Forgiving Other People's Incapaccities

Forgiving Other People’s Incapacities

"Forgiveness involves faith in a love that's greater than hatred, and a willingness to see the light in someone's soul even when their personality had harbored darkness." Put another way, this spiritual teaching encourages us to learn how to forgive other people's incapacities. 

I recall a conversation with my wife to whom I incessantly complained about the lack of duty and commitment in a relative.  This guy always withdrew from anything he said he would accomplish. Somehow, a conflict arises.  On this occasion, he exhausted my goodwill.  As my judgmental tirade rose in crescendo, my wife calmly said, "Honey, you have to forgive people their incapacities."  Her rebuke actually helps me to resist the tendency to condemn people who suffer with character defects different from mine.  With a sober perspective, I am able to consider the reality that my relative and similar types of people do not intend to disappoint anyone.  Simply, they are unable to exceed internal reserves of character, limits of knowledge or lessons from their prism of experience.  They are not bad people.  They need further personal development and spiritual growth. 

Impatience with other people’s shortcomings inevitably leads to a judgmental attitude.  It is very easy to condemn within someone else the personal inadequacies we attempt to hide through the construction of a public persona.  Focusing upon someone else’s faults enables us to avoid self-evaluation.  Usually, we maintain an air of moral superiority as we adhere meticulously to the dictates of a code of personal piety.  Typically and not surprisingly, the tenets of an individual moral code are sins, difficulties and quandaries we have overcome.  Thus, it is easy to judge someone who still suffers with these issues.  An alcoholic with years of sobriety may forget the very long days and even longer nights of early recovery.  As a consequence, he may harshly speak about drunk drivers without any appreciation that he may be one had he not been given the gracious gift of recovery.  How soon do we forget the days of struggle and pain when we begin to live during periods of smooth sailing and sunshine?

Recently, I listened to a lengthy discourse by my adolescent son who was given the coveted position of coaching his peers in basketball.  My son breathes, sneezes, coughs, eats, digests, regurgitates and sleeps basketball.  Upon awaking each morning, he proceeds directly to the nearest television in order to listen to any ESPN news updates relating to basketball.  Nevertheless, he expounded passionately and vociferously about the character deficiencies, laziness, lack of motivation and numerous shortcomings of two players in particular.  “They need to understand that as basketball players they are supposed to do what is necessary to win.  On some games days in college and professional basketball, players travel for many hours and long distances but still have to play that night.  You don’t complain.  You suck it up and win the game.”  My son further criticized his players’ failure to study the game plan and give extra effort.  After patiently listening to this tirade of sorts, I asked my son to apply his thorough and sincere critique to his academic performance.  He responded to my suggestion with marked chagrin.  In turn, I told him that every criticism he offered of his players and peers his mother and I could equally proffer relating to his inadequate academic performance over the course of the last two years.

My son’s ability to see clearly the incapacities of her peers whom he coaches without any inclination toward self-reflection is myopia in its purest form.  Despite his twenty-twenty vision accuracy in analyzing the shortcomings of others, he was unable to discover similar personal areas for growth.  His blindness as it relates to self-improvement perfectly demonstrates the behavior of someone who refuses to forgive other people’s incapacities.  Often, we may suffer with very similar issues but different variables.  Rather than contrasting assets and liabilities with other people, we seek common ground with them.  Realizing our own imperfections affords us an opportunity to empathize with them.  Seriously considering the hard facts and tough choices that other people face, we may discover that we would choose as they do when confronted with parallel challenges.  We delude ourselves into believing our choices would necessarily be morally superior and ethically pure.  In a similar vein, my son applauded himself for his preeminence in basketball when compared with his peers; yet he fails to apply his wisdom and strategies to his academic performance.  In that comparison, the same peers whom he chastises actually earn better grades than he does notwithstanding his intelligence and knowledge because he refuses to apply himself with the same passion he exerts on the basketball court.

A practical and effective means of forgiving the incapacities of others is accepting their limitations.  Simply put, stop expecting people to perform beyond their abilities, strengths and talents.  Allow them the liberty to offer a sincere and significant contribution regardless of its quantity or quality. Acceptance creates more peaceful and personable relationships as people do not expect someone to be anyone other than who he is.  Further, we discover sympathy for people when we grapple seriously with realistic circumstances of the context in which they live.  Their “prism of experience” may distort their understanding of morality, truth and justice.  In many instances, no one invested in their personal development and spiritual maturity;  their ignorance is genuine.  Their uninformed way of being in the world deserves our compassion, patience and forgiveness instead of condemnation and judgment.