Love as a Business Strategy by Mohammad F. Anwar

Author:Mohammad F. Anwar
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2021-04-02T02:30:02+00:00

Yes, Forgiveness Is Blind

As hard as it can be to ask for forgiveness, offering forgiveness can often be even harder. When you feel you’ve been wronged or hurt, it can be difficult to let go of that feeling. It took two full years after Mohammad embraced love as a business strategy before his team in India could forgive him for the hurt he had caused before. Even after Mohammad realized the extent of the harm his actions had caused and offered an apology, it took a leap of faith on the part of his team to look past that hurt and be willing to forgive.

This is the power of the apology. In order to forgive, we must be able to see the goodness in the person we are forgiving. A sincere apology helps bring those qualities front and center, whereas we otherwise might only see the flaws and weaknesses of the person.

That said, we don’t always have the benefit of a dramatic apology to consider whether a person deserves forgiveness. In fact, often we receive no apologies at all for the harm we perceive others to have caused—and they might not even be aware they have caused it!

In situations such as these, practicing forgiveness can be especially tricky. It’s hard to forget when we’ve been wronged. It’s hard to let those feelings of unforgiveness go. But it’s crucial that we do so. If we don’t, we risk harming the very people who have harmed us.

As we said in Chapter 3, unforgiveness is the root of all misbehavior. Unforgiveness compels us to lash out at our teammates, to verbally attack or emotionally abuse them, to play mind games and punish them, to become apathetic or disassociate from our jobs. Unfortunately, no form of misbehavior or act of revenge can release you from the hurt you are feeling. Sure, you might feel some temporary satisfaction by yelling at someone or playing mind games, but that satisfaction is fleeting—and when it’s gone, you’re right back where you started—or even worse off.

Viewed in this light, forgiveness isn’t something we do for others, but something we do for ourselves. It’s a way to release ourselves from our pain, to overcome the grudges we hold, and to find peace both within ourselves and with those around us. One of the best approaches we’ve found to initiate forgiveness is through service. When you are able to serve the very person who has caused you harm, you learn to empathize and connect with that person—through empathy and connection, you will find it in your heart to forgive them.

To be clear, this forgiveness may never be reciprocated. Just as a teammate may never know they have harmed you in the first place, they might never recognize the work you put in to forgive them and move past that harm. At first glance, this might sound like a hard pill to swallow, but in reality, it also doesn’t matter. Even if the act of forgiveness is only for you and no one else, it’s still worth the effort.

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