Why is it always harder ?

[Elgama]

.... to forgive minor things with those closest to us than major things with those we do not like much. Or is it just me lol?

[applepansy]

no dear its not just you. I think we have higher expectations for the ones we love the most. That's not always fair and is why we always reminded to treat our families the same as we would treat the visitor to our home.

Growing up I heard "Charity begins at home" often, from my grandparents.

[NeuroTypical]

I've had to forgive incestuous siblings, parents who enabled evil, and a rapist. The small stuff is easy compared to that, and it's all small stuff in comparison.

[Elgama]

dunno I have forgiven a lot of hard stuff in my life that was easy, but right now have a stupid phone conversation going round in my mind, it was just thoughtless on her part and trying to do the right thing.

I was able to walk away from a lot of things I have never experienced any hatred for but this I am so narked about a couple of things that were said lol ironically one was unjustly accusing me of unforgiveness, maybe I feel the need to give her some justification

[Bini]

Not just you :]

I have a bestfriend who I trust my life with. I remember once that I felt she betrayed me and it completely turned my world upside down because we're so close. I kept thinking to myself during that time, wow this hurts really bad. It just doesn't have the same "burn" when it's someone you don't love and cherish.

[ryanh]

Absoutely not just you. The closer and more meaningful a person is to us, the more likely we are to be directly hurt/impacted by their actions. For me, it's a matter of how much I am hurt by the actions that impacts how hard it might be to forgive.

[Misshalfway]

Absoutely not just you. The closer and more meaningful a person is to us, the more likely we are to be directly hurt/impacted by their actions. For me, it's a matter of how much I am hurt by the actions that impacts how hard it might be to forgive.

I think the difficulty is all proportional to the level of trust. I think that's why there is more pain in familial / intimate relationships because we let our guard down. We allow ourselves to become vulnerable. And so if my husband cusses me out, I'll cry for a week and always remember the day. But when someone flips me the bird cuz I didn't merge right, who cares? Maybe he was having a hard day. But my H "shouldn't" do that cuz he promised to love me forever.

[Loving_Wife]

I am struggling with the very same thing. The closer the person is the harder it is to forgive. I am ashamed to admit I don't know that I will ever forgive what happened to me by supposed loving family members.

[Elgama]

I think it was harder because the person accused me of being unforgiving of something much more serious that actually I do not have any hard feelings over lol but now I am unforgiving of her saying it. Hopefully forget about it tomorrow

[RipplecutBuddha]

Ditto to all the above...except even when it's people I love and trust...I just can't seem to hold on to a grudge for more than a few days.

The longest I held one was for a couple weeks. It's just too much work for me. I end up either forgetting all about it, or deciding at the moment of offense that since it's not gonna matter in a day or two, why bother worrying at all?

Having said that, there are people who have hurt me that I simply cannot bring myself to trust the same way again, but I can't say that I'm still angry about what they did. I forgave them, got past the hurt, but learned a lesson in the process.

[Guest]

I'm a set-it-and-forget-it person. I can't hold on to grudges (not sure if that's the word I need). Basically, if somebody does something that really hurts me - whether close to me or not - I go through my "rage" moment, then when I calm down, that's it. I'm your friend again. Usually don't last for more than a day unless the situation is still prevalent.

Anyway, my problem is not the forgiving, my problem is the "rage". When it is somebody close to me - like my husband is a good example - my rages are crazier! I have thrown stuff at my husband in my extreme frustration! He's very good at dodging flying objects. I've been on yelling matches with my mother. After my temper goes back to normal though, I'm done with the whole thing too - everything is forgiven. That is, after my husband forgives me for raging as well.

But when it's just a co-worker or ward member or someone not too close to me, I don't even go through the rage part. I just say my piece, then I'm done and it's forgiven.

But yeah, it seems like the closer I am to the person, the bigger it hurts so I go through a bigger rage to get over it.