Can you forgive and forget?

Yes. Slowly.

yes as Jesus says ” do not forgive 70 times, but 70 times 7”

It depends on the situation, but I have forgiven friends and given them a second chance.

Yes. I’m so gullible.

Why do I need a friend who betrayed me? Why do they need me? We can both make friends with people who suit us better.

Forgive, sure. Forget, absolutely not.

I lost a girl in sophomore year of college to a friend. Things were “almost over” over between me and Peggy but I was hanging on by a thread and then Gerry began taking her out.
I did not speak to him for two years.

At some point after graduation, after she dumped him too, we began to talk occasionally and the friendship re-developed over the years.

That was over 30 years ago and we now speak at least once per month.

Holding a grudge over a long time just wears you down sometimes..

SRM

I got forgiven by a friend once. It was awesome. I wrote her a letter telling her how wrong I had been. I sided against her with another friend. When the other friend played the same game on me I realized what I had done. I was truly repentant and wanted to make it right. She was very kind to extend me forgiveness. She didn’t have to do that.

It depends how much you like the friend. If you really like her, then you may well want to be friends again. If you don’t really like her that much, this can be a good time to let it go. You don’t have to stay angry, but you also don’t have to be her friend.

I forgive because I would want to be forgiven. A grudge only affects the person holding it.

Yes.

Wait.. What was the question ?

Forgive, 100%. Forget, not so much.

In the type of situation you are talking about, I probably would forgive and forge ahead with the friendship. I may not be so quick to depend upon that person in the future, though.

Forgive? Yes and maybe be friendly again.

Forget, never. You cannot go home again.

When is it forgiveness? When you say, “I forgive you?” When you start calling and hanging out with them? Or is it when any niggling doubt or hesitancy in your mind has been put to rest?

Seems to me that there’s forgiveness in name, and then there’s forgiveness in fact. I say it’s very difficult to forgive; harder to forget, but that those goals are not necessary. It’s good enough to hang out and be able to have fun. The rest comes later.

@daloon: very true.

My best friend and the love of my life got together shortly after she and I broke up. I still feel very sad about it. This is almost two years ago. They’re still together, last I heard. They both want to be friends with me, and I’m still carrying pain around it – too much to be willing to be friends with them. I wish I could forgive.

NO, when you burn your bridges you can’t rebuild them.

I think more specific information is needed for the situation. It really depends on the two individuals, the length of the friendship, etc. I had a very close “best friend” from age 8 untl 19, when I finally decided I couldn’t give her any more chances. While we still talk occasionally (maybe once every couple months through facebook or by happening upon each other in public), things will never be the same between us because of all the things she has done to me emotionally. I have moved on with my life – going to college, getting engaged, working – and she remains stuck in her old routine of drugs and alcohol, burning and using friends, and partying. There are billions of people in the world, and sometimes friends outgrow each other. There is no harm in making new friends and simply keeping the good memories you’ve had with an old.

Another response – you can’t forget but you can forgive and if you can’t forgive completely, you can forgive partially.

But there is no point in holding onto grudges -

Try to understand it when your father who was 80 at the time was still so mad at his sister for something that happened ten years earlier that he would not go visit her when she learned that her cancer had become terminal. That was in 2002.

When my father died last year, he was still mad about the whole thing and Aunt B… had been dead for over 5 years.

Grudges are self-poisoning.

Forgive what you must,
Forget what you can
You will all find out that life is too short for this kind of nonsense.

SRM

unfortunately I don’t things are so cut and dried as forgive and forget…as other people have stated it is possible to do both partially I feel…sometimes subconsciously and sometimes consciously…

i think its something we should try to attain but probably will always fall short of carry it out fully at the crucial moment. I really try to forgive people…and at the time i generally do…but that doesn’t last i don’t think… – for example…you might think you have forgiven and forgotten…but I reckon we always carry some bad history round with us (I’m talking about seriously soul and emotionally damaging stuff…not…“someone drank my cup of tea today” of stuff) and when that bad stuff comes back to bite your butt…you gonna remember how hurt you were and it will still be there…

@trusting life…that’s exactly what I’m on about! respect to you and my heart goes out to you…can’t imagine how painful that must be….:-(

i can forgive but i can never forget! that’s one of the problems i want to work on…

Some things yes, some things no. My s/o lives by the maxim “Forgive, but never forget.”
Some things are too serious for me to forgive. If, say, someone deliberately poisoned my cat, I would never forgive. Or at least not until the day that cat is restored to me, alive. And I think that’s the 12th of never and that’s a long, long time.