Why is asking for forgiveness so hard?

Question

To me, it seems like most of the time you'd need some courage to ask for forgiveness. Maybe not for little things, but surely for big things. I don't know, maybe it doesn't seem hard for you, but for me it seems that way.

Answer 1

There is no need of asking forgiveness if you've already forgiven that person from the heart.........you just have to pretend you havn't forgiven them to remind them of their part of the fault.

Answer 2

The ego keeps looking for others to blame.

Answer 3

because you cant forget the feelings or memories or experience that made/push you not to forgive them.  

Answer 4

i completely agree. it is really hard sometimes to even admit to yourself that you made a mistake, and it is even harder to actually admit it allowrd and ask for forgiveness for what you did.  

Answer 5

since you say that it is hard for you , you should have some clue why it is hard for you. What exactly do you feel when you jave the intention or actually ask for forgiveness ?

Answer 6

The most difficult thing about asking for forgiveness is the possibility that you might not get it.  Besides, there is always the threat of facing the anger of the one from whom you need forgiveness.

Answer 7

Everyone has excellent answers so I just want to say this----it takes a big person to apologize and ask forgiveness, but it takes a bigger person to accept.

Answer 8

Forgiveness is extremely hard to ask for because your ego does not allow you to want to admit your flaws and that you made a mistake.  

Answer 9

Because you have done something wrong sometimes its sort of embarrassing.  

Answer 10

Sometimes, we're afraid that

we won't be forgiven.  It's hard

to humble yourself, and then

be told no.

Still, if you error, take that

step to ask for forgiveness.

You'll feel better for having

done it.

Also, you never know

who is watching.  

You could be setting

an excellent example.

Answer 11

Asking forgiveness is easy. The hard part is getting past your pride and admitting you made a mistake.  

Answer 12

because its hard to admit that your wrong. I'm not to sure, i had to ask for forgiveness today from my girlfriends mother, because i stayed the night and got found sneaking out the house, alas i had to go back to her house, and the hardest thing i found to be was courage, i couldn't bring myself, but after awhile you find you pass that point of no return and you just deal with it.

Answer 13

I think we tend to have people in our lives who do not have it in their hearts to forgive us. Everyone makes mistakes during their lives, and I think people find it hard to ask for forgiveness because we fear the person saying no.  

Having the capability to forgive others for their wrong  doings in our lives, is a priceless quality.  

Thanks for reading!

Answer 14

Why FORGIVING and ASKING FOR FORGIVENESS  are so hard ?

In my case, forgiving is harder, and I've been working on it for many years. I have lightened up  A LOT when a friend of mine emailed me this:

Many people feel that forgiveness is a gift.

It is a gift! not to the one you are forgiving, but to yourself.

By forgiving the people who have hurt you in the past you set yourself free from the chains of resentment and other harmful emotions running rampant through your mind, body and spirit. By forgiving you are empowering yourself by  taking away the control the other person has over you. You will heal deep-rooted pain that perhaps you thought was gone a long time ago but has survived, living under all of the resentment that you have held onto for so long. By forgiving you are one step closer to your journey of self-growth and healing.

Answer 15

I think that the hardest part about asking for forgiveness is getting to the place where you have passed the "blame everyone else for the problem" stage, then the "it's all my fault" stage and finally to the reality stage where you are ready to take real responsibility for only your part of whatever happened. It takes courage to go through all those stages, because sometimes it hurts emotionally.  No one wants to go through emotional pain on purpose if they can avoid it.

Answer 16

That is funny you used the word "courage" for asking forgiveness.  Dr. David R. Hawkins, spiritual teacher/healer, was once in the practice of psychiatry and devised an arbitrary map of human consciousness, that denotes positive and negative energy on a logarithmic scale.  Calibration 200, the level of Courage and Integrity, is the where energy becomes positive, life supporting and represent power and truth;  like at 100 degrees liquid becomes vapor.  Below is the level of pride and the varies levels that represent force, falsehood, non life supporting.  These level are determinable through the muscle testing technique of kinesiology and has been demonstrated thousands of time in front of lectures of numbering in the hundreds, sometimes thousands.

In his book Dr. Hawkins teaches that the ego holds on to it positions too tightly, out of fear of not being 'me' and and subject to dying, thus ego positions are heavily defended.  Because the ego is obsessed with being right rather than dedication to truth it becomes prideful and would   rather die than admit it is wrong.  

Dr. Hawkins teaches that forgiveness can be chosen at anytime if one decides to.  To practice forgiveness to become unconditionally forgiving, even to oneself, is of great benefit unlike any material joy.  Over time the adoption of a forgiving lifestyle becomes who one is.  We can see that everyone can only be what they are or else they would otherwise.  To adopt an attitude that people 'ought to know better' fails to see that if they did they would choose better (That is the significance of the scale of calibratable levels of consciousness and the kinesiology test).

Furthermore,  we can now have a sense of compassion for others and the world, thus making forgiveness a natural way of being.  Also adopting an attitude of humility (not as in humiliation or embarrassment) is of great benefit.  The ego resist each and every time the opportunity to choose these option presents itself because of it self  interest and fixation on retaining 'me'.  To also forgive the ego is a wise decision as it too is only driven by its innate nature.  To adopt the ego as a pet to be discipline and realize that forgiveness does not mean approval brings about great ease in life.

Answer 17

God knows our intent. We are forgiven before we ask.

Can we forgive ourselves is the question. In time I think we can try to resolve this and do what we can to make amends as best we can. This maybe the motivator to be the best we can be, to do the will of God, knowing that our will had not served us very well.

For me the will of God is living by Truth-Beauty-Goodness.