Introduction
This time I want to take up a theme that surfaces particularly strongly in sessions — forgiveness toward events of the past.
Has Forgiveness Become About the Other Person?
When clients speak about something that happened in the past, words like these often come out.
“I should forgive by now, shouldn’t I.”
“It isn’t good to stay angry forever, is it.”
“For their sake too, I ought to let it go.”
One large assumption is hidden here.
It is that forgiveness has become not for oneself, but for the other person.
From childhood we receive, without noticing, messages like:
- Good people forgive
- Mature people forgive
- Not being able to forgive is immature
As a result, forgiveness becomes not “an act of setting oneself in order,” but “a pardon granted to another” or “a moral obligation.”
In the moment of trying to forgive, it is not rare that the standard has already shifted away from one’s own center, toward the other person’s judgment or a social sense of what is “right.”
Seen from the viewpoint of Rolfing, this is highly telling.
Just as the body distorts itself to meet the expectations of others, forgiveness too, when the standard is placed “outside” rather than in one’s own sensing, moves away from the inner Center.
When forgiveness is painful, it is not because a person is immature. It may simply be that they have not yet returned to their own heart, their own hara.
Forgiveness as Self-Care That Brings Structure into Harmony
In Rolfing, the body is grasped not as “a collection of parts” but as a single system. And this system lives within gravity and within relationship, constantly reorganizing itself and rebalancing.
When we resent someone, or hold tight to strong anger, sorrow, or bitterness, our tissue — the fascia in particular — contracts distinctly, the breath grows shallow, the field of vision narrows, and the flow of energy comes to stagnate. In other words, an event of the past continues, as structure, inside the body of now.
The executive coach Joe Hudson puts this question to clients who feel unable to forgive someone.
“Do you have a boundary that makes sure it never happens again?”
The question is introduced on X.
The forgiveness here is not a “pardon” for the other person. Nor is it conduct for appearing to be a “good person” socially. Forgiveness is making a boundary between oneself and another — an act by which one’s own heart and body return home again.
To remain unforgiving is to keep the boundary with the other person in a vague shape, and further, to keep carrying the weight of the past. That weight obstructs harmony with gravity, takes away uprightness (Alignment) and free breathing, and narrows the choices available in a life.
Forgiveness, then, is not for the other person. It is a decision to release one’s own Structure.
Resentment and Boundaries: A Question of Support
So why do we keep holding tight to resentment?
“It’s over.”
“Better to forget.”
“Forgiving will make it easier.”
The head understands, and yet the body does not let go. Hudson puts what lies behind this well into words.
“Resentment is what we use when we don’t believe we’re allowed to have limits.”
This is very much in line with Rolfing.
Resentment and anger are less “bad emotions” than a substitute defense the body sets off when Support is insufficient.
A territory that ought to be protected by a Boundary is not protected. So one tries to secure space through anger. But space secured by anger comes at a large cost.
- Tension never leaves
- The breath stays shallow
- The sympathetic nervous system works in excess
- One is confined to thinking in “right and wrong”
- And above all, the heart closes easily
Drawing a clear boundary becomes a “structural support” for keeping one’s own Inner Space safe. Resentment can end its role the moment a boundary stands up. So, before hurrying toward forgiveness, a boundary comes first.
Three Steps That Make Forgiveness an Inevitable By-Product
Forgiveness is less something “done” by will than something that “happens” through a process, as with the reintegration of the body. In a podcast, Joe Hudson spoke of forgiveness in three steps. For anyone interested, it is below.
I think these can be organized, in Rolfing terms, as follows.
Working Through Emotion (Heart)
First, to feel the emotion all the way through. Anger, sorrow, bitterness, fear, shame, helplessness. To touch “the emotions one does not want to feel,” and release the tension left in the body.
Emotion does not finish by being processed in the head alone. The rib cage, the diaphragm, the throat, the belly, the pelvis — it is stored somewhere in the body. Touching there again is the first step of forgiveness.
Curiosity (Mind)
What arises next is curiosity. Not justifying the other person, but loosening the story once.
“Why did this person do that?”
“What wound or background might there have been?”
“What were they trying to protect?”
When we cannot forgive, we “fix” the other person in place — labeling, deciding in advance. Villain and victim, right and wrong. That fixing closes the heart and the body.
Curiosity works to open a closed Mind. Then the way the world looks shifts a little, and the hardness in the heart changes too.
A Clear Boundary (Gut)
And last, a clear boundary. This is where structure comes in.
- I will not meet them one-on-one anymore
- I will not accept any more than this
- On these terms I will be involved; on these terms I will not
Once a boundary is settled, resentment as defense naturally thins out. Because “it will never happen again” is supported by structure rather than by anger.
When these three come together, forgiveness happens as a “by-product.” It is less “forgiving the other person” than the experience of one’s own system opening again.
Three Points for Confirming That Forgiveness Has Taken Place
How, then, to confirm that the process of forgiveness has finished and Integration has occurred? Late in a session, at the moment the body returns toward Alignment, I observe the following signs.
Soma (Gut)
Whether a Clench remains deep in the belly. Whether the breath enters deeply and support has returned underfoot. Whether the boundary stands as a bodily sensation rather than as a thought.
Heart (Emotion)
Whether the tissue around the heart has widened. Whether there is any sense of being open toward the world. Whether there has been a shift from “protecting by closing” to “protecting while open.”
Mind (Story)
Whether the Story of Separation dividing self from other has begun to dissolve. Whether the fixed “that person is the worst” has loosened, leaving a margin in which Interconnectedness can be felt.
When these three come together, forgiveness appears not as “the right thing,” but as a fact of the body.
Conclusion
Having passed through forgiveness as a process, we become able to stand in a body different from before. A different breath, a different center of weight, a different field of vision. And a different Identity.
Here there is one very important line.
“Just because I have gone through forgiveness doesn’t mean I have to go spend my vacation time with these people.”
Forgiveness and keeping distance can hold together. With safety secured by a boundary, heart and body can remain free. It is a quiet and powerful transformation — for living lightly within gravity, and from one’s own True Center.
Forgiveness is not “becoming a good person.” Forgiveness is “opening one’s own system once again.”
I hope this is of some use.