A Self-Interested Case for Forgiveness | Jack Kornfield
10% Happier with Dan Harris
10% Media, LLC
4.6 • 12.9K Ratings
🗓️ 12 December 2022
⏱️ 68 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.
The allure of resentment, of holding a grudge or nursing your rage can be super powerful.
In today's episode, Jack Kornfield, one of the great western meditation masters, talks about Buddhist strategies for not holding grudges and the self-interested case for forgiveness. This episode is the first of a two-part series this week on forgiveness.
In this conversation we talk about:
- What forgiveness is and isn't
- Whether forgiveness is a single act or an ongoing process
- The cost of not forgiving
- A forgiveness practice you can try in your meditation
- Whether it's possible to respond to the misdeeds and transgressions of others with force and love at the same time
- Whether there are things that are unforgivable
- And Jack's contention that forgiveness involves a shift in identity
Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/jack-kornfield-533
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is the 10% happier podcast. |
| 0:06.0 | I'm Dan Harris. |
| 0:11.3 | Hello, my fellow suffering beings. |
| 0:14.0 | The allure of resentment of holding a grudge, of nursing your rage can be super powerful. |
| 0:21.7 | In a recent episode of one of my favorite television shows, Atlanta, one of the main characters |
| 0:27.0 | earned, played by the genius Donald Glover, tells his therapist, and I'm quoting here, |
| 0:33.3 | I love spite. |
| 0:34.6 | It's a pure, powerful thing. |
| 0:36.6 | It gave me courage. |
| 0:37.6 | I could count on it. |
| 0:39.2 | He's right. |
| 0:40.2 | It is powerful. |
| 0:41.2 | Spite can be clarifying and courage giving. |
| 0:44.8 | But as the Buddha has said to have said, anger has a honeyed tip, but a poison root. |
| 0:52.1 | In other words, it might feel good on one level, but on a more fundamental level, it's |
| 0:56.2 | toxic. |
| 0:57.2 | Today, we're going to talk with one of the great Western meditation masters about some |
| 1:02.0 | Buddhist strategies for not holding grudges, about the self-interested case for forgiveness. |
| 1:09.3 | We're going to dispel some of the prevailing myths about forgiveness. |
| 1:13.4 | It's not about being a pushover. |
| 1:14.8 | It's not about subjecting yourself to mistreatment. |
| 1:17.0 | It is not a weakness. |
... |
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