I think forgiveness and reconciliation is absolutely the hardest part of conflict resolution. Back when I did work in the international conflict resolution field, I saw this first hand. We could help parties negotiate better, understand history better, and in general communicate  and solve problems better, but we weren't able to do much to help each side forgive the other for the historical wrongs that had been committed. Without that forgiveness, it's hard to make too much progress in the other areas.

Part of the problem is that, in general, I think we assume forgiveness will be conditional. The "I will if you will…" pattern. I will forgive you, but first you will need to say your sorry or admit you were wrong. I will forgive you if you will show me that you are going to change your behavior. There's nothing wrong with  a party apologizing or admitting they were wrong or changing their behavior. I would applaud all of those things, and, in fact, specifically recommend it if you happen to be a party that has done something wrong. But as long as forgiveness is conditional upon those things, you're setting yourself up for failure. As I've said in other posts, you're putting your focus on something you cannot control at all: the other party's behavior.

So while I was ruminating during a run the other day, something hit me. I was thinking of an actual conflict in which I am personally mired right now, and I thought to myself, what if this other person DID admit they were wrong and apologize. I imagined a little scenario in my head where this person did that. Full apology. Full admission of bad and hurtful things done. You would think that would meet my conditions, and I would forgive. But I'll be honest. In this hypothetical situation, no wave of forgiveness came over me.

Forgiveness, it turns out, has nothing to do with the other party and their behavior. It is 100% about you. There is absolutely nothing stopping you from forgiving the other party–except yourself. This is not news people want to hear, particularly when they have been wronged. But it is true. It does not matter how much the situation is the other party's fault. You still have to forgive.

Well, you don't have to forgive, but things get a whole lot better when you do, in my experience. But it's hard work. Give yourself time to figure out what forgiveness really looks like and feels like to you. Practice it in your head. How will you really let the other party be who they are even though they did wrong? Are you willing to give up the label of "victim"? What do YOU need to say to the other party? What do you need to do to release them from the impossible demands you are making of them (that is, the demand that they go back in the past and undo what they have done)?

If you do this internal work, then the behavior and the interaction with the other party actually get a lot easier.