The REAL truth behind forgiveness
- Daniela Goes-Udoff
- Dec 1
- 4 min read
The wound is the place where the Light enters you.
— Rumi
The Truth About Forgiveness Nobody Warns You About
Forgiveness has become a personality test on the internet.
If you forgive quickly, you’re “healed.”
If you forgive slowly, you’re “stuck.”
If you don’t forgive at all, you’re “toxic.”
Meanwhile, your nervous system is in the corner like:
“I’m sorry… we’re doing WHAT now?”
Somewhere between Rumi quotes and yoga influencers holding crystals, forgiveness got marketed as a moral achievement.
A badge of honor. A spiritual flex.
But here’s the inconvenient truth no one carved into their vision board:
You don’t need to forgive someone to be free of them.
Sometimes the holiest thing you can do is block-and-protect.
Sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is walk away without bowing.
And sometimes — let’s be honest — you’re just not ready because your amygdala is still running the group chat.
I learned this the hard way.
And by “learned,” I mean: lived through enough emotional hurricanes to earn loyalty points.
The Forgiveness Industrial Complex (Yes, I said it)
Forgiveness culture has one job:
To keep you palatable.
Predictable. Non-threatening.
Because when you’re angry, you’re inconvenient.
You ask questions. You build boundaries. You say “no.”
You stop performing softness for people who haven’t earned it.
Forgiveness without boundaries?
That’s not healing.
That’s emotional clearance shopping on Black. Friday.
And your brain — your beautiful, dramatic, protective brain — knows it.
You can chant “I forgive you” 47 times, but if your chest tightens every time their name shows up on your phone?
The REAL Truth Behind Forgiveness
That’s not forgiveness.
That’s your limbic system screaming: “THE THREAT IS STILL ACTIVE.”
My Turning Point (yes, that one)
There was a moment this year — March 10th — where my life split into Before and After.
I walked away from someone I wanted to stay for.
Not because I forgave them.
Spoiler: I didn’t.
And maybe I never will.
I walked away because staying was destroying the version of me I was trying to become.
And do you want to know what was harder than releasing them?
Forgiving myself
—for staying too long
—for believing potential instead of patterns
—for carrying someone who was supposed to walk beside me
That’s the forgiveness that shifts tectonic plates inside you.
That’s the forgiveness that unhooks your nervous system from old alarms.
That’s the forgiveness that birthed Zyrena™.
Not grace.
Not nobility.
Not a healed halo of enlightenment.
Just a woman in the ashes saying:
"I’m done waiting for someone to become who they truly are, instead of who their fear keeps them from being."
You Don’t Owe Anyone the High Road
Let’s get this straight for the people in the back:
Forgiveness ≠ reconciliation.
Forgiveness ≠ weakness.
Forgiveness ≠ letting them back in your life so they can try again.
Forgiveness ≠ deleting the lesson so you can repeat the pattern in HD.
Forgiveness is simply this:
Choosing your future over their apology.
And sometimes that choice requires distance, silence, or a door that stays closed forever.
You don’t forgive to let them off the hook. Oh no. Forgiving someone who knew exactly what they were doing — and chose to do it anyway — does not let them off the hook.
You forgive to unhook yourself.
When Forgiveness Becomes Self-Abandonment
We don’t talk about this enough:
Sometimes forgiveness is dangerous.
Forgiving too fast can re-open the wound.
Forgiving under pressure can break something inside you.
Forgiving without boundaries can invite the threat back in.
Forgiving before you’re ready can feel like betrayal — of yourself.
If you’ve ever forced a forgiveness you didn’t feel?
You know the aftermath:
• adrenaline
• anxiety
• migraines
• emotional numbness
• the quiet, sickening sense that you abandoned yourself to keep the peace
That’s not healing.
That’s self-harm with a spiritual filter.
Forgive when your body exhale says yes — not when your guilt does.
So What Does Real Forgiveness Look Like?
Real forgiveness isn’t pretty. It’s not a ceremony. It’s not humming bowls and perfectly lit candles.
It’s quiet.
It’s ragged.
It’s human.
It sounds like:
“I decide to stop carrying this.”
and “and ‘I’m keeping the lesson — or not.”
and sometimes “I love myself too much to re-enter that battlefield.”
It’s a decision. A boundary. A reclamation.
Forgiveness is not the high road.
It’s the exit door.
The Only Part of This That Actually Matters
Here’s the truth, meu amor:
You don’t forgive because they deserve it.
You forgive because you deserve the bandwidth.
You deserve the clarity.
You deserve the energy that resentment has been renting inside your chest like a bad Airbnb guest.
You forgive not to erase the past — but to stop dragging it into the future like unpaid luggage.
Your life is happening now.
Your power is here.
Your next chapter is already trying to open.
You don’t need their apology.
You need your permission.
Read the full article, where I teach the Neuroscience behind all of this on Linkedin:
timing ▴ wiring ▴ will
— Dani
Founder, Zyrena™ | Mental Performance & the Neuroscience of Resilience
Calm first. Then command. 🐦🔥
Comments