First published on KSL.COM

SALT LAKE CITY — In this edition of LIFEadvice, Coach Kim shares the different ways we argue, forgive and apologize — and how to honor each other's needs.

According to Gary Chapman, the author of "The Five Love Languages," each of us have a specific way we give and receive love. Likewise, we have a way we apologize and forgive best.

In my book, “The People Guidebook: For Great Relationships,” I explain how your unique values and fears make you different from other people and drive your behavior. In putting these different ideas together, I discovered there are four different ways we argue, forgive and apologize in communication with other people.

Read the “fighting styles” below to figure out the style that works best for you so you can see the pros and cons of it. You may also want to figure out the fighting style of your spouse, another family member or friend, as this will help you to resolve conflict and have difficult conversations in a way that works for both of you.

The 4 fighting styles

1. Long communicators with connection needed

These people are long talkers and always have lots to say, so they can argue or converse about a problem for a long time. This is fine, unless they are fighting with someone who is a short communicator (who can get easily overwhelmed or worn out by long talkers).

Long talkers often have a tendency toward a victim mentality and sometimes struggle to accept any blame or responsibility for a problem. They usually see themselves as the injured party. These people can get mean and ugly if pushed in an argument (which can be scary for less passionate and/or quieter people).

These people usually have lots of friends and highly value their connections. They often cannot resolve something and move on until they feel a close, caring connection has been restored. It’s easier for them to accept an apology after the person has taken responsibility for the slight or asked for forgiveness, or they have received validation about their feelings and feel cared for and reconnected again

2. Long communicators with restitution needed

These people are long talkers who need a person to restore their loss before they can let things go. They are very good communicators who can keep arguing for a long time. They are so good with words that they can twist the other person’s words around and use them against that other person.

These people tend to be very opinionated and stubborn. They have very black-and-white, right-and-wrong thinking styles, with no room for gray area. They are also very logical and practical (meaning not very emotional and sensitive) in how they see things. They can struggle to understand another person’s feelings if those feelings don’t make sense to them.

These people struggle to accept an apology until the other person has taken responsibility for the slight, asked for forgiveness, and has made some kind of restitution or major change in their behavior. If they feel taken from.

3. Short communicators with validation needed

These people cannot do long, drawn-out arguments, so don’t subject them to hours and hours of conversation. If you talk too much, they will start to shut down and will often say anything they have to just to make the conversation stop. If it doesn’t stop, they will pull back or leave. Don’t take this personally. It doesn’t mean they aren’t willing to work through the issue; it just means they can’t do it in one sitting.

These people don’t like mean, ugly, personal attacks or fighting that is loud and scary. These are quieter people who would rather avoid conflict. Angry criticism makes these people feel very unsafe. They need lots of positive validation before and after anything negative is mentioned.

The secret to engaging with these people is laying the ground rules before you engage. Tell them three things: how long this conversation will last (i.e. “30 minutes and no more, I promise”), how painful this is going to be (i.e. “I promise this is not an attack and you will get to give me feedback here too”), and what you are going to ask for in the end (i.e. “In the end, I am only going to ask you to change one little thing”). If you set up rules of engagement and stick to them, short communicators are more likely to stick with you and work things out.

These people cannot accept an apology until the other person has taken responsibility for the slight, asked for forgiveness, and has given them some positive validation about how good they are. If they feel like a failure at the end, they will struggle to forgive you.

4. Short communicators with restitution needed

These people cannot do long, drawn-out fights or arguments because they don’t have the patience for them. They are more likely to tell you off and then leave. Don’t take this personally. It doesn’t mean they aren’t willing to work through the issue; it just means they can’t do it in one sitting.

These people can get mean, ugly, loud and scary, but they won’t stay in that emotional state for a long time. They will explode and then cool down. This behavior can scare quieter people who would rather avoid conflict. Sometimes it will work best if you will let them explode and be mean, and then let them cool down before returning to the issue.

The secret to engaging with these people is to establish rules of engagement. Tell them the same three things from above: how long this conversation will last, how annoying or emotional this conversation is going to be (try to stay logical and practical), and what you are going to ask for in the end (let them know it won’t be asking for much).

These people cannot accept an apology until the other person has taken responsibility for the slight, asked for forgiveness, and has made some kind of restitution or major change in their behavior. If they feel taken from, apologies won’t matter until the loss has been restored or they see you have really been acting differently.

This information might be a game-changer in your relationship, because arguments and difficult conversations are only productive when both parties feel respected, heard, understood, and honored for their right to be them. You want to practice the Platinum Rule to treat people the way they want and need to be treated (not the way you want to be treated).

Don’t assume that the way you show up and handle yourself is the right way. It’s just a different way. Everyone has the right to be wired the way they are wired. Respect that and honor their differences and you can easily resolve most problems.

You can do this.

first published on KSl.COM

Question:

My marriage is struggling, and over and over one of us gets defensive and we give each other the cold shoulder for days. It is so hard to get back to love and feeling good when we feel offended, insulted or mistreated so often. Once those walls go up it’s so hard to get past them. What can we do to stop this cycle and end the constant offending and fighting?

​Answer:

First of all, I need to clarify that the answer in this article is for the person asking the question above, and in their relationship there is no abuse happening. The fighting is garden variety offenses and grouchy behavior where they trigger each other and get bothered on a regular basis. Obviously, if your partner is abusive, the mistreatment needs to be addressed and stopped immediately, and I encourage you to reach out for professional help.

If you and your partner get defensive all the time and often feel like the other person is the enemy, this article is for you.

People tend to get defensive when they feel mistreated, insulted, criticized, taken from or unvalued by the other person. These experiences make a person feel unsafe and threatened; in this state, a person tends to believe he or she has to defend or protect themself from the threat. But a sense of safety with one’s partner often has more to do with what he or she believes about themself than it does with how their partner treats them.

If you get defensive easily and often, you may feel unsafe in the world generally. You might have started feeling unsafe long before your partner showed up in your life. It might also be helpful to check for the following behaviors, which are signs of living in a subconscious fear state all the time, which means you might have a tendency to get defensive faster than the average person:

• Is your subconscious immediate reaction to many situations one of distrust and assuming the worst?
• Are you always on the lookout for signs of exclusion, insults or slights?
• Do you fear you might not be good enough a lot?
• Do you generally feel unsafe in the world and see the universe as against you (this might show up in fear of being robbed, hurt, taken from or disrespected)?
• Are you a glass-half-empty person who sees what’s wrong before you see what’s right?

If you experience even a few of the above tendencies, it’s likely you wear what I call "mistreatment glasses," which means you tend to see personal attack in situations even when it isn’t there. If so, you might need to own that you have some subconscious fear programming.

If you function in a fear state — always looking for slights — you cannot make your partner solely responsible for you feeling defensive. You can still bring up and discuss slights, but you should first run through the process below to make sure you are seeing the situation accurately. You should also seek out some coaching or counseling to work on your fear-based programming.

The 10-step process

When you feel slighted, insulted and/or defensive, follow these steps:

1. Own that you are feeling defensive, which means you don’t feel safe. Remember that your sense of safety with your partner may have more to do with what you believe about yourself and your life than you think. This means you must acknowledge that no one can make you feel unsafe without your participation at some level. Just be willing to own that your fears of failure and loss could be in play.

2. Ask the other person if they feel unsafe and defensive, too. Acknowledge that you understand that feeling and feel the same way. Acknowledge that this will be harder to resolve while you are both unbalanced and fear-triggered.

3. Agree that you are both safer than your feelings and your subconscious programming may believe. You both love each other and you both want this relationship to work.

4. Decide to be two people against the problem, not two people against each other. Agree to approach the problem by listening to how and why your partner feels the way they do. Commit to being willing to listen and really understand instead of trying to win.

5. Recognize your own fear trigger. Have you been fear of failure triggered — where you feel insulted or attacked by something, making you afraid you aren’t good enough? Or have you been fear of loss triggered — where you feel mistreated and/or taken from, ming you afraid you aren’t safe? Which are you struggling with right now? Knowing this will help you get balanced again.

• If you are fear of failure triggered in this moment: Remind yourself that your value cannot change no matter what happens or what anyone thinks or says. You always have the same exact value as every other person on the planet. Knowing this makes you bulletproof and less defensive.
• If you are fear of loss triggered in this moment: Remind yourself that nothing exists God did not create, and the entire universe is conspiring to bring you situations that will grow you. This offense is today's perfect classroom and it is here as a blessing to make you stronger, wiser or more loving. Trust the universe you are actually safe in this moment.
• If you aren’t sure which fear is driving you: Try both solutions and choose to trust in this moment that your value can’t change and this situation is a growth opportunity and the perfect classroom for both of you.

6. Recognize your partner's fear trigger by asking questions. Does he or she feel insulted or attacked? Mistreated or taken from? Give them some validation and reassurance to quiet their fear.

7. Now you are ready to talk about the issue that started the defensiveness. Be willing to ask questions about what happened and how your partner feels Listen for the purpose of understanding them. Keep asking questions and listening (without sharing your thoughts) until you can tell they feel really heard and validated.

8. Ask if your partner would be willing to listen to you and give you time to explain your thoughts and feelings without interrupting you. If he or she agrees, then go to step 9. If he or she doesn’t agree, tell them you respect that and maybe the two of you can continue the conversation later when they feel more able to show up for you.

9. Carefully share your thoughts and feelings. Avoid "you" statements because they can feel like an attack. Use "I" statements and talk only about your perspective, your feelings, your triggers and your observations. Also, make sure you’re focusing solely on future behavior and don’t waste time talking about the past, which your partner cannot fix or change. Ask if, moving forward, they would be willing to do this or that differently.

10. Repeat. At this point, your partner might have more to say. Go back through steps 7-9 again. Keep doing this until you can reach an agreement or compromise.

Remember, your spouse isn’t ever a jerk, selfish, mean, or careless; he or she is more likely scared, and it is their fears that drive jerky, selfish, mean or careless behavior. We behave badly when we are worried about protecting ourselves. Reminding yourself that you are safe, is critical to the process of working through a fight maturely.

These 10 steps show you how to have a mutually validating conversation without letting fear triggers make you both defensive. This may take some practice to master, but you will be amazed at the clarity it gives you both, when you recognize the fears and why you are feeling defensive.

If you have felt defensive and unsafe with your partner for a long time, you may need some professional help to work through forgiveness and making some big changes in behavior. I recommend getting professional help sooner than later. Someone who knows how to help relationships heal can make the process much faster.

You can do this.

First published on KSL.COM

Question:In your article on forgiveness, you mentioned that there are some situations in which we should forgive but definitely not let the person back into our lives. What does that look like to have boundaries? How do you handle that if the difficult person is a family member or a person you are forced to see regularly, like an ex-spouse or co-worker? Why do I have to forgive if they aren’t sorry and aren’t going to change?

Answer:You asked a few different questions, so let me answer them one at a time.
Why do I have to forgive even when the person isn’t sorry and won’t change?

I could give you the usual answer — that you forgive so you feel better — but the truth is that your ego feels pretty good about staying mad. Instead, I encourage you to change what forgiveness is for you. Forgiving in the traditional sense meant you had to pardon someone for their mistake, because staying angry or hurt causes you more stress and unhappiness than it does the other person. So, you tried to do this for yourself, even though the person didn’t deserve it. This kind of forgiveness is hard and it’s the reason most of us struggle.

However, if you completely change your idea of what forgiveness means and, instead of pardoning people, make it all about changing your perspective about the incident and life in general, you can totally change how you feel about the situation. This can be done easily, even when someone doesn’t deserve it or isn’t sorry.

The most interesting perspective shift to try is to decide to see life as a classroom and this person and their mistake as being something that will ultimately serve you and make you stronger, wiser or more loving. This means that the hurt they caused can be used to bless and serve you in the long term. If you see the difficult person as a teacher in your classroom and their behavior as something that is serving your growth in some way, you might find you don’t even need to forgive. You can just let it go.

How do you handle forgiving if the difficult person is a family member or a person you are forced to see regularly, like an ex-spouse or co-worker?

Forgiving and changing your perspective does not mean you have to associate with or have that person in your life. You can and should limit contact with people who are a negative influence, a drain on your energy, or makes your life harder or more miserable. But you can still have forgiveness and even compassion for them and how miserable it must be to live that way.

You can love them from afar. This means you don’t harbor hate that would keep you in a miserable state. You can release all that negativity and choose to trust God and the universe that you are OK and let this person go in peace, while also choosing to stay away from them.

You must give yourself permission to make your needs important. Taking care of yourself and making sure you are balanced and happy is actually your No. 1 job, and that isn’t selfish. Your job is to make sure your needs are met and your bucket is full so that you have something to even give other people. This will often mean limiting the contact you have with people who make you miserable and drain your bucket.

Ultimately, it would be great if you could get to a place where you could be around this person (when necessary) and not be negatively affected by them, but that doesn’t come easy. In the meantime, you should stay away from them and protect yourself from further abuse or mistreatment.

What does that look like to have boundaries?

If you cannot limit contact and are forced to associate with the difficult person, then you need to define and enforce some boundaries. Here are some questions to ask yourself that might help you figure out what boundaries are needed to make this relationship work:

1. What are some things I have allowed this person to do or say that upset me in the past?
2. What do I wish I didn’t have to do, but I haven’t felt comfortable saying “no” to?
3. What do I need to give myself permission to do in order to protect myself?

Maybe you have allowed a co-worker to waste your time or interrupt your work. Maybe you have allowed an ex-spouse to yell at you by phone or send nasty messages. Maybe you allow your mother-in-law to make you feel guilty for missing family gatherings. Make a long list of behaviors you have allowed in the past that are not working for you.

It is important to make some new rules and write them down. Just deciding in your mind is not nearly as powerful as putting them on paper is. When you write the new rules on paper, there is a different commitment level that happens in following them. Remember though, boundaries are rules you enforce on yourself to save yourself from your own weakness. Write down which behaviors you are no longer going to allow and how you will enforce it.

• You might write that co-workers are no longer allowed to distract or bother you while working, and you will make a sign for your cubicle that says: “I am focusing on work right now and cannot visit until later.” If they try to interrupt, kindly tell them you would be happy to chat later but have to focus right now.
• You might write that your ex-spouse is not allowed to yell at you by phone and you will simply hang up and/or not answer until they can be respectful. Hateful messages will be deleted without being read or listened to.
• You could write that you will no longer feel guilty for missing family gatherings that didn’t work with your schedule or life. Your mother-in-law can say whatever she wants, but you will no longer allow it to affect you.

That last one is a good example of a boundary you enforce with yourself. You cannot make your mother-in-law stop saying things or acting rudely, but you have complete control over how you react and feel about it.

The most important part of having boundaries and enforcing them is not letting other people’s reactions to your boundaries bother you. Chances are, they won’t like your new rules and they will make you feel guilty for having them. That is not your problem and, on some level, it isn’t even your business. You are in charge of your own behavior, thoughts and feelings; you are in charge of being the best, strongest, most loving version of yourself you can be. Focus all your energy on that and let other people deal with their own feelings or issues themselves.

Giving yourself permission to have boundaries is the hardest part, especially if you have been a lifelong people pleaser. This may take some time to give yourself permission to make your needs important without feeling selfish.

If you are dealing with a really toxic, difficult person, you might want a coach or counselor to help you process the emotions and learn to be easier on yourself. Be patient with yourself and just keep working on it.

You can do this.

This was first published on ksl.com
​
Question:
I am struggling with my brother who did something really inconsiderate, and I can’t seem to let it go. I know that it’s probably causing me more pain than it’s causing him, but I just can’t forgive him yet. My whole family is bugging me to forgive him, but it’s not that easy. Any suggestions to make this easier?
Answer:

There is a reason most of us struggle with forgiveness: There are very real benefits to staying mad or hurt. Here are some possible reasons you might not want to forgive someone:

• Does casting the other person as the bad guy make you feel safer and better than them? Are you fighting fear of failure, which makes you afraid you aren’t good enough? Sometimes the human ego compensates for a perceived weakness by casting others as worse.
• Does it earn you any sympathy or validation from others when you talk about how you were hurt? Do you find yourself trying to get others to agree with you about how bad the other person is? Does that make your ego feel safer?
• Does being hurt excuse some of your own bad behavior toward that person? Does it justify you treating them badly, and are you enjoying that on any level?
• Does it give you an excuse to be depressed or disengage from life or relationships? Is there something you are avoiding that might happen if you let this slight against you go?
• Do you feel casting the other person as “the bad one” protects you? Are you afraid that if you stop casting him as the bad one, people may forget his guilt and think you were bad?
• Do you feel like letting this go would be saying what the other person did was OK or that you are pardoning them from guilt?

After going through the above questions, can you see why you might be holding onto the offense in your situation?

Choose a mindset

Forgiveness may feel near impossible right now, but changing your perspective and looking at the issue a different way might make you feel completely different. In this situation, you have two perspective options and you must choose one of them. If you don’t consciously choose a mindset, your subconscious mind will choose for you — and it is usually going to let your ego drive.

Option 1: A judgment and condemnation mindset.

With a judgment and condemnation mindset, you believe life is a test and we (human beings) must earn a sense of value. Here, any mistakes you make count against your value, which means some people inevitably end up seeming better than other people. With this mindset, you see human value as changeable and based on our behavior, appearance, property, etc. In this place, there is judgment, criticism, attack, gossip, guilt and a constant fear that you aren’t good enough. This fear-driven mindset makes you focus on the bad in others and cast them as worse than you so you can feel like the better person. This mindset creates anxiety, insecurity, and fear of failure. If you choose this mindset, you will always struggle to forgive others because you must condemn them to feel safe and good about yourself.

Option 2: A trust and forgiveness mindset

With a trust and forgiveness mindset, you believe life is a classroom where humans are meant to learn and grow. In this classroom you can erase any mistakes and try again, and no mistake affects your value. With this mindset, everyone has the exact same intrinsic worth, and that worth cannot change no matter what bad choices we make. Bad choices just sign us up for some interesting lessons and create educational consequences you then get to work through — but, you always have the same value as everyone else.

With a trust and forgiveness mindset, insults and mistreatment happen to make us stronger, wiser and more loving, and you can believe there is purpose and blessings that come from them. Here, you can see the positives that each negative experience creates, and you are grateful for the strength and wisdom you gain from them. With this mindset, you don’t need to condemn others to feel safe because you believe you are safe all the time. With this mindset, you understand your value is infinite and absolute, and so is everyone else’s.

Forgiveness is easier here because you trust that you can’t be diminished, or have your journey ruined, because it is always the perfect classroom for you. When you trust the universe that it knows what it’s doing, it is easier to let offenses go and forgive.

The question you must ask yourself is: How do you want to live?

Choosing a trust and forgiveness mindset means you don’t hold onto offenses or mistakes. You let yourself and everyone else be a work in progress or a student in the classroom of life with much more to learn. You give forgiveness to others because you want to feel good enough yourself.

More tips to help you forgive

Here are a couple of other tips to make forgiveness easier:

1. Remember that none of us is perfect. This person did something wrong — and it sounds like this was an especially painful wrong — but you aren’t perfect either. You may not have made this mistake, but you have made others. If you want to feel forgiven for your past wrongs, you must give others the same forgiveness.
2. Now that the offense is over, you alone are responsible for the pain you are experiencing. No situation can cause you pain without your participation. If you struggle to understand this principle, read my article about choosing to be upset. You are in control of your thoughts and feelings. You don’t have to wait until you feel ready to forgive. You can choose to be ready now.
3. The other person is guilty of bad behavior, but you both have the same infinite and absolute value. This belief comes when you choose to see life as a classroom, not a test. It means your mistakes can’t and don’t change your intrinsic value, but the same is also true for other people.
4. Forgiveness is the key to happiness in life, and it creates peace, confidence and security. The key to forgiveness lies in one very simple choice that you must make over and over every day: Which mindset do you want to live in?

Choose to forgive yourself and others for every misconceived, stupid, selfish, fear-based mistake either of you has ever made. Choose to see these mistakes for what they really are: lessons born from confusion, self-doubt, lack of knowledge, low self-esteem and fear. Choose to see every person as innocent and forgivable, and let them (and yourself) start over with a clean slate every day.

If you choose this mindset, you will feel safe, loved, whole and good about yourself, and life will be more peaceful and happy.

You can do this.

This was first published on KSL.COM

​I was asked recently what changes in your people skills that would most improve your relationships. This is a great question, because your ability to create healthy relationships is the key to happiness in life. You can’t feel happy, fulfilled, and good about life, if your relationships are stressed, unsafe, or confrontational.
 
This is especially true with your significant other. If that special relationship is strained or in trouble, it can suck the joy from every other part of your life.
 
Below are my top five people skills tips that would improve your relationships fast:
 

1. Allow people to be different from you. You have a subconscious tendency to think the way you navigate the world, handle problems, and treat people is the right way and anyone who functions differently is wrong. If you will accept the idea that different isn’t necessarily better or worse, it’s just different, this one change could be profound. In my coaching program I teach there are 12 types of people in the world and every type has good behaviors and bad behaviors. None of them have only good and no bad. This means everyone has bad behaviors, even you. They are just different bad behaviors than other people have, but they are just as bad.
   
   The most powerful change you can make to improve your relationships is learn to understand how the people close to you are wired, how they see the world, and what their triggers are. Then, you can stop expecting them to act like you, and accept them more fully for who they are.

 

1. Give the benefit of the doubt.  The people in your life are inherently good. They have no desire to do you wrong or hurt you. When they do offend you, it is usually unintentional. It is usually because they were in a fear state and therefore overly worried about themselves (you do this too). It is a game changer when you decide to assume the best of them, instead of looking for the worst. Assume they mean well and were just clueless in that moment. Stop making them into the bad guy, remember we are all doing our best with what we know in that moment. It’s just that we need to know more.
   
   Give the people you love room to be a work in progress. We are all students in the classroom of life and we are never going to be perfect. Give the people in your life allowance to make mistakes and go easier on them when they make one, because you want them to go easy on you, when you make one.
   
   
2. Ask questions and listen, more than you talk. The heart of every relationship lies in how you talk to each other. If you talk more than you listen, you won’t have good relationships. Talking is all about you and is not loving or validating. Only asking questions because you truly want to understand and show love to the other person, validates their worth in your life. Listen to understand not just to figure out what to say next. Set your thoughts and feeling aside and really listen to what they think and feel. Spend time here and ask enough questions that you gain understanding about how they see the world and why. You will be amazed at what you didn’t know about the people you love most.

 

1. Be a safe place without judgment. What everyone wants most from their important relationships is safety. We all want someone who we are completely safe with, who has our back, knows our intentions are good, because they know our soul, and who sees the good in us, even on our bad, immature, of balance days. Be that person. Be the safest place in the world for the person you love. Make sure they can tell you anything and you will listen without judgment, understand, and not make it a about them. If you have trouble doing this, it is because you don’t feel safe in the world yourself. If you don’t feel safe, you will be overly focused on getting a sense of safety for yourself, and you will have nothing to give. Get some professional coaching or counselling to work on your own fear issues. When you are on solid ground yourself, you can focus on giving that to others.

 

1. Forgive and let the past go. Forgiveness becomes easier when you understand that life is a classroom and you always attract the people, who will be your perfect teachers. They are in your life to trigger your issues, push your buttons and bring your fears to the surface, so you can work on them. This means any past offenses, were the perfect classroom experiences you needed.
   
   Real forgiveness is about healing your perception around other people and their behavior. When you change the way you see them and the offense, you will immediately change how you feel about it. Choose to see any offense as perfect for you, and the pain will lessen. It didn’t happen to you, it happened for you. It isn’t a loss experience, if it was here to served you.
   
   Also remember, there is nothing that exists, that God did not make, and chance plays no part in His plans. This means you are safe in His hands all the time. Nothing can diminish your intrinsic value, nor bring you a journey that is anything less than perfect for you. In order to be offended, you have to believe that you are vulnerable in some way. If you trust God fully, you are never vulnerable and cannot be wronged. You can only be educated and taught.

 
I realize this may be a new and even mind blowing perspective for some of you, which might even take a while and some work to understand, but it is the path to amazing relationships and greater happiness.  
 
You can do this.

This was first published on ksl.com

Question:

My husband sent me your article about a victim mentality to read. I do have a hard time with that. My husband had an emotional affair with a co-worker a few years ago, and I am having a hard time letting it go, even though it’s been over for a while. How do you not feel like a victim when your husband hurt you, and now he also wants to blame you for what he did and the effects it has had on your family? We have gone to counselors but it hasn’t helped. Yet, he says my behavior is having a negative effect on everyone and everything. Can you help me change how I feel about his affair and let it go?

Answer:

The way out of a victim mentality when you have been offended lies in two things: 1.) Changing your perspective and trusting in the universe that this experience is here to teach you something, and 2.) Learning how to truly forgive others for disappointing you.

I explained how to change your perspective in last week’s article, now I want to explain why you might be struggling to forgive. The fact is, you may see "rewards" in not forgiving and as long as holding onto anger is serving you, then you may not want to change it. Forgiveness can only happen when you are ready to let go of these perceived rewards and grasp onto different rewards that are even better.

Here are some common perceived rewards for not forgiving along with the costs associated with them:

• Are you casting the other person as the villain so you can feel like the good one? Is staying mad giving you a self-righteous upper hand and allowing you to feel better than them?

COST: You might feel superior to the other person, but you may never have a healthy relationship with them that truly makes you happy.

• Are you getting sympathy or validation from other people when you talk about how you were hurt? Some people hold onto a victim story for this very reason but not consciously realize it. Do you wonder who you would be without this story?

COST: People may feel sorry for you, but they may never respect you or see you as strong or wise. Is that something you're OK with?

• Do you feel being a victim excuses some of your bad behavior because you were hurt and, as a result, you can’t help acting the way you do?

COST: You might earn sympathy this way but it can also make people lose respect for you. It doesn’t really excuse bad behavior either so you may still look bad to others if you behave immaturely.

• Are you afraid if you stop casting the other person as the villain then people may forget how guilty the other person is and they may even think you were to blame? Do you feel like letting it go would be saying "it's OK" and pardon them from their guilt? Staying angry can sometimes feel like a safe place from which you can maintain your position as the good person.

COST: People may lose respect for you because this isn’t mature behavior and you won’t be free from the negative energy staying mad creates.

Be honest with yourself, are any of these the reason why you might be holding onto an offense? Can you see the benefits you may be getting from staying angry and the costs you may pay for it? It is your ego that wants to hold onto the offense and stay angry? Sometimes your ego thinks it has to protect you from getting further hurt.

Instead of being the person your ego wants you to be, choose a different mindset around this situation so you can show up strong and loving. You have two options:

1. Stay mad

Play the victim. Don’t forgive. Let your fears create bad behavior that may push people away and make them lose respect for you.

This victim, fear-driven mindset may also keep you in a place of judgment toward others and yourself, which could mean you may want to put others down to feel better. In the end, you may not feel good about who you are. This judgmental mindset might be why you're being blamed for the effects his emotional cheating has had on your family. You might be creating negative effects with your reactive behavior. Sometimes, our reaction to the offense can cause more damage than the offense itself and we alone are responsible for that behavior.

2. Let it go

Choose to feel whole and safe. Forgive him for being a struggling student in the classroom of life and let this mindset create behavior others will respect.

Choose to see all humans as having the same value no matter what they do. You might not have made that mistake, but chances are you've made others. If you honestly feel that you can’t trust a person anymore, then you might need to make a decision about whether you stay in a relationship with them, but you should still do that from a place of forgiveness. In your case, it sounds like your husband deserves another chance to earn your trust back.

You can do this. 

Coach Kim Giles is a sought after executive coach, author and corporate trainer. There are many more worksheets to help with forgiveness available on my website https://www.claritypointcoaching.com/worksheetsdownloads

Question:

I’m a 40-year-old woman and I am truly struggling with the relationship between myself and my parents. From the time I was 19 to now, our relationship has continually gone downhill. I believe this has to do with differing life choices, values and lack of respect for our different views. At times I would like to resolve the issues, but the majority of the time, I’m fine not having a relationship with them. What would be your advice on how this should be handled? Should I try to get counseling with my parents and I? Should I just accept it’s an unhealthy relationship and move on? Avoid and evade them? I acknowledge that I’m as much of the problem as they are ... and that I’m holding on to some hard feelings. So what could or should I do?

Answer:

Most relationships are worth trying to salvage and improve, especially with your family members. It's hard to avoid your relatives and if you are going to have to interact with them, you will want these hard feelings repaired. So here are some things you could try:

Work on Forgiving all involved (them and yourself) for all your past wrongs to make this easier — work on these 5 perspective shifts.

1. Understand their bad behavior is driven by fear. We are all scared, struggling students in the classroom of life, who are scared of both failure and loss all the time and those fears are the reasons we sometimes feel unsafe and behave badly. When you understand your parents are just scared people and their behavior is about their fear (it isn’t really about you), you might have more compassion and less judgment toward them. Their value system may have taught them to have great fear about your value system. They may not be able to separate loving you from fearing for you, and when they react from this fear, the behavior isn’t very loving or validating. Understand this isn’t personal, it’s just hard for them to access their love when they are so scared.
2. We all have the same value no matter what we do. No one is better or less than anyone else, despite their values and choices. This is a choice you make to view all human beings as having the same value. This perspective helps to make you bulletproof, so nothing anyone else says can diminish you.
3. The universe is your perfect classroom. If you choose to see this conflict as your perfect classroom and here to serve you and them, you won’t have as much fear, stress and charge around it. You won’t feel as threatened and you will show up with more love toward them. Choose to believe you got these parents for a reason, because you could both teach each other important lessons that apparently you both need. Resolving the conflict and learning to love people with different values is part of this lesson. So, embrace the challenge to stretch the limits of your love.
4. Not forgiving them for past wrongs isn’t doing anyone any good. It isn’t hurting them and it’s not helping you. It won’t create justice and it won’t protect you from further pain. It will make you feel better, lighter and happier, though, if you can forgive.
5. Forgiving gets a lot easier when you trust the universe that it knows what it’s doing, and this is a perfect classroom lesson on love for all of you.

Once you have worked on forgiving and shifting your mindset, you may decide to have a loving, mutually validating conversation with them. I taught how to do that in this article. These conversations mean, upfront, you do a lot of listening (not talking) and validating their right to their thoughts, feelings, ideas and opinions (even if you don’t agree with them.) It will require you to remember nothing they say diminishes you unless you decide to let it. If you handle this conversation exactly as we advise and don’t let them trigger you and pull you into fear, this could fix the whole thing.

Get a professional involved to help you have a conversation with them. We do these types of meetings with families all the time, and we have found it works best if we meet with each person separately first, to prepare them for the meeting together. Find some professional who will do this prep work so a family meeting session accomplishes as much as possible. This also makes people more willing to attend this kind of meeting because they have had the chance to tell their side to the professional beforehand.

If family members are unwilling or unable to change 

If they feel threatened or unsafe about any kind of conversation or meeting, or if they are unable to accept any fault on their side, or show any willingness to change or work with you, you are then left with two options:

1. Be in their life, but don’t let them hurt you. This means seeing them accurately as people who are not capable of behaving better, and then not taking what they do or say personally, or let it hurt you. This requires great strength and wisdom. So, you might need some professional help yourself to get here. You will have to become bulletproof and let all offenses bounce off.
2. Avoid and stay away from them. If you can’t be around them without feeling beaten down, hurt, or offended, then avoiding them might be the loving choice. It is loving toward yourself. Remember you are just as important as everyone else is, so making a loving choice to take care of you is not selfish, it’s wise.

You might also want to read this article about when family members have different beliefs and values, and how to handle that. It would be very helpful.

You can do this. 

Kimberly Giles and Nicole Cunningham are the human behavior experts behind www.12.shapes.com. They host a weekly Relationship Radio show on

This was first published on KSL.COM

Question:

I just read your article on adult children rejecting the parent’s religion and I agree with what you’re saying, however, my heart is still hurting. I understand my pain is all about me and that I need to just love them, but I can’t help resenting my son and his wife for causing me this pain. He is my only son and I resent his wife taking him away from the way he was raised. I find myself resenting them and not wanting to hang out with them. I don’t want to feel this way, but my heart is so sad that there will not be baby blessings, baptisms and temple marriages for my grandchildren. I'm just not sure how to bridge the gap, stop grieving and feeling so emotional about it. Thank you for any thoughts on this.

Answer:

First, we want you to choose a perspective about why we are on this planet. Most people feel we are on the planet to do two things: 1. Learn, grow and become the best version of ourselves we can be and 2. To love and serve others and try to make a difference in their lives. We find these two ideas are consistent with most religions and life philosophies.

If you think these two ideas feel like truth to you, you might consider seeing life as a classroom. This philosophy means that everything that shows up in your life is there for one primary reason — to help you learn to love at a higher level.

We believe this experience might be in your life for that very reason. It has the potential to stretch you out of your comfort zone and teach you to love, forgive and accept people when it’s harder to do. It’s easy to love and accept people that are the same as us, it’s much more challenging to love those who are different. It’s especially difficult if their choices trigger fear of loss in you.

We want to make sure you really understand what a “fear of loss experience” is, as we define it. We believe there are two simple core fears which cause most of our suffering.

The first is the fear of failure and you experience this whenever you feel you aren’t good enough, or get insulted or criticized. This fear causes suffering, insecurity, stress and sadness as it makes us feel inadequate. This fear is easier to understand since you experience it to some degree every day.

Fear of failure experiences give you wonderful opportunities for growth. They can help you practice not caring what others think of you, getting your self-esteem from your intrinsic value instead of your appearance, or trusting that all human beings have the same value.

Fear of loss is also a wonderful classroom opportunity for growth. Loss is triggered whenever this moment or event (that you didn’t want to happen) is taking away from the quality of your life. If you get stuck in traffic, on the way to a big meeting, and you hate to be late — you are having a loss experience.

You can feel loss whenever people mistreat you or take from you, but you can also experience loss when life itself doesn’t turn out the way you wanted it to. You can feel robbed by life when you don’t get blessings or experiences other people get. Whenever you find yourself in self-pity around what you have been dealt, you are having a loss experience.

This is the most important part of this article we want to make sure you get this point – Life isn’t fair and no one gets the journey they wanted. They get the journey that fosters their growth best.

If we always got what we wanted, we wouldn’t grow, and that’s the point of the whole thing. One of the best things you can do for your mental health is to throw all your expectations about how your life should look out the window now.

Life is not going to meet your expectations. It’s going to be messy, ugly, painful and even embarrassing at times. It’s going to include some wins and some losses and sometimes it’s going to pull the rug out from under you completely. If you haven’t had those experiences yet, they are probably still coming.


We are not telling you this to scare you, because life is also going to be rich, wonderful, sweet, beautiful, amazing and thrilling too. The point is it’s going to surprise you and if you stay attached to your expectations, about how it should look at each stage, this is only going to create misery.

Instead, we recommend that you choose to trust the journey, the universe, or your higher power that it knows what it’s doing. Whatever interesting twist or turn your life has taken, that you didn’t see coming or didn’t want, it has a purpose for being here, and that purpose is always to serve you.

Having your son leave your religion is definitely not what you wanted, but it’s not as bad as a lot of other challenges you could be having. Talk to some people who have a child with cancer, or a child that died, or people who have a host of other awful challenges that life can throw at people. The truth is that you still have much more to be grateful for than you have loss.

Here are some things you can do to feel better about your situation:

1. Be grateful. Every day make a list of things you are grateful for in your life. This list will always be longer than the list of what isn’t right. Focus on your blessings every time you feel loss pain.
2. Find people to serve, who have it worse. Or even make a list of all the losses you could be having that would be worse than this one. Get rid of your self-pity around your situation and understand it does you no good.
3. See the universe as a wise teacher and trust it knows what it’s doing. Choose to see life as a perfect classroom that is providing the exact lessons you, your son and his family need to learn the lessons they need to learn.
4. Let go of the picture of what you thought life should look like. That was a fantasy and when you stay attached to it, think about it and wish for it, you create suffering. Choose to trust life instead.
5. Focus on how this could make you better, wiser or more loving. This is the most positive thing you can do. Focus on becoming a better you (not on fixing anyone else). This experience could make you more trusting, more unselfish, more faithful, peaceful and unconditionally loving. This is probably the whole reason you are having this experience so it deserves your focus. Every time you want to change your son, work on changing yourself instead.
6. Let go of the idea that you are right and they are wrong. Understand that from another person’s perspective your right is wrong. It’s all perspective and you must honor every person’s right to believe what they believe, and have the same value as you.
7. Love unconditionally. This means sincerely loving, giving and serving without any comments about your disappointment, feelings of sadness, or fear. For this to be sincere though, you really need to stop being afraid or sad. You must hand your fear over to your higher power and trust (that in perfect love and wisdom) everything will be fine. When you do this you actually release your son from needing to please you.
8. Release your son from needing to meet your expectations. This means you must need nothing from him and only be there to give love to him and his family. You don’t need them to please you or live a certain way for you, because you know you are safe, whole and cared for all the time. You are lacking nothing. If everything that shows up in your life is there to serve and bless you, then you are not deprived in any way. There is no loss if all is perfect.

Just play with this idea and see if it changes how much pain you feel. We find it completely changes loss experiences for us. We realize this idea (that you always get your perfect journey) is not something we can prove is true, but you also can’t prove it’s not true. This means you can, and actually have to, choose a perspective.

You can see yourself as at risk of having your life ruined, being taken from, robbed or deprived if you want to, but it will only create suffering. Or you can play with seeing yourself as whole, blessed and well. You could actually believe you can’t be deprived because the whole universe is conspiring to bless and educate you all the time. If it is always for your benefit, it’s not a loss. From this place of wholeness, it is a lot easier to love others unconditionally and let go of the pain.

Play with it and see how you feel.

You can do this. 

Kimberly Giles is the president of claritypointcoaching.com. She is the author of the book "Choosing Clarity: The Path to Fearlessness" and a popular life coach, speaker and people skills expert.

This was first published on KSL.COM

Question:

My life has been hard and I’ve made mistakes, I have a hard time forgiving myself and not feeling defined by my past. How do you not? How do I feel good about myself and as you say see my value as good enough?

Answer:

Everything you feel comes from the way you are looking at the situation. Your perspective determines the story you tell yourself and how you feel about everything. The way you currently see your past and the feelings you have about it could completely change if you chose a different perspective.

Here are some ways you might change your perspective and look at your past differently. See if they help.

1. Choose to see life as a journey.

Imagine your life as a road trip. On this road trip there are high points and low points. Some of the experiences are fun, some are scary and others are miserable. Each of these experiences could be seen as a location on your journey through life. These experiences do not define who you are nor do they affect your value as a person. They are just places you've been. Just because you spent time traveling through Texas doesn’t make you a Texan. Texas was a location on your journey; it is not who you are forever.

2. See life as a classroom.

The thing you must understand about your past is that each experience — each location you have been through — has brought you to where you are today.

Each experience taught you things. Some experiences taught you about who you don't want to be. Some showed you options in human behavior and the consequences of those options. Each experience served a purpose in your life to help you become stronger or smarter. At least, you have the option of seeing them this way if you want to. You could choose to embrace what each experience taught you and remember that you are not there anymore.

You are a different person now. The person you are today wouldn’t make the choices you made then (though that is partly because of what you learned from making those choices before). You cannot change the past, nor should you want to. Your journey taught you important lessons. But you can refuse to let your past define you now.

3. Choose to see your value as infinite and unchangeable.

You have the option of believing every human being has the same intrinsic value and that value cannot change. This would mean that no matter what mistakes you have made, they don’t affect your value and you still have the same value as everyone else. You can see human value this way, by simply deciding to.

4. Let go of shame. 

We define shame with the acronym: Should Have Already Mastered Everything. You are always a student in the classroom of life, so you can’t expect to have known everything, all along. That would make no sense. Shame is a waste of your energy. Instead, focus all that energy toward being who you want to be today.

5. Live in this moment, all the time.

There will never be a moment when it is not "this moment" and this is the only moment you have the power to make any choices. In this moment you can always choose to see yourself as good enough and let your past be experiences that taught you things and nothing else. Don’t waste time that could be filled with joy today, feeling pain over the past.

6. Focus your energy on what’s in your control.

Look at your current situation and write down what’s in your control and what’s not. Focus your time and energy only on what is.

7. Do something to metaphorically let the past go.

Write down the experiences you are having trouble letting go of emotionally. Then burn the paper, bury it, or tie it to a balloon and let it go, or rip it up and throw it in the trash.

8. Choose to trust life and the universe. Another option you have is to trust that your journey was the perfect one for you and that everything happens for a reason. Trust that you are on track and right where you are supposed and always have been. If you choose this perspective, it will change how you feel about yourself and your past.

9. Don’t worry.

Worry, guilt and stress do you no good. They will not prevent bad things from happening, and they just make you miserable. Choose to trust that good things will happen to you. Optimism may actually draw good things your way in the future because people will be more drawn to you.

10. Set aside a time each day to experience regret and guilt.

If you just can’t let the past go, choose a 15-minute block of time today to wallow in self-pity and shame. Dive in and immerse yourself in it during that time, but the rest of the day don’t think about it.

The key to a successful, happy life today lies in looking at the past, understanding it and learning from it, then, leaving it in the past and moving forward. Put the lessons you’ve learned to work by making better choices today. Choose to see the past as a location on your journey that taught you things and nothing else; do not let it define your value or who you are. If you see experiences accurately, you will be grateful for the lessons and even be empowered to be a better you.

You can do this. 

Master Coaches Kim Giles and Nicole Cunningham are the founders and creators of www.claritypointcoaching.com and www.12shapes.com they are the hosts of Relationship Radio on Voice America and iTunes.

This was first published on KSL.com

SALT LAKE CITY — Each January for the last seven years, I have written an article recommending one New Year’s resolution that would have a great impact on the quality of your life. This year we recommend forgiveness: total unconditionally forgiveness for yourself and others.

Here are some principles that will make forgiving yourself and others easier:

1. The secret to forgiving yourself lies in forgiving others.

We believe this is a profound and life-changing truth: the way you choose to see, judge, condemn or attack others also determines the way you see, judge, condemn and attack yourself.

If you are quick to see faults, flaws and mistakes in other people and you let those mistakes determine their value, or you see them as bad guys, you are giving power to the damaging idea that people can be "not good enough" and that human value is changeable and can go up and down.

If you give power to this idea, it will also affect the way you see yourself and your own value. You will also see your own value as changeable and in question, and you will constantly be afraid you aren’t good enough.

But it is human nature to subconsciously look for the bad in others, gossip and judge to make ourselves feel better. If they are the bad ones, we think we are the good one. But the more we put down, criticize or gossip about others, the worse our own self-esteem becomes. There is no escaping this cause-and-effect cycle once you start judging. But you don’t have to live this way.

You could decide to let all your and their past mistakes go, and see life as a classroom, not a test. This means letting everyone be a struggling, scared, amazing, divine, infinitely valuable, and innocent being who is doing the best they can with what they know at each moment. It means giving them and yourself the freedom to be a work in progress and not expect perfection from anyone.

You have the power to choose a compassion mindset where we are all innocent, silly, sometimes stupid, learners, whose value is (fortunately) not in question or changeable. You could decide to see all humans and their value as infinite and absolute and see every human being as having the same value. This mindset will make you feel better about yourself, and you will also treat other people with compassion. But you must give up judgment and criticism to claim this.

Start today and eliminate judging others from your life. Forgive them (whoever they are) for all their mistakes. Focus on the lessons each experience taught you, and let a higher power (or the universe) be in charge of your and their classroom journey from here. Forgive them and move forward without any anger, hurt or pain around what happened. Bless them on their way.

Of course, sometimes you have to still associate with the person. Just remember, just because you forgave them, doesn’t mean you have to trust them again or want them in your life. But you can choose to see their value as the same as yours, because you don’t want your mistakes to affect your value, either.

Forgive yourself for all your past mistakes. They were just lessons and they don’t define who you will be moving forward. Use them to become a better version of yourself in the future and let go of shame and guilt.

2. You alone are responsible for how long you stay in pain. 

When a painful event happens in your life, it is normal to feel pain and suffer for a while, but eventually, you must decide how long you will live that way. No situation or person can cause you pain forever, because it is your thoughts (about the situation) that are continuing to cause the pain, and you do have control over your thoughts.

Sometimes when an offense is fresh, you will need to feel the pain and can't expect to choose your way out of it yet. But eventually, you will have the power to decide how miserable and for long you want to feel that way.

In the end, no one can take away your peace or give you peace. No one can make you feel terrible or make you feel better. You alone have that power. If you struggle to understand this principle, read my KSL article about choosing to be upset.

You have the power to choose peace, joy, confidence and forgiveness in any moment. Owning this truth gives you the power to not continue to hurt over an offense or feel like a failure because of a mistake.

3. Remember your family (spouse, children and relatives) are your greatest forgiveness teachers.

Your family is your primary forgiveness classroom. This is especially true because the people closest to you are the ones you allow to hurt you the most.


When you see your family life this way (as your classroom) you will finally be seeing them accurately. Every fight, offense or disappointment that shows up is a chance for you to practice seeing human value as infinite and practice forgiveness toward yourself or others.

Your family, and especially your spouse, provide you daily opportunities to stretch the limits of your love and work on forgiveness.

4. Understand how pointless shame and guilt are.

We teach our clients that "SHAME" is an acronym that stands for: Should Have Already Mastered Everything. If life is a classroom though, shame is ridiculous. You are a student in the classroom of life, there is no way you could have known it all, all along.

Give yourself permission to be a work in progress. You are learning and growing, and have much more to learn. You are on the path of self-improvement, and wherever you are at this point is good enough for right now.

You will do better in the future, but guilt, shame and beating yourself up for months or years does you no good. It doesn’t fix the past nor create a better a future. It makes more sense to focus your energy on working to be a better person today.

5. What other people think doesn’t matter, but what you think does.

Remember, the opinions of others are just thoughts and ideas in their heads, which have no power, mean nothing, and can’t hurt you, diminish your value, or change you in any way. They may influence events in your life, but if you trust the universe is a wise teacher you won’t worry about that because you know it only brings the experiences that are right for you. Don't worry about losing out or not getting the life you wanted, and see the opinions of others as irrelevant.

But what you think of yourself and your past matters a lot.

If you see life as a classroom and your value as absolute (and forgive yourself) you will show up with confidence and love, and everywhere you go people will feel that in you and respect you in spite of your past mistakes. Even if you made BIG mistakes in the past, if other people can feel that you have learned the lessons, moved on, and you now know your value isn’t affected by them, they will tend to follow your lead and let your past go too.

If you cannot do this, however, and continue to beat yourself up, carry shame and guilt around, and feel you are less than other people, other people will feel this too, and they will also have trouble forgiving you or letting your past go. Whichever stance you claim, they will follow.

6. Write down the positives each negative experience has or is creating.

We believe forgiving works best if you shift your perspective and look at your life in trust that it has always been your perfect classroom. Trust that every offense or mistake happened, because it could teach you something. See if you can name 10 positives that making the mistake (or being hurt in that way) has created in your life. This will help you see your life as your perfect classroom journey. When you no longer resist what happened, but embrace or accept it as something that served you, you will find forgiving gets much easier.

Focus on being the most forgiving person you can be this year, toward yourself and others. This powerful choice will take pain and suffering off you, and bring the light back in. If you still struggle to let mistakes go, check out another KSL article I wrote about the benefits of not forgiving. It might help you to see why you are still holding on.

If you make this a year of forgiveness, it will also be a year of more joy, more progress and more peace.

You can do this. 

Kim Giles and Nicole Cunningham are master executive coaches and the founders of Claritypointcoaching.com and 12shapes.com You can download free forgiveness worksheets on www.12shapes.com in the Resources Section.