...to forgive is a valuable gift to yourself, according to Stanford University psychologist Carl Thoresen. His team has built a six session group treatment to help people forgive. A study of 259 adults who took part saw stress, anger and sympotoms such as headaches and stomach upsets go way down, compared with a control group. Positive effects remained six months later.

Forgiveness doesn't mean forgetting or condoning offences, or even reconciling with the offender, Thoresen says. It means giving up the right to be angry. The programme emphasizes:

• Shifting rigid personal "rules" for how people should behave to "preferences," and accepting no adult can control another.
  
• Seeing the hurtful incident from a neutral viewpoint.
  
• Moving from blame to understanding, and then moving on.

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Healing Power of Forgiveness