I believe in forgiveness, but I conceptualize it much the same as the pp who said they are striving for acceptance. Forgiveness to me is merely recognizing that the infringement was "set up" to occur, and if the transgressor was capable of making a better choice they would have. This isn't an excuse for what happened, rather a way of keeping what happened in perspective. Of course my WS "should" have told me she was being contacted by my friend in secret. She didn't. Her context at the time, the misinformation and misperceptions she believed, her FOO issues, our recent relationship problems, my depression...all of it mixed together in this huge clusterf*&k that resulted in her making a choice that at that time seemed the best option for her. Without adjectives, judgment or my own feelings, that is exactly what happened. It sucks. It was very hurtful. She "should" have been more evolved, more self aware, more trusting...but could she have been? Obviously not, or she would have made a better choice.
Forgiveness goes beyond that for me, too. I have probably "forgiven" her in my heart, but not yet in the relationship. I cannot offer her that gift until I feel that she has humbled herself to the point of telling me everything that happened and risking the discomfort and conflict in a gesture toward the deeper emotional connection we both deserve in our relationship.
Forgetting is bullshit. I've always said that. Our memories are how we gain wisdom and experience. We are not wired to forget, which is why dementia and Alzheimer's disease are so devastating to us. We ARE our memories. We require mistakes to grow. The person who says they've forgotten should not be trusted, actually. Even if we don't consciously think about what has happened in our lives, every experience shapes how we later behave. It is our responsibility to determine if the experience will affect our behavior toward others negatively or positively.
Forgetting is the antithesis to learning and growing through this experience. I am recognizing the mistakes I made in the relationship and my own arrogance in the security I felt with the belief that this would never happen to me. I bit my own self in the ass by becoming complacent. I'm not the reason it happened, and I didn't deserve it, but it can't go unnoticed that I learned these things about myself. If I forget what happened, then I will forget the important lessons I gained from it.
Will I ever trust that way again? No. I'm coming to terms with that, because it was a nice feeling. I wanted it back for so long, but it was merely an unrealistic illusion. For a while I thought it a bad thing that I would never feel that way again, but now I see that it was silly. It's not that I've resigned myself to a station in life where I can't get that security, rather I'm recognizing that the level of security I felt was not appropriate for any relationship. We are not and never were completely safe from ruin. If we remember that then we treat each other with respect and compassion rather than relying on imagined bonds that will keep us together no matter what.
As I go through this (and I'm a Christian, too) I am realizing that my respect for Eastern philosophy is growing. It recognizes the dynamic nature of human relations, the need to live in the present, and the awesome power of accepting the things we cannot change. It focuses on letting people "be" who they are and trusting the information they give you.
"When you are depressed you are living in the past, when you are anxious you are living in the future, when you are joyful you are living in the present." --Lao Tzu
