Epitome Anatomy: FORGIVENESS
EPISODE SUMMARY:
"Do it not to appease other people, not for the one who wronged me; I forgive not for them but for myself."
Forgiveness is a deeply personal process shaped by betrayal, memory, and the choice to move forward without carrying resentment. Through honest storytelling and thoughtful insight, Wish shows how letting go can become an act of self-preservation, clarity, and peace.
Reference from this episode:
Forgiveness definition on Greater Good Magazine, UC Berkeley
Listen to the Episode
MAIN TOPICS:
00:00 — Why forgiveness feels so hard
01:23 — What forgiveness actually means
02:26 — Personal stories of betrayal and hurt
05:15 — Forgiving for yourself, not for them
12:27 — Release, reconciliation, and moving forward
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Wish Ronquillo Peacocke (00:00.024)
We are all investors in life. We bank on meaningful relationships with most people around us with each encounter, whether random or common or close, and that comes with either a reward or a heartache. There's always an outcome in boy boy that they can be so ugly sometimes when someone wrongs us in the littlest or the most humongous ways. It's so infuriating or it leaves you in shock.
The result will always be different too, but this is where the biggest pressure from it will be. Are you willing to forgive? That's a loaded question. Welcome to Human Thesaurus Presents Epitome Anatomy. My name is Wish, a retired tech operator, Indie author and
Cat Mom and Self-Aware Life Explorer. Epitome Anatomy is an opinion piece on the power of words and their ethos that I extracted from this life. Ready for the epitome of forgiveness? Let's go. Our keyword is forgiveness. Psychologists
Generally define forgiveness as a conscious, deliberate decision to release feelings of resentment or vengeance toward a person or group who has harmed you, regardless of whether they actually deserve your forgiveness. This is according to Greater Good magazine of UC Berkeley. Forgiveness stems from the old English word forgiefan, meaning to give up, allow, and
Or remit a debt. It is a compound of the prefix for- meaning completely or away and giefan meaning to give. Therefore, the etymological root of the word translates literally to giving completely or giving up, the desire to punish. Top synonyms for forgiveness include pardon, absolution, mercy,
Wish Ronquillo Peacocke (02:22.198)
And clemency.
There are a lot of people in my past lives I'm a cat who did shitty stuff to me before. I'm not a victim, but that does not mean that it erases my history of a few people, a few characters who took advantage of me. I remember one who made me homeless, penniless. Thankfully I've got friends who saved me at that time.
I'm still friends with them by the way, but not that person. there's another one who was so emotionally abusive of me that I almost lost myself or who I am. I also had an ex who was a serial cheater and now in prison in the US for murder. That's a different story another time. I had a few who took advantage of my kindness because they were perpetual victims. They see me as evil.
projecting all of their shortcomings and made me the villain of their own stories. And there are a lot of people who did a few different betrayals to me one way or another. There are lots of bad people out there, but good people still outweigh them at the end of the day. So in terms of forgiveness, I will read to you one thing first before I go on. I will continue this
Paragraph that I got for the definition of forgiveness. This is from Greater Good Magazine of University of California, Berkeley. To quote, just as important as defining what forgiveness is though, is understanding what forgiveness is not. Experts who study or teach forgiveness make clear that when you forgive, you do not gloss over or deny the seriousness of an offense against you.
Wish Ronquillo Peacocke (04:20.876)
Forgiveness does not mean forgetting nor does it mean condoning or excusing offenses. Though forgiveness can help repair a damage to relationship, it doesn't obligate you to reconcile with a person who harmed you or release them from legal accountability. accountability. In terms of forgiveness as a whole, my stance has always been consistent.
I've been reflecting on this when I was writing my intro script, how I forgive. I was also talking about forgiveness with my friend Sophia the other day. She was she's also based in London. We were talking about her past in my past, and there's a theme of how we forgive or how we don't need to forgive. Reflecting on all of these.
Going back, circling back to my stance, it's always been consistent with me throughout life how I view forgiveness. I know for a fact that I do not forget that the bigger events, the bigger heartache, painful events are not forgotten in my life. In terms of forgiveness, I normally, well regularly or always.
Do it not to appease other people, not for the one who wronged me, but I forgive not for them but for myself. One of the formative word here is release. Forgiveness is equals to release. And forgiveness for me is inwards. I base on time. I know that I have to go through process to go through this forgiveness for.
Forgetting or moving on and all of this. So I go through the process of replaying those things sometimes in my head and trying to find imaginative, most creative ways of eliminating this person in my life. Just in my head. You know, it's cathartic to do that. I'm sure you do too. So I go through the process of vengeance in my head, but it's only in my head because in real life.
Wish Ronquillo Peacocke (06:44.384)
I know for the fact that karma takes the lead when it comes to vengeance. I don't need to do anything. Because if that person has a bad behaviour who did me wrong, at some point life will catch up to them. Lessons will be learned or not. Most of the time not, but it doesn't matter. I believe in karma and I leave it up to there. I don't need to do anything.
So another part of my process is I need to come from a place of my personal peace. Sometimes I make peace with the situation. Normally when someone wrongs me, I give them time. Also, I don't go back. I just walk away. That's part of being Piscean or again, I I will quote this again and again I suppose. Don't push a kind person to the point they don't give a fuck.
Because this is what happens. You just walk away from them. Let I just let time pass through to find that place of peace, release, or sometimes another formative word that I'm gonna use is indifference. Sometimes this situation is enormous. You know, it's enormous, it's painful, it's debilitating. All of these like negative parts of
Heartache. You go through life, you get more perspective. You know, I will connect this with some of my episodes, which you can listen to again about friendship or closure. So you combine all of these things and you become indifferent, or sometimes we only knew what we knew at that time, that what we move on and experience more in life, that we realise what.
paint us at that time or who robbed us at that time. Yes, we recognise what happened there, but it doesn't matter to you anymore. Because you've moved on through leaps and bounds that it didn't matter anymore. That does not mean that you've forgotten completely. Or sometimes you know there are some little things that the indelible mark of that person is like, that person is annoying or that
Wish Ronquillo Peacocke (09:06.638)
person was so horrible. That's a horrible person. And then someone would ask, did what did they do? I actually can't remember anymore. I just remember the feelings of it. I don't know, but I just remember that that person is back. There are also major turning points in our lives where someone did us some shit and that leaves a mark. I remember this very clearly. Remember the one who got
Me homeless and penniless. I remember this 20 plus years. This happened 20 plus years, but I will always say the same exact thing. I will never ever be like her. This is my hallmark card moment. When that happened to me, I remember that's what I said. And I will keep on saying that now. So whenever I self-check with just a tidbit or a teeny tiny
Fragment of her behaviour that I'm doing, I will cut myself off immediately. Because I will always stay true to myself that I will never ever be like her. Have I forgiven her? Have I forgotten her? Be my guest. There's just no resentment towards it. I think I made peace with it quite a long time ago. I'm not resentful.
I am actually at this point, I'm not even indifferent about the situation or the person. When she gets mentioned in a conversation, I'm not indifferent, I'm not angry at her, but I feel more at this point in my life, after 20 plus years, pity. Pity for who she was and perhaps is. I still hear some stuff about her and looks like nothing much has changed with the behaviour.
But I pity her. What a very sad place to be at. Now that some of the people who wronged us in the past gets mentioned, part of the process at least for me is when I accepted that that happened and I moved on. I accepted that sometimes some of those people could still trigger me when they get mentioned.
Wish Ronquillo Peacocke (11:30.178)
They trigger me in a way that yes, you've moved on, no more resentment. But when they get mentioned or doing something to another person that I know or care about, of course I will react. Because I know it by history. I know what happens and I could predict it already because I've learned from it. So I do accept this is where that I don't forget factor is coming from.
I usually don't forget most of these big events only because I've learned from them and I want to be better than what it was. I don't want to become like them. I want to be a better person. I don't want to be the villain. I don't want to be hateful. I don't want to be a perpetual victim. I don't want to be a murderer. I don't want to be emotionally abusive. I don't want any of those things. I only remember because of the lessons that
That I've learned from them. Again, in the matter of forgiveness, it's very much for me inwards. Forgiveness is equivalent to release for me when I release the person. I don't expect to go back to any of the damaged relationship beyond reason. And some of the relationship that I gain back, it's only because I humbled myself down or it's a completely situation altogether. And sometimes some forgiveness.
With reconciliation happens genuinely, it's because it was salvageable. And some people are just suckers going back or reconciling. Maybe it doesn't need to be. Or maybe it does. This is how complex some things are. But as complex as they are, there's always a way to simplify them. We don't need to overload ourselves with too many burdens of the past.
We have to offload so that we can live in the present and appreciate what we have right now because we are alive. And if you're religious, your reasons may be different. The society or your church or your beliefs may advise you to forgive. And perhaps that's a good thing. It's a good reminder too. It's really more of how are you gonna release yourself with this negative emotions that you have?
Wish Ronquillo Peacocke (13:52.866)
So regardless of religion or or not or or something else, we need to save ourselves from resentment because of other people's bad decisions. How about you? How do you forgive? Are you the petty kind or the mature kind? Please comment. I'd love to hear from you. I have a direct message via text or voicemail on top of each of my episode summaries, so please check them out.
And also check out my other back episodes. Until next time, ciao!
Wish Ronquillo Peacocke (14:39.822)
Comment, like, subscribe, and share wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also visit humanthesaurus.co. That's where my show notes are. Epitome Anatomy is produced by me and Jeremiah Ronquillo. Music by Ketsa UK. All rights reserved by Wishblizz Media. Thank you, and see you in the next episode.
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