The Myth of Forgiveness
This is not a story about how to forgive, or why you should. It is for the person who has whispered, I should be over this by now, while something softer inside keeps saying, I do not know how to let this go.
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The Myth of Forgiveness offers a different path forward, it invites you to question whether moving forward really requires forgiving at all.
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Lauren has spent years keeping the peace. She has forgiven a partner’s distance and the quiet loneliness of pretending its OK. She has forgiven a father who disappeared when she was a child. She has forgiven a mother who never quite knew how to be close. She has forgiven herself for missing the red flags, for believing that she married her husband with a broken heart and an unfinished story.
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Some things live under the surface and keep pulsing.
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There is a love in this story that does not fit neatly into the categories we have been given. A devotion that pulls in more than one direction. A bond that feels both impossible and inevitable. Lauren finds herself standing in the space between what is expected of her and what is true, and she learns how quickly the word “forgiveness” can become a way of asking someone to silence their own knowing.
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Lauren discovers that she does not have to forgive in order to be free.
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By the time you close the book, you can begin to loosen your own belief that you have to forgive in order to heal. Not because the past suddenly makes sense, but because you no longer believe healing requires you to make peace with what never should have happened in the first place.
Praise for the Myth of Forgiveness
The Myth of Forgiveness is filled with insights that leaves you thinking long after you’ve finished a chapter. The book explores family dynamics and it had me stop and reflect on my own relationships.
What I loved most about this book is how it challenged the way I used to think about forgiveness. Reading the book had me feel more forgiving toward myself, and more understanding of the people around me.
There’s a quiet power in the way the author makes you question and reframe your own relationships.
This is the kind of book that sticks with you in a good way.
-Julianna Warren
Reading “The Myth of Forgiveness” opened doors in me that had long been sealed shut. The light poured in as the darkness began to offer up long hidden treasures I had labeled as scars or flaws.
Beautifully written in poetic language, the author takes you on a journey of self discovery and deep understanding through the characters family dynamics. Filled with countless golden moments that will leave you covered in goosebumps and reaching for your journal, this book is sure to have you turning pages and new leaves over as the information downloads into your heart, changing the landscape around yourself.
I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in improving their relationships to others and to themselves.
~ Misti Hill
Johanna Lynn is a systemic therapist & founder of The Family Imprint Institute.
She has supported clients around the world navigating betrayal, relationship stress & the echoes of what was never resolved in their family.