The Best Reset

Categories: Blog, Forgiveness, Tim Anderson, Pressing RESET, Dr. Everett Worthington, Emotions, Bodcast Jun 05, 2023

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Everett Worthington on the OS BodCast. Dr. Worthington is the world’s leading expert in the practice of forgiveness. His personal mission is to spread the practice of forgiveness and to provide the tools and resources of forgiveness all over the world in every language. 

If you get a chance to listen to the interview, you will see that Dr. Worthington is the message that he preaches. He is the kindest and most gentle person I believe I’ve ever had to fortune of talking to. He is forgiveness. 

But what is forgiveness? 

I’ve been thinking about this a lot over the last few years. I think it’s hard to concretely define because its roots run so deep and wide. For example, forgiveness is letting go of whatever it is that is keeping you a prisoner. This may sound odd, but if you are holding an offense against another person, you are trying to put them in your mental jailhouse. If you have someone in your jailhouse, you are the jailer. It takes your constant vigilance of contempt and anger (your energy) to ensure they are in your prison. This means you are constantly bound to your prison as well - you are spending your energy draining your own joy and vitality to hold a grudge against another. You’ve sacrificed your freedom to ensure another stays locked up in your jailhouse. Your unforgiveness is your own prison. 

Or maybe you don’t hold offenses against others. Maybe you hold offenses against yourself. Self-imposed guilt and shame make wonderful torture chambers. Your refusal to let yourself off the hook, to offer yourself grace, can ultimately weigh you down and make you so miserable you can’t stand yourself or your life. You trudge through life as if you had 1000 pounds on your shoulders all because you won't let yourself go. 

Personally, I think forgiveness is an act of Love. It’s letting things go, setting others free, setting yourself free. It’s the refusal to be shackled by negative energy. It’s the choice to be free. 

I think forgiveness is the ultimate reset. If we can learn to do it, if we practice it often, we will experience unimaginable freedom. If we can forgive others as well as ourselves, if we can let things go that bother us, if we can accept there are things beyond our control, we will literally learn to let the stress leave our bodies. If we can learn to forgive, we will create a way for negative emotions, thoughts, and stresses to leave our bodies and our minds. We will literally set ourselves free to be able to enjoy joy. 

Forgiveness is the path to freedom. It is the cyclical nature of love in action, and it is given and received. It’s choosing life rather than choosing imprisonment and death. And that's the rub. It’s choosing; choosing to love or choosing to condemn, choosing to let go, or choosing to hold onto pain. 

We were all meant to be free, meant to live a life worth living, meant to feel amazing, meant to love and be loved. Forgiveness is the way. 

To listen to Dr. Worthington pave the way, click here: 

BodCast Episode 180: The Art and Need of Forgiveness with Everett Worthington, PhD

https://youtu.be/SgsfVewYRrc

Or here: 

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/original-strength-bodcast/id1388021929?i=1000615414832

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