Releasing Resentments in Your Relationships (Past or Present) with Brenda Reiss

Hello, I'm Dr. Zoe, host of Stronger in the Difficult Places. I'm so glad that you're here today. Today we're talking about releasing resentments in your relationships, past or present, whatever's going on. I don't think that we can live a couple decades, at least in our life, without being in relationship with people and eventually having some resentments. And most of us have some that we need to let go of. So today I have a guest. Her name is Brenda Reese. She is the country's leading forgiveness coach. Did you even know one existed? She's been featured in a lot of media outlets, including TV to radio shows, and she can help you learn how to forgive yourself and others. Listen in. Brenda, I am so thrilled to have you on today. And I know I say that about a lot of my people, and I'm usually thrilled to have people on, but you and I have a connection. We were in a mastermind together, and I haven't seen you in a while, and it's just so good to see you.

Oh, it's really good to see you. You always light up my heart whenever I see you, Zoe. So just know that.

Thank you. Thank you. Well, I'm excited about this topic, getting rid of resentments in your relationships. And so can you just share with us how you got onto a path of radical forgiveness working in this field, in this place, which I think is just such— I've never heard of a forgiveness coach until I met you. So I'm just excited.

Oh, thank you. Well, I hadn't either. In fact, I didn't even really know I needed forgiveness. In this way, uh, because it kind of found me, which I love how that works, you know.

Yeah.

So what led me into it was, uh, my third divorce. So, you know, I'm pretty much a good expert on relationships, I think, now. But, but in that third divorce, it, it took me to a place I had never been before— on my knees Because I had become so heavily codependent.

Yes.

And, you know, which we can talk about, which I discovered through the forgiveness work that I did, you know, coming to realize I'm the common denominator. So maybe it's not all their fault. But what led me there was trying to do it myself. I was trying to figure out how to forgive him and move forward. Right. I needed to do that. So I was trying these different ways, but every time I saw a Metro bus, I would get triggered. And the reason is because he was a Metro bus driver. So we all have these little triggers— songs, smells, people, you know. And, and it wasn't working, you know. Time was going on, like, let time, you know, let time happen. It'll, it'll heal. Time heals all wounds. Well, so they say. Because I was still feeling, uh, victimized. By him, by a betrayal that happened, and I just I just didn't know how to move on. So I was doing my best, and and then I had I had taken two years to work on myself and figure out what the you know what was underneath this, finding out all sorts of great things, becoming stronger. Decided to date. Yeah, I decided to date. Okay, and so I'm going through going hmm, still kind of picking the same kind of guys. What's going on? But getting better. At catching the little red flags, as I think a lot of people can relate to, and then getting better and better. And then finally, I was about ready to give up. It's like, I don't know about this. And then I was introduced to my current husband. And so I was like, well, fine. My girlfriends had gone, hey, just go to lunch. I was like, okay, fine. And I think a lot of people can relate to that.

Yeah.

And then it was because it was amazing because we hit it off. And I said right away, all right, here's the boundaries. I'm setting boundaries. We can— I cannot meet every day. We're not going to talk every day. We are going to talk these days. And if— and that I'm not in it to play around. I'm in it to find a person that I want to spend my life with. So— and everything has to be on the table. If you're game, let's go. If not, bless you.

Okay.

And he's like, okay, well, reason I'm telling you this was because It was in this process that my body started to break down. And because of what I learned was in my job, which was my dream job that I had finally gotten as an executive assistant to a vice president of a very large company, I was always the assistant, right? Never willing to be in the light. You know all that.

Yeah.

You know where that comes from. And so it was like, oh, so he was just like my ex-husband. Who was like my other ex-husband. My boss was common.

Yes. Yes. Right.

And so, and I wasn't catching the pattern until, you know, I was having ocular migraines. My hands were going numb. I wasn't eating well, sleeping well, body breaking down. Ended up because it was him, you know, my current, my husband, uh, who wasn't my husband at the time, but says, you know, I like you on the weekends, but I don't like you during the week.

Interesting.

Yeah. Good reflection. Naturopath going, you need to take time off all of this stuff. So I ended up with a neck fusion and a back fusion within 6 weeks of each other.

Wow.

And in that time was when I found we were going to take a trip in between these surgeries because the back surgery was pretty intensive. And like Mount Shasta came to mind. I got this little pamphlet about Mount Shasta I'd never heard of, never been, never, you know, and in the back of it was a little advertisement with this picture of this woman. And I didn't even see anything. I just saw the picture. I'm like, have you ever done that? I was like, I need to know that person. And, and it's like, there's something about her. And then I saw forgiveness coaching.

Oh my goodness.

I said, I don't know what that is, but I need to know it. And from there, you know, it was history when she found a pattern that no one else had been able to find after years of therapy. I went, oh my God, do other people know how to do this? And she's like, not enough. And I went, okay, sign me up. So that's what started me on this forgiveness path.

So that started your journey. And I assume through that process, you uncovered so much that you were still holding on to that maybe you thought you weren't, because that happens often. Yeah. And I'm so glad that you mentioned your boss, because I was just talking to a client about this, I think 2 clients, and I think I might have talked to somebody on a podcast about this. Is this concept of people will say, you know, if one person tells you something, you can listen, but you don't necessarily need to consider it. But if like 3 or 4 people tell you the same thing, then— but here's the caveat. A lot of times people who are codependent, people who may be empaths, surround themselves with narcissists, gaslighters, people who are not being honest with them. And so if you have a boss who might be a, you know, a toxic person, if you have a husband who's toxic, if you have kids or friends, then it's not surprising that they're all going to be telling you similar things about yourself that aren't true. Right. And your response is to think you should believe them. And so often we just imagine that the world is this way because our boss is this way and our husband's this way and our friends are this way, when actually you've drawn that and created that for yourself because of your own issues. Yes.

Yeah. That's what I learned. And you said it so eloquently.

Oh, wonderful. So can you tell us, as a forgiveness coach, I mean, you work with women doing this. Why do you think it's so hard for women to release resentments? And I'm saying women because that's most of my audience, but it's everybody,

right? Yeah, it is everybody, actually. And So this is what I discovered for me, and studies show this, that with resentment comes an identity.

Okay? Yes.

So this is one way to look at it, um, that with our resentment intact, we know who we are, right? A person who's been wronged. And there's power. We feel power in that, right? Because we're looking for power. And with this comes a sense of, you know, that solidness and purpose, and we feel right. Rightness, and I've got some strength in there which feeds my anger and my victimhood. Right. You can feel that.

Yeah.

But to let go of that resentment, I have to let go of being the identity as the wronged one. And whatever strength, solidity, and sympathy I was receiving, because, you know, our society is all about, oh, yeah, he's so bad, or she's so bad, or, oh, yeah, honey, you are so right. You know, we feed each other. And, and that can be a benefit because, you know, as people, we— it's either a cost or a benefit is why we continue to do things or not do things. So that's almost like a benefit. And a lot of it's unconscious, as, as I learned and you just mentioned, you know, it's like it's unconscious. So, but what we're really wanting in holding this resentment underneath it all is we're really wanting to be seen and heard and acknowledged. And know that we matter because that's not something we got in the past. Oh, but we, we've— yeah, because we feel like we need to punish that person to hold this space, right? To be right, because otherwise we get swallowed up in the emotion.

And we feel like we're going to lose control. Brenda, that is so powerful. And so for a woman out there who's listening, I want you to just sit with what she just said. Because those words might be hard to hear. Because it— so many times I will ask a client, why do you think you're holding on to this? And the answer is, well, I don't know. Right? I don't know. Or actually, actually, what I actually ask is, how does this benefit you? And often the question— It doesn't benefit me. It's like, it's this burden that I'm carrying. You know, I can't forgive them, but it doesn't benefit me in not doing it. When you just spoke, Exactly what the benefit is. And it might feel bad to identify yourself with that. I don't think it's a bad thing, right? Because that anger does in some ways give us power in a place where maybe you felt you had none. Yeah. But I think it's so important to recognize that now, assuming the thing is over with, you have your own power and you don't need that to wield over someone else.

Wow.

Wow. And so you kind of answered a question I was going to ask, which was about whether people can be addicted to anger and resentment. And what you just said, you know, the longer you hold on to this, the more it becomes entrenched in your identity, right?

Yes, definitely. And keep in mind that whatever we do over and over again, right, we're getting a benefit from. So we're getting a dopamine hit. Right. So what I realized, I wasn't dealing— I didn't even realize how angry I was in my divorce until afterwards. And so I'll have to tell you a quick story. So I realized how angry I was when I had to move out of our home. I chose to move out of our home. I moved into this little rundown apartment, right? Because that's all I could afford at the time. And I was just angry and hurt. Fixing a desk, you know, one of those pressboard desks, and putting it together and hammer and nail. And I went to nail it and I missed the nail and hit my thumb.

Oh,

okay.

Uh-huh.

I went into a blackout rage.

Wow.

I kind of came to a few minutes later. The desk was torn apart. I had been just like ripped at a pressboard, which is pretty heavy, and I was crying, but then I was kind of laughing going, wow. It was this huge, beautiful— it was a release. It was scary, but it was this huge release. And I had been holding all of that anger. And then I got to learn how to process it properly.

Right.

But that anger that I was holding on to was feeding me, was benefiting me because I could aim it at other people or things or at— big one— at myself.

Yes.

I couldn't do it right. I'm not good enough. I got to look better. I got to be better. I got to try harder. And that's what all came out of that. Just once I kind of blew the top off the volcano, then I could take a look at what was inside. But remember that anger is like an addiction and that it feeds the same as we would shopping or gambling or drugs. Um, we get that dopamine hit too from it when we're not handling it. Properly, right? And so, and then the anger can feed into the resentment,

right?

Right. So they're feeding each other. So we stay bitter and angry. And that's not what we want.

It's not what we want. And when you were describing that scene, which I could almost hear was coming, I thought, I'm so glad that you got that release. Because imagine if you hadn't. Your body is carrying that. And so for someone out there listening, if you haven't had that kind of release and you know that you hold on to some anger and resentment, think of what it's doing to your body. And we know there's health consequences, right? Let's talk about some of those consequences of holding on to those resentments.

Well, that's what led to that. My bone, my body breaking down. I went into adrenal fatigue because that happened. And then as I'm trying to recoup, because it's like a snowball snowball, right? It's like a snowball coming down the hill. It's like it's going to come to a point. And even though I started to take care of myself and do better with my thought process and physically, it still was catching up to me because I was still kind of feeding it in the I'm not good enough with the boss. But still, years. So years of anger and resentment break your body down. But the health, they talk about that resentment and anger can make your blood pressure higher. It can feed into depression and anxiety, the mental health, but it's also the physical health. You're exhausted. You don't have the energy to go in. And sometimes we can isolate, right? Because it just feeds. It's just like fungus or mold just kind of grows. And it really does affect us.

It does. It does. And sometimes that isolating is even just about protecting ourselves because we've created the story about the world, right? And we don't want to get hurt anymore. And so We're protecting ourselves. So, yeah, what are some of the processes of learning to forgive? I'm sure there's a woman out there thinking, okay, well, yeah, that's me. I see it. I know that's going on.

Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. So there's a lot of people that talk about forgiveness. So there's different ways to approach it. And so I wanted to say, I'll talk about mine, the way that I learned, because it just changed my life. But there's other ways that you can go about it, too. And a lot of people use prayer. A lot of people use, um, the Bible. They go, you know, use church services. Any kind of community can be helpful. Any kind of ways of being able to get it out of your body is really important. Yeah. Um, and to address it, because the thing I want people to really kind of think about is don't ignore the resentment, don't fight it, don't shove it down. Right?

Right.

Look at it. Look at it. Be willing to look at it because we're afraid of it. Right. And I'll talk about why in a minute. But when we— the process that I teach that I fell in love with was the Radical Forgiveness process. And there's a book out there for people who want to check into it. And it's called Radical Forgiveness by Colin Tipping. And then I took the 2-year course, uh, to learn how to, to teach it. And so the process is a 5-step process. Now, when I started this, I was definitely more in my head, and I think you can relate. It was— I was afraid to be in my body, hence why my body was breaking down, right?

Mm-hmm.

I was going, going, going, proving myself based on those beliefs that I'm not good enough and not paying attention. Right. Not paying attention as I could have. And so what really resonated with me was a process. And that's what this radical forgiveness gave me. So I call it— it's like gives my head something to do so my heart can heal.

Right?

Yeah. Because I needed that. I was afraid to go into my heart. I was afraid to be in this body that— because there's been abuse. Right? There's been all kinds of abuse. There's been neglect. There's been all these things, and I was afraid to feel, hence the volcano of the anger.

So that's why people are afraid to forgive, is because they're fearful of the way it makes their body—

The feelings. Because we're not taught. We're not taught to allow the feelings. I love it now that, that my youngest daughter is really— she's teaching her kids Preteens, you know, like how that it's okay to have the feelings. In fact, feelings are information. However, we— some of us are afraid if we open that Pandora's box, we're not going to quit crying, we're not going to quit grieving, we're going to fall into this abyss and not be able to get out. But that's just our brain telling us that to keep us safe. That's all it is, right? When it is lies. But when we have somebody with us. That's, that's why the benefit of the coaching, when we have somebody with us that says, hey, I'm here, I'm going to hold your hand, and we're going to go into this together. We can go into the cave together. I got flashlights, I got food. Yeah. So the process was a 5-step process that sounds simple, and it cannot be easy because of that feeling the feelings. But the first thing about this forgiveness process is Telling the story. Okay, so we've told the story millions of times in our head. We're tired of our story a lot of times, but sometimes we're feeding off of that story.

True.

So what I tell clients is this, is like, I want to hear your story. It's the victim story. I want to hear it. You tell it this way for the last time.

I love that you label it. You label it the victim story. So you're naming it and acknowledging that that's the space that they're in, but still giving them permission to tell it. That's beautiful.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Thank you. So it's true. And to be able to go— so they're like, for the last time, you're telling it for the last time this way. And that's valuable. It's like, oh, it provides a little bit of relief. So they get to write it out or speak it out or however, mainly writing, because you know how that is so healing. But then the second step, taking them into— as they're writing the story, I encourage them to the best to feel the feelings. That's number 2. The second step is like, feel the feelings. Now, we spend a lot of time on that because a lot of people will write out the story, but they're afraid to get into the feeling of it.

Right.

So then I encourage, and I use tactics like, okay, what worked for me was the tennis racket to the couch, the tennis racket to the bed, right? The exercise or a hammer to a desk. But I don't recommend

that. I like the tennis racket or even a bat, something where it's not actually damage and destroy things you've paid for yet.

Yes, the bat is okay, but I was going— I hit myself in the back with the bat because it was bigger, right? So the tennis racket is a little easier on the body.

Got it.

So yeah, so that, you know, we encourage different exercise— stomping, you know, yelling, giving ourselves gentle, you know, depending upon how they, how they work. Some people like explosives, some people do not. Some screaming in the car or in the pillow works great, but different ways to be able to get— because We want the anger because we really want what's underneath it. Anger is that top cap so that we can get underneath the

anger.

Sadness.

Yeah.

And the grief.

Yeah.

And we are a grief-illiterate nation, so we don't even know how to handle grief.

You're right.

Right?

Right.

So being able to get to that And it take— it can take a little while, but once we can get there and we can at least tap into the feelings, then the third stage we can do is collapsing the story. So this is where, like, this is— I love this because you're separating fact from interpretation. Fact, you know how facts are simple, you know?

Right.

It's kind of like my husband, you know, we had an infidelity. And, you know, and I couldn't handle it. Fact.

Right.

Interpretation. I'm not good enough. I need to make myself better. I'm not lovable. No one's ever going to love me again. He's the only person that will love me. You know, that's the story. That's the suffering.

Right. Right.

So it's in our stories. A story. If we just look at the facts, separate those, and then here's all of the interpretation. It's like, oh, wow, this is big.

Yeah.

You know, that's those beliefs and just the storylines. And so, um, you know, I, I'll tell— I'll go to the 4th stage and then I'll tell a story. But the 4th one is reframing it. So that's what makes radical forgiveness a little different, because— and, and this is what we build up to, because this is the part where we get to be willing to be willing to look at it differently, because radical forgiveness is all about shifting your perception, which changes your energy.

Beautiful. Okay.

When I'm holding onto a victim story, it's everybody else's fault. I'm not taking responsibility. There's no other reason for this to happen. If I look at a reframe of it, maybe it didn't happen to me, it happened for me. It does not mean that I haven't been victimized because a lot of us with abusive situations, we've been victimized.

Sure.

Do I have to hold on to that? Can I glean something from it to help me help others, to help me move forward, to help me do things? And so looking at it from this perspective of maybe, just maybe, if I looked at it from like a 10,000-foot level, huh, maybe that's what led me here today.

Wow.

Maybe that's what I can take from it and learn from it. Right? So that's the reframe. And then the 5th stage is all about integration. So you're integrating all the time, but you're bringing in What do you want your new story to be? We're reframing that first step number one, that victim story into a victor story. Like, how do I want to move forward?

That's beautiful.

Well, thank you. And it came about when I was going through that process real quick with the forgiveness coach myself. She found patterns. And this is what I love to do with people, and you probably do too, because when you're listening to the story, if somebody's listening to you, that they love it or they're trained to do it, where we can pick out the bits and pieces and go, oh, I see the pattern. We can connect the dots.

Mhmm.

She asked me about my life, right? And she said, how many times you've been married? You know, how many times your jobs, kids, all this stuff. And so, you know, it came down to, well, my first job was 10 years. My second job was 20 years that I was in at the time. My first marriage was 5 years. My second was a little over 5, and my third was 10. She said, what happened to you when you were 5? You have a pattern of 5 in your life.

Wow.

I had not heard that before, this number pattern. And I said, well, my dad left. I said, my dad left me. He moved into another family, right, who had a daughter. Same— we were a month apart. He would pay attention to her and not me. So interestingly enough, When we dissected it and we looked at it, it's like, oh my gosh, the story was my— but the fact is my dad left my mom. I don't know why. I'm not sure what their problem was. Dad left mom. The interpretation was every man that I love is going to choose another woman over me.

Right

now, I didn't know it at the time, right? So this is looking backwards where I could see it happen in every single relationship.

Wow.

Everyone.

That's mine.

Either choose either. Yeah. Either an infidelity or choosing somebody over me or a job over something because I'm not lovable, I'm not enough.

And that takes us full circle to that magnet, that energy that we talked about in the beginning that we create in our life. We recreate these things. Wow.

Yeah. So that's a long-winded about forgiveness, but that's what helped me find that number pattern. And doing these 5 steps, Zoe, is what— because there's There's tangible tools. There's a worksheet that we— that I go through so that they— people can empower themselves. But it takes, you know, it takes someone believing in you at first to help through it. Because my heart hurt, you know, my heart was hurting. And when, like you said in the beginning, ooh, this can be hard to hear.

Right.

But once we can learn to take responsibility for our part.

Yes.

Right? It changes the game.

It does. It completely changes the game. I remember, and I've shared this on my podcast before, the first time a therapist asked— I'm trying to think of what he said, but basically he pointed it back to me like, that's you. Like, why are you choosing that? And I remember I got angry because I was thinking, well, no, this isn't for me to fix. It's that person's to fix. But when I finally attached it to, wait, this is my life, right? And I'm in this relationship. And so I do have a responsibility here.

Yeah,

it was mine. It was completely life-changing. But it took me getting through that anger first, because what I want to do is push away and be the victim.

Right.

Instead, when I took ownership, it did. It definitely— it changed my life. You know, Brenda, what I love about this whole framework for forgiveness is pretty much never once did you talk about the other person, right? No, it's not about them. It's not about— it's not about releasing them. It's not about, you know, for, you know, it's not about them. It's about you.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah,

all about me. And the reason why, too, is what I learned. And this is hard for some people, um, to ease. I like to ease people into it, but it's the fact of mirroring.

Mm-hmm.

What's being reflected for me? And this is what I learned. Now, it's, it's out there, right? A lot of people talk about this, but it— I learned it when I, when I took the training 10 years ago for the radical forgiveness. And that was That if I'm willing to look at relationships are for healing and growth, what is this other person mirroring for me that I have denied, repressed, or rejected about myself?

Beautiful.

What have I stuffed down? Right. Granted, I mean, we needed to for survival and defense mechanisms. We needed that. But what can I be willing? And that's where I went, that's the anger outburst. My ex was angry all the time, angry at the world, angry. And I would do everything in my power to try to make everything okay and keep it down, all the while not acknowledging my own anger for things that had happened to me and my decisions and choices in my life. Right. I was holding that all down. But he, he had his own stuff. I'm not saying he isn't— he doesn't have his own things to work on. But my part for him, for me, oh my gosh, was to see how angry I truly was.

Yeah.

And, and we can look at it through everything. So now I look at people, it's like when I get irritated or agitated, I can go, okay, they have their thing. However, what can I learn from this for myself? Where am I not loving myself?

Right.

Where am I frustrated at somebody else is doing, you know, where am I jealous? Why am I jealous? Are they doing things that I'm capable of that I'm not doing? Like I did in business. I did that a lot. Like, I get upset at people. Like, look how successful they are. Well, you could too, Brenda, if you would, if you worked on the inner game and be able to touch into the heart. And what is it that you really want?

That is beautiful. Beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. I have one last question before we end, and that is, when should we not be focused on forgiveness? Which might be a weird question. But the thought came up for me.

Yeah. So right after the hurt, and even for a little ways. So the beauty of being a human being is that we have our emotions. And the one thing that we didn't or weren't able to do, a lot of us in childhood, was be able to experience the full spectrum of the emotion. You know, learning, like they talk about neuroscience in different places, talk about that if you allow an emotion to go through your body, it's 90 seconds to 2 minutes.

Wow.

It, it gets hung up because we've never learned to do that. So, you know, it— we don't let it process. We stuff it down, or we eat, or we go and we do stuff. We make ourselves active, busy, all those things. So the best thing to do is to learn that I get to have my emotion. It's okay. My feelings are mine. Right? And that no one can tell me any different. It doesn't matter. Don't feel bad or wrong about it.

Right.

Feel the hurt, feel the anger, feel all of that first. Right? And then you can, as it subsides and you talk— I highly recommend talking with a trusted friend or a coach or therapist, right? To be able to talk and be able to work through that. Then as it lessens, you'll feel it. You'll know it's time to forgive when you can feel some space within you. And, and it's, you know.

Yeah. So it's almost, it's almost part of the process, though, of forgiving, right, is releasing it. So not force yourself to work through the forgiveness process, but just let yourself feel and know that you are moving forward. As long as you're not trying to push it down and get stuck in that place. And I think there's a part of us that knows when things become redundant, right? When we— when we— I think we know a difference between sitting in something and feeling something.

Yes.

And so we need to give ourselves space. And the other caveat I would say is, if the transgression is continuing to happen right now, that's not the time. To work on forgiveness. That's time to figure out how to get out of the situation. The forgiveness comes after.

It definitely does. It really does. And we know when we're tired of hearing the same story, when we're— when we feel stuck in it. But it's like there's a little opening that happens, you know, in us to go, I think I'm done. Sometimes somebody has to reflect it back to us. It's like, I am done hearing your story. I think it happened to me. I'm done. You need to be done. You need some help. It's like, oh, okay.

Yeah. If someone's telling you that, that definitely means something. And if you find that you're saying it to your friends, or in my case, I've said that to my therapist, I'm tired of talking about this. Yes. And so that tells you, I'm done with this. I need to figure out how to move through it and forward. Brenda, you are just a light, and I'm so glad that you are here today to share your wisdom wisdom in such a beautiful way with the listeners. So thank you so much, Brenda. How can people find you? How can they work with you? Because I'm sure there are women out there that are thinking, I need a forgiveness coach.

Yes. So check me out on my website would be the best place to go. BrendaReissCoaching.com. I'm also on Instagram @BrendaReissCoaching if they want to check out some— I give a little advice and tips. And yes, and if they want to get more information, I have workshops that I do that are on my website. Uh, I've got one coming up in March. It's a self-forgiveness, self-acceptance workshop for 8 weeks if they want to check it out. And, and yeah, I have a coupon code that I can send to you, um, if you want to add that. If people are interested in it, there's a coupon code for $50 off. Awesome.

Thank you.

And I look forward to connecting with, with anybody.

Wonderful. We'll put that in the show notes. Thanks. Before we close, Do you have one last word of encouragement for a woman out there who's— or a man, sorry, I always say women, but majority of my audience— but for someone out there who's realizing that they really need to work on this forgiveness thing, that they've held this resentment for way too long?

I do. I have. I just, I like to do a reminder, and that is forgiveness releases us from the bondage of the past. It's not about forgetting. It's taking the sting out of what happened so that when we have the memory of it, it doesn't consume us and keep us stuck so we can move forward. It allows us to look upon the past with compassion, and it helps us release the anger and the hurt and the blame because that discolors how we look at our life. And forgiveness liberates our minds and our bodies and our souls, and it removes the fear of being ourselves. And it's not for the other person's benefit. We only have control over ourselves.

Correct.

Not others. Right. I mean, that's important because we forget that. And holding on to the hurt and the pain doesn't make them feel our own pain.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

All forgiveness is self-forgiveness. Right. All forgiveness is self-forgiveness. And if we can just— we don't even have to believe it. Just be willing to be willing to, like, look at it differently. And it can make a huge change in our life. The first one is feel the feelings and be able to share the story with someone for the last time that same way.

That is so beautiful. Thank you so much, Brenda.

Thank you.