move on and turn the other cheek.
The popular wisdom is that forgiveness releases and the popular wisdom is just that: a belief which can be unfounded. Forgiveness of self causes release after atonement, forgiveness of others binds us to their actions and pains inflicted on us. It is up to us to manage our reactions to the actions and do that which assists us in our growth. That is a big enough challenge on it's own.
However remembering is necessary for pause and self love. It is the new boundaries that we set that helps us to release our feelings, insecurity and makes us strong. The need to forgive is weak.
Forgiveness puts us one up on the other, it inhibits the Karma bus from acting. It creates a place where forgiveness is necessary and trust a requirement. Can they earn your trust back? What a difficult position you put yourself in determining if trust can be 'won' back. Let it go.
Have I forgiven the G? Absolutely not my job to do so, have I let go of my need to forgive? Absolutely. And it is the most releasing and healing thing of all, to be neutral and calm. Free of any negative poison, gone. Would I give the G any thought these days? Only in these pages where my story is written. I don't even block him on FB or any other way because I truly don't care if he or his little BIT haunt my SM (which they do) , It's truly freeing not to even be bothered. I recommend releasing yourself and being free of that need of forgiving. Instead observe if the atoning actions match the words. Not your job to punish, let WW higher power do that.
What is the opposite of love? It is indifference, it is letting go, it is moving on and not looking back. It is starting anew, afresh with a clean slate. That alone makes the returning wayward look to atone their actions. So if asked have you forgiven me? Say, that's not my job to do. That gives the wayward behaviour no get out at all, none. That holds the wayward to account in full. It is strong. Forgive yourself for everything connected, waywardness is the waywards choice in full, it holds them accountable for it in full with their own higher power.
For you that new start may mean WW, I doubt you will ever forget those dark days, they changed you. If your R2 is to have a chance then let WW forgive herself, do the work and atone. You don't need the Karma bus to run her over and to be in the driving seat. Be Meh about it all. If WW steps over your boundary then you enforce it and walk away and that is clear because you are strong. That can never be the same. You can observe but not absorb.
Detachment, fine if it works and ok if it doesn't.
And the choice is yours not the boys as to whether an R2 is in the offing. It is to be inappropriate to defer to them. It ìs YOUR choice. Just saying my 2c.
V
Freedom is just another word for nothing left to loose. V 64, WAW
