Question Do you forgive people easily ?

[smoke]

I am very intollerant of people being late...probably because i am always earlier for everything (i'll probably be early for my funeral, which is a scary thought).

Ricky Gervais said something very funny about people being late: no excue is good enough.
"My grandmother died"
"...well, you knew she was ill"

 

[Doc]

Forgive and forget are not a part of my vocabulary.

Doc:ramen::happy:

 

[lexico]

Sorry, I picked non japanese WOMAN! can someone change it please?

Some repressed libidinal force surfacing ? Freud didn't believe in mistakes.... sorry, just couldn't help it. I don't agree with him on that.

And if someone didn't have a good reason to betray me, there is no need to apologize, as I won't give him/her a second chance. I won't be angry, I'll just forget about him/her.

Is not being angered something you've learned ? Or do you transform it into forgetting as a trade off ?

I'm usually more vengeful; would rather keep him/her around for some bashing (non-physical). I'm more moving towards A. B. C.

A. "Don't get mad; just get even to get it over with."
B. "Totally cut off the relationship."
C. "Talk it out till I'm satisfied."

After a while I can forget (the pain), but the momory of breaching is there. So I could never revive a dead relationship.

 

[Doc]

Some repressed libidinal force surfacing ? Freud didn't believe in mistakes.... sorry, just couldn't help it. I don't agree with him on that.
Is not being angered something you've learned ? Or do you transform it into forgetting as a trade off ?

I'm usually more vengeful; would rather keep him/her around for some bashing (non-physical). I'm more moving towards A. B. C.

A. "Don't get mad; just get even to get it over with."
B. "Totally cut off the relationship."
C. "Talk it out till I'm satisfied."

After a while I can forget, but the momory of breaching is there. So I could never revive a dead relationship.

Lexico I can understand where you're coming from. For me I can forgive a person for what they did to me, but I can never forget, and that alone will prevent me from trying to revive the already dead relationship. I don't hold grudges much, and I'm not that vengeful. However, I will never forget when a person backstabs me in a relationship killing it off completely.

Doc:ramen::happy:

 

[ralian]

I've read about a person who forgave the murderer who killed her child.
I could not believe it, but it was a true story. She said, "I forgive him".
You might say, "Is she mad?"
At least she is free from the anger.
Anger kills us, really.

 

[Revenant]

Agree with Brooker. And actually, I forgive even those that don't ask forgiveness. I forget, and it's very hard for me to maintain hard feelings towards anyone.

To me, it makes sense anyways, as forgiving is letting go of negative feelings towards someone. Anger isn't exactly a happy emotion, so to be living the exerience again in memory, one also relives the anger. Worse yet, is that people always try to justify their feelings. People start to look for supporting facts to justify their feelings. It's unobjective, and is detrimental to happiness, in the way that, humans for the most part can only focus on one thing at a time. So you are focused on anger? How can you then also be focused on that which could make you happy?

I do feel closer to someone who sincerely apologizes. Anyways, my Japanese wife often says, I don't say I'm sorry often enough. I give reasons for being late, but it's just not a conditioned response for me to say sorry.

The other thing I was wondering, is that once, I was doing a TV conference lesson, and couldn't get the camera to connect with theirs. I was late by 10 minutes, and apologized, saying, my apologies for being late, but I couldn't connect. The students later called my boss, and complained that I was late. My wife said, that by saying sorry, I was accepting responsibility for being late. Therefore, the students assumed it was completely my fault.

Anyone else have any similar experiences?

 

[Maciamo]

In Italy, to keep the bella figura, when one is late for an appointment (which is frequent there), it is often better not to apologise but make up a story as an excuse and try not to take the lateness lightly and humouristically. It is almost the exact opposite of the formal apology with bowing and no excuse that the Japanese expect.

 

[monrepo]

I would forgive someone only if they apologized.

 

[Kinsao]

Hmmm... it's difficult to answer the question.
Usually I can forgive people very easily, because I think if you carry on to be angry for a long time, it gives them power over you. If you can forgive them, you can be stronger than they are and you are free from them.

But, I think it is much harder to forgive someone who has hurt badly someone you love.

 

[CC1]

But if you are late for something isn't your fault? I mean no matter what the reason, if you had left 5 minutes earlier you would have been either early or on time! So if you are late, you should be apologizing right?

 

[Maciamo]

But if you are late for something isn't your fault? I mean no matter what the reason, if you had left 5 minutes earlier you would have been either early or on time! So if you are late, you should be apologizing right?

What if you couldn't leave 5min earlier because of somebody else. You could be caught up in a meeting with a customer that you cannot end easily whenever you want. You might have been delayed by an annoying police officer that wanted to check your bicycle registration (made me arrive 5min late to an appointment on 2 occasions in Japan). You could have had an emergency to deal with (anything from a sudden urgent need to go to the toilet to calming your wife because you forgot to pass the vaccuum cleaner before leaving). Today I was 5min late to an appointment because of unusually dense traffic and bad luck about train timing.

Yet, in any of these situation, few Japanese want to hear justifications, even if it really isn't your fault. I have understood that and just apologise. Whenever I try to add an explanation, they typically dismiss it as unnecessary. They feel like I am making something up and just don't want to hear it. I only know one Japanese who is constantly late (something rare in Japan), and always find some pretty bad and quite unbelievable excuses (even rarer) like "the train stopped for 10min at the station" (once I could believe it, but 5x in 2 months ?).

 

[Kinsao]

If I'm late for something, I just say "sorry I'm late"... I will give the reason if I think it's relevant, something that might hold up other people like "there's a bad accident at the roundabout". But usually I don't give the reason because it sounds like you're making excuses. :kanashii: When I'm on the "receiving end", I generally assume that people don't want to be late, and therefore must have been held up by something outside their control. I'm not curious as to what that was, just as long as they say "sorry" out of courtesy.

With a mobile, if there's a train delay it's easy to let people know in advance if you're going to be late, I think that's basic politeness too.

 

[Pachipro]

In Japan a sincere apology is taken most seriously. A wise person can tell if the person is sincere or not. It is the act of apologizing that is important. Apologizing for being late for class or a date or missing a meeting shows that you are taking responsibility for your actions. In Japan I would expect someone to apologize as that is the custom.

Here in the states an apology is rarely given as, an excuse, whether true or not, is the norm. Still, I would expect a sincere apology and if none were given I would be wary of that persons true intentions.

In my case I tend to "forgive and forget" which is why I have been taken advantage of in the past. We are all human and mistakes are bound to happen. No one is perfect all of the time and circumstances beyond ones control do come into account. However, fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, or thrice, shame on me.

 

[Reiku]

Hmm...

...well, I do find it hard to forgive people--vengeance is just in my nature I guess.

But personally I find a good (and true) excuse to be better than an apology, though usually I'll still be pissed at the person regardless. I guess you could say there is a certain degree of seperation between my emotions and my intellect, so what one knows does not usually carry over to the other.

Still, I don't particularly care if someone is "sorry". Feeling bad for having done something wrong just shows you aren't a sociopath--guilt doesn't absolve you, nor is it any indication that you won't do the same thing again.

If it honestly wasn't your fault, however--and you can prove that--then there's nothing to feel guilty about, the wrong was not committed by you, you were just another victim of it.

For example, a person who is late to work because someone had a traffic accident and the freeway was closed off isn't at fault, so there's no reason to apologize.

But a person who tearfully begs me to forgive them for staying home and smoking pot instead of coming to work is asking for a swift kick in the teeth. Ill bet you're sorry: You're sorry you got in trouble, deal with it. That was the choice you made and you shouldn't have decided to do it if you couldn't accept the consequences.

A person who skips work that just tells their boss honestly shows a lot more character and responsibility than one who thinks they should be forgiven because they "feel bad" about what they choose to do. I'd rather have an employee who weighs the consequences before acting and doesn't chose to do things they will regret later, even if working for me isn't their top priority.

 

[Thor]

I forgive people very easily. I give them three chances. If they do some serious injustice to me, that will be one chance gone for them. Three strikes, and you're out? Yes!

 

[Riyko]

The only way I will forgive someone is if they explain themself to me and explain everything without lying.

 

[sl0thmachin3]

I may forgive easily but I do not forget. Also, apologies make forgiving easy. I find it hard to remain angry for long and it's too troublesome anyway to be angry. Your day is ruined and you get stressed and morally tired afterwards. I feel it is better to just let things slide especially if the person gives a sincere apology. Acting like nothing happened though really pisses me off.

 

[PRIZMATIC]

:blush: Only Jesus Christ forgives... (or Buddha)
People can agree only whether or not with the apologies brought to him...

 

[Takaryo]

No.

If I forgive them, they'll just do the same thing all over again.

 

[Mitsuo]

I am really easy going. If something pisses me off, then most likely I will have already moved on within the next ten minutes or so. But I rarely hold grudges (the only way I get revenge is by doing better then that person.) Kind of like that saying "The best revenge is living well". I do like apologies though. They have to be sincere and face to face. I am a pretty straight forward guy, so if I want to say something, then I will. And the only way that I will apologize is when I know I'm wrong or feel that I provoked it. If I apologize to anyone, then it will only be sincere. I will not give a phony apology.

The only time I will not accept an apology though, is when they keep repeating the same thing that made them apologize in the first place. Also, backstabbing is one of my pet peeves. I hate it. Once I am betrayed, it will take awhile for the betrayer to get back on my "good" list.

So, I guess what I'm trying to say is....It depends on the situation. Took me awhile to get there, but I did.