Is Unresolved Resentment Blocking Your Blessings?

How the Practice of Forgiveness can Attract More Desirable Conditions into Your Life

In the summer of 2015, during my morning walk, I saw a woman walking toward me. She was about 15 feet away. I’d seen her several times before and my previous encounters with her created instant dread at having to pass her. A muffled groan escaped from my throat as soon as I saw her.

This woman was of about 5’8” tall and weighed about 180 pounds. She wore black biking shorts, the tight knee-length kind, and a red T-shirt. She clutched two pink dumbbells in each hand, and she pumped them to do bicep curls as she walked. I was frightened by the “don’t fuck with me” scowl etched on her face. I couldn’t help but picture her cloaked in a suit of armor, which she needed to protect herself from the cruel and unfair world in which she was living.

The first time I’d passed her on one of my walks, I looked at her face to greet her with a friendly hello. When I tried to look into her eyes, which were averted, I got an ominous feeling. I thought that if I were to have spoken to her, she might have lashed out at me, so I didn’t say a word. Her heavy, angry energy cast a dark cloud over my usually bright and uplifting walk. I did not want to come in to contact, no matter how briefly, with her foreboding presence.

So that morning, as I approached her, I braced myself putting on my imaginary suit of armor to protect myself from her menacing aura. We passed each other silently, each of us not looking directly at the other. Once I was a few steps beyond her, I sighed to shake off the stress I felt during the preceding moments.

Then, I continued on my walk, reciting my French language lesson for the day. When that ended, I started listening to a Stuart Wilde book on tape called Silent Power. Ironically, what I heard almost immediately after turning on that recording were instructions on how to handle people with strong negative energy fields. Wilde’s advice was the complete opposite of what I had just done in bracing and hardening myself and my heart. His recommendation: soften and silently project love and peace to those you meet on the street, including the hard-done-by people, like this woman. Wilde explained that, in this way, their negativity can pass through you instead of attaching to you and the negative energy you created to combat theirs.

Ooops. I failed that pop quiz, I thought. I’ll have to remember to do that the next time I see her. I honestly thought the next time would be the following day or the day after that, but not five minutes after I’d heard Wilde’s advice, she appeared in the distance. She was completing another lap of her morning walk.

I smiled to myself as I looked skyward, imagining God winking at me. Instead of feeling dread this time, I was excited. I would soon have the opportunity to try out this technique. As I walked toward her, I took a deep breath. As I passed her, I said silently, “peace and love be with you.”

As I walked beyond her, I felt relaxed and peaceful, not tense, irritated, or threatened as I had earlier.

The change in my energy from our last encounter, 20 minutes earlier, was unbelievable. I had no hostility toward this woman, as I’d had previously, and my judgment of her dissipated almost entirely. It actually worked!

A few days later, on my morning walk, this same woman came into my field of vision. Instead of dreading our encounter, I smiled to myself. I’d soon get another chance to use this technique and see if it would work again. We approached each other, as we had two days earlier, but this time I noticed something different in her. When we got face to face, she glanced in my direction. The corners of her mouth were upturned slightly, and she had a quizzical expression on her face as if to say: “What did you do to me the other day? I felt better.”

Once I was beyond her, I smiled broadly. She had felt the shift in my energy, and it did something to hers. Whatever she’d felt allowed her to open up enough to smile slightly and look in my direction. My test with the power of energy, and using it to attract more desirable conditions, convinced me that this energy stuff is the real deal.

Who knew that yielding with loving thoughts instead of blocking with hard, defensive ones could have such an effect? And, how incredible to get a chance for a do-over to apply what I’d just learned! I had offered this angry woman a blessing of peace and love. I benefited from it, and so did she.

What I had done in that instance was the third step in the forgiveness practice my coach taught me this week.

For this forgiveness technique to be most effective, it is essential to first, separate the person you want to forgive from their behavior. The person is not their actions. Next, recognize that the person’s conduct was only a small part of what was going on for them. You might not know the whole story of why they acted the way they did. If you did know the entire story, you would, most likely, feel compassion instead of animosity or conflict.

Then, once you’ve separated the behavior from the person and have come to the understanding that there is a hidden reason that triggered their action, offer them a sincere blessing such as “May you be well. May you be at peace. May there be love in your life.”

Having been reminded of how powerful forgiveness can be, I plan to make this practice a part of my daily routine.

Who, in your life, could use your forgiveness?

Lay down your suit of armor and cloak yourself in forgiveness. Try out this technique, and attract the positive vibes you project when you let go of conscious or unconscious resentments.