This advice has been a guiding principle for me whenever I meet and get to know new people. Yet, sometimes it becomes exhausting. It\u2019s disheartening to show kindness and receive only pain in return, to admire someone only to be betrayed behind your back.\n

One day, I asked my mother,\u00a0\u201cMom, do they really deserve my forgiveness?\u201d
\nShe smiled, tucking a stray lock of hair behind her ear.
\n\u201cEveryone deserves to be forgiven,\u201d\u00a0she said.\u00a0\u201cIf they wrong you once, they deserve it. If they do it twice, give them another chance. But if they hurt you a third time, it\u2019s time to forgive yourself.\u201d\n

$\"\"$ \n

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Confused, I looked at her with questioning eyes. She laughed gently.\n
\u201cForgive yourself for believing in them, only to be disappointed. Forgive yourself for trusting too much. Forgive yourself for giving another chance, thinking it would make things better. And, my dear, give yourself the chance to be free \u2014 free from hatred and revenge, free from your past.\u201d\n
Many years later, I learned that my Dad had some differences with my Mom. I asked her if she now hates Dad, and she simply smiled and shook her head.
\n\u201cMy heart has no room for hatred,\u201d\u00a0she said.\u00a0\u201cI don\u2019t deserve to suffer from it. I\u2019ve forgiven him, but that doesn\u2019t mean I\u2019ve forgotten. When he sees me smiling despite everything, he\u2019ll know who truly suffered.\u201d\n
She added,\u00a0\u201cThe best thing you can do for someone who hurt you is to live a better life. Show them what they lost when they broke your trust, and how their actions helped you grow and move forward.\u201d\n
In that moment, I realized the profound truth in her words. Without her wisdom, I might still be haunted by things that were never my fault.\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This advice has been a guiding principle for me whenever I meet and get to know new people. Yet, sometimes it becomes exhausting. It\u2019s disheartening to show kindness and receive only pain in return, to admire someone only to be betrayed behind your back. One day, I asked my mother,\u00a0\u201cMom, do they really deserve my …\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":82943,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[670,642],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-82942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-moral-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82942"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82942\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":82945,"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82942\/revisions\/82945"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/echowoven.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}