Forgiveness- giving up the desire and power to forgive

Zbikowska, Malgorzata (2015) Forgiveness- giving up the desire and power to forgive. UNSPECIFIED. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

The current research project is based on three separate narratives on the subject of ‘What is your story of forgiving? What does it mean you forgave?’. Its design is strongly embedded in the qualitative research tradition that places in its centre an individual subject along with his unique, subjective perspective. It employs Lacanian Discourse Analysis (LDA) as an interpretative tool and a systematic framework for analysis of the discourse underlying and emerging through the three anonymous narratives. Incorporated into the research design variability of volunteer participants being self-declared atheist, spiritual or religious (one in each category), was introduced to provide or exclude additional insights into the nature of forgiveness relevant over and beyond the differences in moral sets of beliefs they hold. The study involved participation of three male volunteers who met the initial criteria of being English native speakers of at least 25 years of age and previous long-term experiences of personal development in the systematic form. The analysis being a creative process of an analysist engaging with the text did not aspire to produce general and measurable findings. Nonetheless, based on the analysis successful forgiveness seems to embrace all the aspects of the self including the repressed, unconscious contents and it requires the self to renounce the desire and the power to forgive to extinguish the victim-transgressor relationship.