example of this. In the failing to get even syndrome, a person fails
as an adult in order to unconsciously keep himself in a position
where his parents must continue to support him or else feel guilty
for not doing so. Unfortunately, this resentment can be carried for
decades, not only robbing people of enjoyment of life but also pre-
venting them from achieving their desires.
Forgiveness is the path out of the lack caused by resentment.
Forgiveness means giving up the right to administer punishment—
whether the punishment is directed toward yourself or toward an-
other person. Forgiveness frees you from the grasp of the
resentment, which keeps you dragging along the unpleasant as-
pects of your past in your current life.
Nancy was a struggling real estate agent. When she started work-
ing with me (PL), her credit card debt was out of control. She had a
recurring pattern of real estate deals falling through at the last mo-
ment, which resulted in an income that fell short of her bills.
When we discussed this, I discovered that whenever she got a
commissionable listing contract, she tended to cease prospecting
efforts to find new clients until the deal in process was either com-
pleted or fell through. She told me that the deals usually fell
through for rather bizarre reasons that weren’t mentioned in the
contracts. When either the buyer or the seller pulled out of the
deal, there were usually threats of lawsuits and bitter words.
When we discussed this, Nancy realized that she had uncon-
sciously re-created her childhood relationship with her father in
her real estate clients. She also saw that her natural childhood ten-
dency to rely on her father as her sole source of financial support
caused her to cease prospecting efforts as soon as she had attained
one commissionable contract. Her father is a wealthy investor who
uses money to control his daughter. Over the years, Nancy often
asked him to rescue her from the financial jams she created. Strings
were always attached to the help he offered. Nancy told me that, as
any past discussion with him about him giving her money pro-
gressed, he would keep adding conditions to the “gift.”
Sometimes she accepted the “gift” and its conditions, but in
most cases she had declined his offers of help. In these cases her fa-
ther would become angry, making dire predictions about her finan-
cial future and abilities and threatening her with disinheritance.
I asked her whether she was willing to accept the fact that he
would never help her in any reasonable adult manner. By forgiv-
ing her father, she was able to disconnect her emotions from his
Acceptance 65