How to forgive someone who has done the unthinkable

THERE’S a lot of lightweight twaddle out there about forgiveness, but if you really listen to people who’ve made sense of both small and big tragedies, you’ll hear stories of forgiveness that are as rich and dense as a proper chocolate cake.
Forgiveness isn’t a decision, a single act or a feeling. It doesn’t mean forgetting what happened or making excuses for it. It doesn’t wipe the slate clean, it’s not weak and it doesn’t let anybody off the hook.
Forgiveness never happens overnight.
Forgiveness is a practice; it’s the work of finding what there is to learn from a truly awful situation, so the road you walk along doesn’t keep leading you back to your pain over and over again.
If you’re interested in forgiveness, here are a small number of big steps that can help with the practice of making sense and letting go.