Forgiveness

This week Richard and Fiona are joined by psychotherapist Shaun Brookhouse to natter about the complexity of forgiveness, its relation to accountability, repentance and the concept of accepting imperfections.

shaunbrookhouse.com

Links
Submit a question

The Richard Nicholls Podcast

The Brookhouse Hypnotherapy Group YouTube Channel

Richard's Social Media Links
Twitter Instagram Facebook Youtube TikTok Threads

Support Richard on Patreon
https://www.patreon.com/richardnicholls

Transcript

Richard: 0:10

Hey everyone, it's Therapy Natters time again. Yet another opportunity to listen to some nattering between psychotherapists in the hope that it gives you some insight into why we do what we do and feel how we feel. I'm Richard Nicholls, and as always, I have the wonderful Fiona Biddle with me as well. Good day, Fiona.

Fiona: 0:32

Hi Richard, how are you

Richard: 0:34

Oh, I'm doing, I'm alright. I'm in a giggly mood now.

Fiona: 0:37

Yes,

Richard: 0:38

not, it's not your fault, it's not my fault, it's, it's Shaun's fault!

Fiona: 0:42

it's our guest who rolled his eyes when you started recording.

Richard: 0:47

At my overly cheery attitude. I have to recognise, I can be annoyingly cheerful. And I apologise on behalf, yeah, I apologise on behalf of whatever it is that causes that. To the world, because some people need it, and sometimes it grates. And if it's grating on you, sorry, come back to this one another day. And listen to a more serious podcast, and then come back to this when you need to.

Fiona: 1:16

be interesting to see how serious we get because we've got a fairly serious topic in a way, don't we? But we do have Shaun, who we have mentioned on, um, several, too many occasions on this podcast already. Sometimes anonymously.

Richard: 1:32

Oh yeah, you might say, oh,

Fiona: 1:34

We know somebody who,

Richard: 1:38

Milton Erickson used say, My friend John. Let me tell you about my friend John. And we don't need a John, because we've got Shaun, who has all the things that John ever had.

Shaun: 1:49

You're all too kind. Far too kind.

Fiona: 1:51

let me introduce Shaun properly because that's my job. This is Shaun Brookhouse, who you will have heard the name Brookhouse because we refer to the Brookhouse Hypnotherapy Group He is our friend, our colleague, our mentor. And, well, I've been working with Shaun since 2000, I think it was. We've run various businesses and schools and all sorts of things together, so we've worked very closely over the years and he's an expert on all sorts of things. But today, we decided to talk about forgiveness because it's something I think, well certainly I feel I'd been rather putting off

Richard: 2:34

Forgiveness.

Fiona: 2:35

about. Yes, I find it puzzling. So I'm hoping to resolve some of my puzzle about forgiveness today. So, hello, Shaun.

Richard: 2:45

How do.

Shaun: 2:46

Hello, Fiona. Hello, Richard. Nice to see you both. Forgiveness I don't necessarily think is necessarily a complete wheelhouse for me, but I I suppose I came to therapy from a sort of roundabout perspective in the fact that in my youth I was certainly very much into my Catholicism. I'm not currently into any particular faith these days, but that forgiveness or reconciliation, as it was in Catholicism, was a core tenet of faith and a necessity. But as a young man, I discovered that ultimately there was a, a fauxness to the whole concept of forgiveness, that ultimately forgiveness could not come without punishment. And then even then, forgiveness was not absolute. You know, the idea in, sort of, like in Roman Catholic terms, that forgiveness is forgiveness. God forgives you, and therefore you start again with a clean slate. People don't tend to forgive people in that respect, and even those who purport to have a forgiving nature, you know, the old saying, forgive and forget, well, most people will do neither. Particularly for themselves, We talk about, in therapeutic terms, two constructs of being foo and fos. Foo is F O O, which is forgiveness of others, and fos is forgiveness of self. Oftentimes, we'll find it easier to forgive others than we will do to forgive ourselves, because we judge ourselves by a higher standard usually than we judge anybody else, and, the old saying, you know, I should know better. will often be the refrain that people will, use as far as how they view their own transgressions. Be they transgressions against themselves or other people, it really doesn't matter. But, I think, if we look at the world today, socio politically, et cetera, et cetera, we have a very small capacity for forgiveness, so is it any wonder that people come into our offices, you know, wrecked with guilt, which of course is the by product of a lack of forgiveness. So, we work with guilt, we carry our guilt, and somehow the guilt is meant to make us feel better, which I know seems an oxymoron, but it's absolutely true. We carry guilt to make us feel better about the things that we can't forgive ourselves for, and round and round we go. So, is that an adequate opening gambit, as they say?

Richard: 5:19

Yeah, of course. So many people come into therapy maybe there's been a transgression, maybe it's somebody else, somebody else's behaviour, the way that they've been treated by somebody else that they're holding on to. And it's like that old phrase of drinking poison and expecting somebody else to die. but it's not just the holding of the resentment that people need to accept, that they need to let go of in order to live a happier life. There's the forgiveness of self as well, and that, that I think does, does get overlooked. It really, really does.

Shaun: 5:56

My thing with regards to the idea of forgiveness, and, one can't deny the necessity of forgiveness, but we also talk in the flip side of forgiveness of revenge. that somehow that's going to make it better. Now, there is a Chinese proverb that says, when you seek out revenge, remember to dig two graves. Because in the end, you destroy yourself with the necessity of revenge. And you know, how do you gain revenge on yourself? Now, revenge of self can easily be things like self harm in the myriad of ways that we can self harm, not just the sort of, if you like, the ways that people will naturally associate with self harm, things like cutting and such, you know, abuse of food, abuse of alcohol, abuse of drugs, all that sort of stuff falls into the myriad of ways that we can do ourselves harm, because we're holding on to a grudge with ourselves at the end of the day. very often, people who tend to hold grudges with other people will tend to hold a grudge with themselves just as hard.

Richard: 6:52

Mmm.

Shaun: 6:53

So there is a necessity of understanding our own imperfections, and that context is everything. I can injure you, but that may not have been my intent, that may not have been my desire. Now, obviously, the quickest and easiest way to avoid circumstances like that is to apologise immediately. As soon as you recognise that a transgression has been made, you apologise, and very often that can be resolved fairly quickly. The problem with a lot of forgiveness is the fact that we hold onto things for far too long, and by the time we finally own up and say, Well, actually, you know what? I really should have probably not have done this, that, or the other. It's too late. The hardness of the heart has come and the person is in an unforgiving mood. Be that towards themselves and be that towards other people, as it were. Mm-hmm.

Richard: 7:39

there though is the locus of control is external rather than internal. If somebody's holding on to that anger, that resentment, what they're saying is unless somebody else does something, I refuse to feel better. And that's not healthy. It might seem right at the time. I'm not going to forgive somebody unless they apologise, but then they're drinking poison every day, There's a horrible metaphor that I quite like. It's a bit grubby, but it's like picking up dog crap every single day on the off chance that when you see that person that harmed you, you can rub it in their face. But you don't see them and you just have smelly hands.

Fiona: 8:22

It's a bit grubby, but it has its, yeah, it shows something, doesn't it? I was thinking then you mentioned about revenge, Shaun, and obviously there's the quote about that, which is revenge is a dish best served cold, but that's, what that's saying is, oh, let's hold on to this resentment and anger for a while and then get our own back. So that's really quite contrary to the idea of letting things go. I think part of my puzzle about forgiveness is this thing about the other person. Moving on, I get. The idea of moving on from pain and hurt and whatever it may be, but there's something about forgiving the other is somehow letting them off the hook. Because if they don't take responsibility, then we're supposed to still forgive them. But isn't that letting them off the hook? That's where I get tied up in knots.

Shaun: 9:24

I think it depends. on the issue. I think it depends on the intent behind it. I want to go back to what Richard said. I'm going to come back to what you've just, what you've just mentioned, Fiona. This idea about it's not an external locus of evaluation or an external locus of control. It's an internal one for a lot of people when it comes to this. I control my own internal state. My bile is mine. My pain is my own. Therefore, it's not the outside world. So therefore, even sometimes an apology for a transgression won't be enough because it's not enough to quell what I've already created in myself. It's power, for want of other way of looking at it. I mean, if you want to use the, old sort of, um, metaphor that I quite like using is the darkness and the light. You know, when you, if you are a Star Wars buff, you know, the Sith rely on passions and deep emotion for power. While the Jedi rely on peace of mind and sort of mindfulness, if you will. Those are powerful emotions to have at your disposal and can give you a false sense of power. If I hate you. I feel strong. Now, am I strong for hating you? Probably not. But it is a sense of being able to feel in control of the uncontrollable. Certainly for a lot of the clients I work with, they have a sense that the control they have over their emotional state is so flimsy, they'll take it wherever they can get it. If that means self damage through feelings of vengeance or anger and such, well then they'll keep it just because it's worth having. As far as accountability is concerned. Again, you are recapturing your own power and authority. Yes, should people be held accountable? Absolutely. And, you both know I've said for years to trainees that we're in the accountability business, and nobody wants to be in that business, and nobody wants to take accountability. But if I forgive you for what I believe the transgression you made, and remember, this is also very much a personal thing in terms of, you know, maybe your intent wasn't to transgress, maybe that's just the way I see it. So it's, not a historical fact, it's a narrative truth, basically, and that doesn't necessarily make it right or wrong, it just means that in my model of the world, you've hurt me. You're both parents, so you both understand the notion that at some stage of your life, you probably told your child. Especially if they have siblings, but if they don't, this can still apply. Go apologise. Go apologise to your brother. Go apologise to your sister. And they apologise. It means nothing. Because it came from nothing. Because there was no recognition of a transgression. They're just doing what they're doing. So, in and of itself, an apology, certainly a verbal apology, It's nothing. It's words. It's the intent, the actions behind it, indeed the actions after it. If I say to you, you've injured me by doing X, Y, or Z, and then you continue to do so, it reminds, it reminds me of the Father Ted. A bit with Dougal after he sort of blows up something, he says, Ted, I can only tell you the same thing I told you last time, it'll never happen again. It's that notion of that continual, sort of, I'm still making the same transgression, I'm still making the same mistake, so I don't actually care about you. I care about me, and my behavior belies what I care about, so to hell with you. Which is not very nice, needless to say, it's not a very nice position to be in, but it is, it is what it is. But I think, if you can get beyond the notion of accountability and say that I'm accountable to me and I can choose to forgive or not, that gives me power. That gives me my strength. And if I choose not to forgive you, that's my choice and I'll live with the consequences of that choice. Likewise, if I choose to forgive you, I'll live with the consequences of that choice because I can always be opened up to hurt again if I forgive you and I don't feel as though you've actually been particularly accountable.

Fiona: 13:25

Yeah, and I think what we're saying, well what I'm getting to, is that it very much depends. So, if somebody hurts me by saying something careless, without any intent but they say, well I didn't mean it so I, I don't have to say sorry because I, I wasn't intending to hurt you, then you take the power by deciding to leave it behind.

Shaun: 13:53

Mm-hmm.

Fiona: 13:53

If it's something really major, like, somebody drives after getting drunk and kills somebody, so they have several layers of intentional behavior with an unintended consequence, if they don't take accountability. Then for me to say, I forgive you, that doesn't feel genuine to me, but what I would do myself in that is I would be putting it to one side, leaving it there, disconnecting from that person and moving on. It's that word I think I find troublesome in that context.

Shaun: 14:36

too much court tv,

Fiona: 14:38

Oh, I definitely watch far too much Court TV, But

Shaun: 14:41

But it, it, it's that, it's that notion of the, of the impact statement. that so many people find, difficult. But if you use the example that you've just given, and I'll give you, I've given you Catholic reference, I'll give you an Islamic reference, forgive others and Allah will forgive you.

Fiona: 14:59

Yes, I

Shaun: 15:00

So forgiveness is not necessarily, not necessarily altruistic. If I forgive you, really what I'm looking for is forgiveness for myself, that I've got to get out of jail free card when I screw things up. God will forgive me, my wife will forgive me, my children will forgive me, because I've forgiven them so much, then I'm off the hook. So it is that notion of, are you apologising, are you trying to gain forgiveness for... As close to altruistic means as one can. I go through what I would call four R's when it comes to forgiveness. Responsibility, Remorse, Restoration, and Renewal. Those are the four things that are required to truly get past the idea. This is for self as well as for others. In fact, I would this is probably more for self than it is for others. But it all sort of plays out.

Fiona: 15:52

one that I've come across from a, that's from an Islamic point of view and it, it was saying it was about others as well as the self, but I agree it seems more for, for the self. taking accountability, doing something about it, reflecting and moving on.

Shaun: 16:09

Well, it's something, I mean, though I am no longer of the faith. I still have an interest in theology and such like that, and the thing that I always find so interesting is belief systems, which are supposedly so diametrically opposed, aren't. if you take it all the way back to the beginning... Every major world faith, with the exception of Hindu and Buddhism and such, which are far more Eastern tradition, but they have their similarities. But the main Western faiths of, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, all come from the same place. They're all children of Abraham. And it's just a nonsense that ultimately, if you read the Qur'an, you read the Bible, and you read the Torah, they all say the same thing. There is no contradiction here. Ultimately, we are flawed creatures who are basically deliberately flawed. If you believe in a god, you believe in free will. And the problem with free will is the fact that there are consequences to free will. The example that you were using about the person hit and killed by a, a motorist is there forgiveness there? The number of times I've seen and heard people say, I believe in Jesus Christ, and Jesus tells us to forgive, so I forgive you, is that a genuine forgiveness? No, I would argue it's not, because you aren't truly forgiving that person. You are forgiving them with the understanding that if I forgive them, I'm going to heaven. And therefore, that's my buy in.

Fiona: 17:39

Yeah, and please note, I wasn't saying that somebody who did that could not be forgiven. my hang up on it is if they are not saying they're sorry, but then we get into the religious thing about if you repent, then that's all you need.

Shaun: 17:53

Well, repentance is, is, is the notion of behavioral change. No, I would say that repentance has nothing to do with the words, it's a question of the action. And I do think that we have to get past this notion of, when we talk about forgiveness as being this, if you like, namby pamby, hoity toity sort of concept of, I'm going to say this, and that's going to make it better. No, it doesn't. What makes it better is, yes, sometimes you need to hear, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you, but then you need to see the actions afterwards that show that you've actually learned something, I accept I've wronged you, and I won't wrong you again. there's a scene in The Third Godfather where basically Michael Corleone is sort of doing his repentance and such that, If you grant me this, I will sin no more. And, you know, it is that notion that as long as you don't do the same thing again, or so long as you don't... do something similar again, there's always room for forgiveness. And yes, there is, there are complications. The number of times that people who will say that they've changed, they've repented and such. Do they really? We don't know. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. But in the end, Actions, as they say, speak louder than words. It's easy to say, I'm sorry. In fact, it's fairly commonplace. how many times you've been bumped into on the tube by somebody else and you apologise. You know, the words themselves mean very little. It's what's behind that. It's the process, it's the construct of saying, look, I'm flawed. And I think that's the hardest thing for most people to get over, we are taught that we can be great, we are taught that we can be perfect, or that perfection is an aspirational thing, and of course, perfection is impossible. But we're flawed. And acknowledging that flaw and saying, look, you know what, I make mistakes, I say the wrong things at times, I eff and blind a little bit too much, I do this a little bit too much, I do that a little bit too much, is an acceptance of the self and that you are a work in progress. You know, I tell my clients all the time, therapy doesn't end when you finish therapy. Therapy ends when they throw the dirt over you. Because at the end of the day, you are a continual work in progress. What is relevant today is not necessarily relevant tomorrow. And indeed, when you look at it from a behavioral perspective, actions that we might have taken with the best intent at the time, when we look back on it now and say, My God, that was a terrible mistake I'd made. I'd done the wrong thing. I don't think you can get past the age of 20 without getting to some point in time looking back and saying, if had my time to do over again, I would not have done that because I could see the harm that was caused. Even if, the person who's harm that experienced it will never know your remorse about the behavior.

Fiona: 20:43

There's something here that I'm going to quote to you that is along these lines, it's about platonic justice, and in platonic justice there are no amnesties, only expiation. There is no forgiveness, only forgiving ness. There is a benevolent willingness to understand how it is that people cannot help doing bad things because they are ignorant or irrational, or are overwhelmed by untamed or negative forces within them. So that goes along with what you were saying there, Shaun, in that we can get, both for ourselves and for others, an understanding that there will be something that caused the issue, and therefore, That takes away some of that blame and resentment and need for revenge, if we can get to understand what's going on behind it. And going back to what you were saying about children, I think that's particularly important to have that sort of view when it comes to children. I remember with mine that when they did something wrong, they would often say, well, I didn't mean to, as though that was... you know,

Shaun: 21:55

That was your get out of jail free card. Didn't mean to

Fiona: 21:58

I didn't mean to break that bowl. Well, if you had meant to break that bowl, then you'd really be in trouble. But what you did was you were careless. And that led to the consequences, and that's what... I'm asking you to think about and be sorry about, And that comes down to, well they're children and they will be careless, but they need to learn to take some care.

Shaun: 22:23

Look at it sociopolitically at the moment. We're in a time where this is a perfect example of how this manifests itself. The Israel Palestinian issue that was currently in the news. It's very easy to be two dimensional about this. Hamas did a terrible thing. There's no question about that. There's no justification for doing... Harm against the innocent, and in fact, in Islam, there is a passage within Islam that says those who spill the blood of the innocent are evil and sinners. It's just as simple as it goes. But then you look at it from a different perspective as to what drove that process. It's very easy to sort of see the net result and say, okay, this result bad, therefore bad. As opposed to saying, this result bad. But there are mitigating factors that led to this that, really, had they been done, would it have changed anything? We don't know. But it is that idea of being able to take a more global perspective at looking at interactions, and I think our own interactions with ourselves as well as with other people. And say, look, could there be another reason? You know, you bump into somebody who's in an absolutely pig foul mood, and you're like, jeez, they're being an ass. But then, not thinking, well, hold on a minute, maybe something's been going on for them that day and you just caught them at the bad moment, but you instantly make a judgment, and then it's instantly, well, they need to apologise. They're being an ass, therefore they must be, they must be punished for that. It's, nothing is as simple as that. there is no black, there is no white, there is only gray. And at the end of the day, in my view, certainly my therapeutic beliefs, anyway, go along the notion of the moment you accept the fact that there's no right and wrong, there's only grey, everything is context dependent. I used to use the example with the students, you know, Richard, if I shot you in the face right now, would that be a bad thing? Now, most people would say, yeah, probably. I say most people, not everybody. Now, if you had broken into my house, and it was two in the morning, and I thought I saw, you know, the window shattered, and I thought I saw a glint of a knife, and I shot in the face. Now, there would be still those who say that's an absolute wrong. There's no justification no matter what that is. But you would, most would agree that there's a different contextual basis for that. It's how in America there's the notion of the various degrees of murder. You know, first degree being premeditated, second degree being a crime of passion, third degree being just how it just sort of happened. It doesn't change the fact that somebody was killed. It just says, well, actually there, are things behind this that have to be taken into consideration. And I think in terms of forgiveness, if we are open minded enough to say, look, okay, what you did hurt me or what I did to myself hurt me, but let me look at the situation behind it and see if there's any mitigation.

Fiona: 25:11

mitigation, that's what I was going to say, in American law, not only do you have those categories for murder, you then have aggravating factors and mitigating factors. So they'll look at all of those and there could be, there was a case recently of a child who'd done one of these school shootings and the question was whether life without parole was possible. This kid was only 14 when he did it. So, considering life without parole, they went through, there were six possible mitigating factors that could take that possible punishment off the table. the judge went through with a fine tooth comb, it took hours, to go through each of these six mitigating factors and make a determination as to whether that applied. Only one of them did, according to the judge, which was his age, but there were Five others, the only one I can remember was maturity, but he got loads of evidence for how the kid was actually far more mature than you would expect a 14 year old to be. So that mitigating factor did not apply. So they only had one mitigating factor that applied and so he's going to get life without possibility of parole even though... He was 14 when he did it, but that's, you know, it's American justice. It's different from ours. But yeah, mitigating factors, aggravating factors. If we can sort of think about those things whenever we find ourselves in a place of wondering whether forgiveness is a route, that probably would be helpful

Richard: 26:46

I like that idea that we need to look at whether forgiveness is a route, because it is a process to go through. And it doesn't take away your entitlement to resent. You can bring it back any time you like. It could be 10 years down the line. If you want to resent in the future, if you want to bring that back, you can do. That is your choice. But if right now you want to put it to one side and move on, you can. But you can bring it back if you want to. It is your choice. I think that's, that's important for people to think about.

Shaun: 27:23

Well, it's the question of the right. You know, do people have the right to be forgiven? I would argue no, they don't. I do think you have the right to forgive yourself. I think that is a basic human right. That there is no crime you could have committed against anyone, including yourself, that is not beyond redemptive forgiveness. That doesn't mean you get away scot free. It doesn't mean you can say, well, I could just do whatever the hell I want to for the rest of my days. It doesn't mean that. What it means is that, okay, right, I accept the fact. that I have done something wrong and that there's a way to sort of come back from that. Look at it from a relational perspective. The number of relationships that you think will not survive, you know, not survive infidelity, for example, that for most people would say is an absolute red flag. It's an absolute, absolute deal breaker, et cetera, et cetera, but people come back from it. Because there is a way of restorative forgiveness. You can say, well, okay, yes, I know I said I'll never do this again, and I can prove that I'll never do this again, and you just have to give me the time. And that does not mean they have the right to it. By which I mean, just because I want to be forgiven doesn't mean I can be. It doesn't mean you have to. All I can do is set out my stall and say, look, this is how I feel and this is who I am and this is what I am and this is what I've become. You'll see this a lot with prison issues, people who go to prison and genuinely rehabilitate. Is it now just to continue to punish them for what they've done, considering what they have become? I would argue, no. It's no longer appropriate to use the same set of standards. I say this to people an awful lot, the idea of, you can't judge today through the lens of history. You know, we talk about Freud as a perfect case in point. If Sigmund Freud were alive today, he'd be a crank. No one would listen to him, he was a nutjob, and a misogynist, and, you know, all manner, homophobe, you name it, he was all those things, in the eyes of today. In the eyes of yesterday, when he existed, no, he wasn't any of those things, because that was the social normative, so it's impossible to judge someone in that regard. So therefore, if a person is going to change you need to be able to say, look, okay, what you did before was wrong, but I can see now that you've taken something from that and you've become a better person, you've changed whatever phrase you want to use. And I can look at you now today, still being aware of yesterday, but I can look at you today from a perspective of reasonability. As well as how I would like to be treated in the end, anyway.

Fiona: 29:54

And there's an interesting one in British justice for a change that if somebody's convicted, let's say convicted of murder, they can't get out on parole unless they say that they're sorry and can show that they have repented. They don't use that word. I can't think what they use, may be atoned. Unless they can show that they're rehabilitated. Well, if they are insisting that they didn't do it, how can you be rehabilitated from a place of not having done the wrong thing in the first place? I don't have an answer to that problem.

Shaun: 30:27

Well, look at Cosby. Cosby is a perfect case in point. Cosby went to jail, got released from jail out of technicality. Which I think was a pretty major technicality in the fact that he was basically given an immunity deal. It doesn't change the fact that he has never had to say what I did was wrong. He would have never walked from prison. He said it himself. He will not plead when he's in prison. He'll do his full stretch because he will not admit what he did was wrong. He won't admit what he did. Now, when you get to that point of view, it is a quote I'm, I'm, I'm fond of or a concept at least that I'm fond of is what you do is based on more of where you are, not who you are. Circumstances have a tremendous amount of impact on the decisions that we make as far as our behavior is concerned. And then when our situation changes, that's when the niggle of remorse comes in. You know, you do something terrible. Let's use an easy one that comes through our doors regularly. A person gets cheated on. basically they feel terrible about it, etc, etc, etc. And then you discover actually somewhere down the road, in the distant past, they did exactly the same thing. So their perspective on it has changed because they've now been put in that situation and now they get to feel not only their own personal hurt, For what they had done, but also the hurt of what they inflicted on somebody else earlier on. So if you like, it's a guilt double whammy as far as, you know, coming to some degree of conclusion that, our actions have consequences for good and for bad. You know, I tell this to clients all the time, even the best consequence, even the best decisions, even the most right decisions along the way will still have negative implications. There's no neutral, there's no, I will do this and nothing will come of it. And there's no one positive thing, that if I do this, all will be positive, because there will always be something that you have to trade off. And the question is, is the trade off worth it when it comes to forgiveness? is my humbling myself, and I, I don't... I don't care to use that phrase very often, but it is about humbling yourself and acknowledging you're not perfect, acknowledging that you have flaws, which for a lot of people it takes, it can take years if ever, certainly in life in general, but certainly therapeutically, to humble yourself and say, actually, I'm flawed. And I have done wrong and I, I want to be, even if I can't be, I mean the number of times, I'm sure you've both done this yourselves, where you've had clients write letters of apology to people that they'll never see that, you know, it's long since passed. Maybe the person's dead, maybe they'll never have contact. It really doesn't matter, but they write it out in order to alleviate themselves, and you know, when we look at humility, we talk about this notion that, there's intellectual humility, which is the ability to separate your intellect from your ego. So that in this context, if we can get the ego out of the equation and basically say, well, okay, look, I can intellectualise this and perfectly reasonably, but just because I can intellectualise it, it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with how I'm feeling about me. My ego is another matter entirely. And I think we struggle in all of our walks of life, forgetting just the notion of forgiveness, of trying to tame our ego, because we spend so much time trying to build it. And then as we get older, we end up finding ways of trying to quell it because we realise we're not all that, as the young folk might say, you know, you're not all that. And you're not all that. You are human, which is great, but it's imperfect. And I think if you can sit with your imperfection, you'll find that the concept of forgiving other people, and indeed, including yourself. It becomes a lot easier because you accept yourself for how you truly are, not what you aspire to be.

Richard: 34:23

yeah, I think you've hit the nail on the head there. Well, I'll tell you something, we've already come to time, and I don't think we've even scratched the surface on this. I mean, I know that's a phrase I say a lot, that we've just

Fiona: 34:37

that's what we are doing, isn't it? We are opening up some thought, thought processes, and that time just flew past. So, so

Shaun: 34:47

Well, it's, it's, you know, if you figure the volumes that have been written on this subject, it's... It's not going to be covered in a podcast, maybe five or six and such, and I think it's always worthwhile as a means of suggestion, get, get some other perspectives on it. Because this is just a, this is just my particular perspective on it and how I work. It doesn't necessarily mean that this works for everybody, because it doesn't, and there will be people who come through the door who the notion of discussing forgiveness is something that, at the end of the day, they're just unwilling to, leave things with. And on, on that note, I'll, I'll, I'll leave you with a thought that we all have to eventually listen to the pacing of our own trajectory when it comes to our authenticity and taking compassion and accountability for our actions. Compassion, at the end of the day, is the bedrock of good mental health. And as we've just passed World Mental Health Day and such, to be compassionate, is something we don't spend anywhere near enough time talking about. And I think that is something that we could all do with spending a little bit of time getting into.

Richard: 36:01

Well, thank you, Shaun. I guess we need to wrap up for another week. You know where we are, if you want us. As always, there's a link in the show notes to a form on my website. Fill it in if you've got a topic idea or a question you want to put to us. And Fiona's got something she wants to say because she's just put her finger in the air.

Fiona: 36:19

Putting my hand up, please, sir, please, sir. Yes, I realised that I didn't say, when I was introducing Shaun, I didn't say where he works. Uh, Shaun has a private practice in Manchester and also works online and you'll be able to find him by, well, I think you'll probably put a link in the show notes, but you can Google him quite easily, Shaun, S H A U N, not the other way.

Richard: 36:42

Right then, let's disappear for another day. As I say, you know where we are. Keep in touch, we'll speak to you next week. Bye everybody!

Fiona: 36:51

Goodbye.

Shaun: 36:52

Bye now. Bye bye.