THE POWER OF FORGIVENESS
We talk a lot about growth, change, and becoming the next version of ourselves.
But there is one thing that blocks progress more than anything else:
Unforgiveness: both of ourselves and of others.
This past week, I was listening to a podcast with Leila Hormozi, and she was talking about how she had to make an active decision not to let her past pain dictate how she treated people or how she went about her life.
Choosing to forgive and release our pain is up to us.
Whether it's a decision you wish you could undo or the ongoing pain from someone you trusted, unforgiveness keeps you locked in a moment you can’t change. It weighs you down and slows your future.
If you're serious about growth, healing, or stepping into the life you're meant to live, forgiveness isn’t just important, it’s essential.
1. Forgiveness Is A Release
Forgiving someone, or yourself, doesn’t mean what was done was okay, but it does mean that you are actively choosing every day to not carry the pain any longer.
When you hold onto resentment, you're the one who suffers.
Your peace and your joy are stolen by a moment you can’t change.
Forgiveness is letting go of being the victim and becoming the leader of your story.
Being the leader of your story means finally deciding to let go and move on.
You have to make an active decision every day to wake up and win the day. Despite pain, despite lost trust.
We can’t change the past, but we can decide how much of a hold our past has on our future.
2. The Real Badge of Honor is Breaking the Cycle
It’s easy to use what someone did to you as a reason to close off or become bitter. But pain is not a permission slip to continue negative thought cycles or to treat others poorly.
The real badge of honor is choosing to do the opposite of what was done to you.
It’s using your pain to help others and to overcome.
You are an overcomer, and this is what overcomers do, they break the cycle of pain.
The strongest people are the ones who’ve been hurt and refuse to pass that pain on.
3. Forgiving Yourself Is the First Step to Becoming Who You Want to Be
Self-forgiveness might be even harder than forgiving others because we tend to hold ourselves to a different standard. We replay mistakes in our heads and repeat thoughts that sabotage our progress.
But here’s the truth:
You cannot grow if you keep punishing the version of you that didn’t know better. Give yourself permission to be human and then release.
My mentor Ed Mylett talks frequently about how you are most qualified to help the person you once were. Use your learning lessons to help others who are in the same position you were in.
Nothing is wasted.
Try This This Week:
Write a letter you don’t send to someone who hurt you or to your past self. Say what needs to be said and then let it go.
Pray or say out loud daily: “I forgive myself for what I didn’t know. I forgive them for not knowing better, too.”
Be the opposite: When you can feel yourself feeling bitter, bless someone. Do a kind gesture to a stranger. Get in the habit of being kind and giving when everything in you wants to hold onto pain.
You don’t have to wait until you feel ready and you shouldn’t wait for an apology.
Deicide to forgive anyway.
The most powerful thing you can do is to overcome and then help someone else do the same.
x, LG Curry