Please forgive me. I forgive you. Thank you. I love you.

These four simple statements are powerful tools for improving your relationships and your life. As a doctor caring for seriously ill patients for nearly 15 years of emergency medicine practice and more than 25 years in hospice and palliative care, I have taught hundreds of patients who  were facing life’s end, when suffering can be profound, to say the Four Things. But the Four Things apply at any time. Comprising just eleven words, these four short sentences carry the core wisdom of what people who are dying have taught me about what matters most in life.

The Wisdom of Stating the Obvious
Ask a man who is being wheeled into transplant surgery or a woman facing chemotherapy for the third time what’s on his or her mind and the answer will always involve the people they love. Always.

The specter of death reveals our relationships to be our most precious possessions. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve met people in my office, an emergency room, or a hospice program who have expressed deep regret over things they wish they had said before a grandparent, parent, sibling, or friend died. They can’t change what was, but without fail their regrets have fueled a healthy resolve to say what needs to be said before it’s too late – to clear away hurt feelings, to connect in profound ways with the people who mean the most to them.

Everyone knows that all relationships, even the most loving, have occasional rough spots. We assume that the people we love know that we love them, even if we’ve had our disagreements and tense moments. Yet when someone we love dies suddenly, we often have gnawing doubts.

We are all sons or daughters, whether we are six years of age or ninety-six. Even the most loving parent-child relationship can feel forever incomplete if your mother or father dies without having explicitly expressed affection for you or without having acknowledged past tensions.  I’ve learned from my patients and their families about the painful regret that comes from not speaking these most basic feelings.

Again and again, I’ve witnessed the value of stating the obvious. When you love someone, it is never too soon to say “I love you,” or premature to say “Thank you,” “I forgive you,” or “Will you please forgive me?” When there is nothing of profound importance left unsaid, relationships tend to take on an aspect of celebration, as they should.

A deep, natural drive to connect with others lies at the heart of what it means to be human. The Four Things can help you discover opportunities to enliven all your important relationships—with your children, parents, relatives, and close friends. You need not wait until you or someone you love is seriously ill. By taking the time and by caring enough to express forgiveness, gratitude, and affection, you can renew and revitalize your most precious connections.

The Practice of Good-bye
It’s been said that life is a sexually transmitted condition with a terminal prognosis. Having worked for years in close proximity to death, I have come to understand viscerally that we live every moment on the brink. We are, each one of us, at every moment, a heartbeat away from death. Seen against the backdrop of our certain mortality, our differences are dwarfed by our commonality – and the importance we hold for one another.

The stories in The Four Things That Matter Most are drawn from the experiences of people who have stood at death’s door, and from their loved ones who learned to use the Four Things in their own daily lives. These stories inspire us to open to the potential for emotional wholeness at any moment in our lives – even in our most troubled relationships.

When I work with people who are approaching the end of life, I emphasize the value of saying the Four Things and I also encourage them to say good-bye. The Four Things offer essential wisdom for completing a lifelong relationship before a final parting. Thankfully, not all good-byes are final – but good-byes can be meaningful.  It’s important to say good-bye in a way that affirms our relationship and acknowledges our connection to one another.

The word “good-bye” derives from “God be with you,” a blessing that was traditionally given at parting and, in some churches, still is.  The protection and God’s help of presence and guidance can be requested whether two people expect to be separated a few hours or forever. In leaving nothing unsaid, we can recapture this original meaning, so that, in saying good-bye, we are actually blessing one another in our daily interactions as well as when we face major life challenges or crises. It only takes a moment to shift the way you say good-bye from a reflex to a conscious practice. Your good-bye and your blessing can become treasured gifts to other people as you part.

Expanding the Realm of the Possible
Our world is bounded by our imagination. This may sound philosophical, but I mean it in a most practical, tangible sense. Helen Keller once wrote, “Worse than being blind would be to be able to see but not have any vision.” When a formerly cherished relationship is marred by unkindness, bitterness, or betrayal, we may assume that healing is beyond our grasp, but this assumption can create a self-fulfilling prophecy. Do you really want to have such a limitation on your vision for your life?

The extraordinary experiences of the people whose stories I tell in this book demonstrate that healing and wholeness are always possible. Even after years of alienation, of harsh criticism, rejection, or frustration, you can establish – or re-establish – authentic understanding and appreciation of others with the help of the Four Things.

Even as people confront death (their own or others’), they can reach out to express love, gratitude, and forgiveness. When they do, they consistently find that they, and everyone involved, are transformed—for the rest of their life, whether those lives last for decades or just days. Stories and experiences of people who have courageously used the Four Things enlarge our vision and imagination, expanding the realm of the possible for us all.

Restoring Closeness
The Four Things are powerful tools for reconciling the rifts that divide us and restoring the closeness we innately desire.  When bad feelings occur in our close relationships, we tend to put off the work required to make things right. We always assume we’ll have another chance…later. That’s understandable, but it’s a mistake. Feeling resentful toward the people we love, or once loved, feeling distant from them, erodes our own happiness.

A brush with death often instills in us a new found appreciation for the gift of life. Simple pleasures – a cup of tea, sunshine on one’s face, the voices of our children – feel like miracles. When we’ve had a close call that shakes us up, the anger we’ve felt toward people closest to us no longer seems significant. Ill will dissolves in love, appreciation, and affection, and we recognize the urgency of mending, tending, and celebrating our relationships.

Because accidents and sudden illness do happen, it is never too soon to express forgiveness, to say thank you and I love you to the people who have been an integral or intimate part of our lives, and say good-bye as a blessing. These simple words hold essential wisdom for transforming that which matters most in our lives – our relationships with the people we love.

About the author:
Ira  Byock,  M. D., a nationally recognized authority in palliative and end-of-life care, has been a longtime advocate on behalf of seriously ill people and their families.

He is Co-founder of the Life’s End  Institute: Missoula  Demonstration Project, Inc., a community-based organization working to improve end-of-life experience. He heads the  national Promoting Excellence in End-of-Life Care program for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’. Dr. Byock is a faculty member at Dartmouth School of Medicine and director of palliative medicine at Dartmouth.

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Foremost, it’s imperative that you view forgiveness as a self-empowering tool – a liberating act done for your enduring benefit. Forgiving another human being allows you to unfetter an emotional ball and chain that you’ve been dragging around for all too long a time.

So, exactly where do you begin your forgiveness voyage? There are seven simple, but nonetheless profound, steps you can walk through to realize the rich benefits of genuine forgiveness. The journey starts with basic recognition:

What Is It That You Want to Forgive?
Before you can forgive another human being, it’s essential that you clearly identify the offense against you. Exactly what was it that hurt you? And why, until now, have you been unable, or unwilling, to forgive the transgressor? There are times in our lives when we may feel tremendous anger and loathing towards an individual, but cannot articulate exactly why we feel the way we do.

Honestly answer these three questions: Who hurt you? What hurt you? And why did this action offend you as it did? This kind of probing personal inquest is the all-important first step in the act of forgiving.

Find a Non-Judgmental Ear
Now comes the time to speak freely about this matter, and precisely what you’re trying to accomplish, with close persons in your life circle. An empathetic and non-judgmental pair of ears is what you need here. These individuals could be friends, family members, spiritual leaders, or even trained therapists. Unburdening yourself is an indispensable catharsis on the road to forgiveness – and a very welcome step two.

Don’t Suppress the Pain
Pain – physical and emotional – is a life one-two punch that we all have to parry every now and then. Like so many of us, you may be in the habit of suppressing your emotional pains – your deepest hurts – because, frankly, that degree of pain is often too much to bear. But while this course of inaction might assist you in existing in the short-term, it’s very detrimental to the long-term.

When you fully own up to, and clearly vocalize, how another person has hurt you, forgiveness is possible. On the other hand, if you opt to merely wallow in anger – in lieu of serious reflection – you will be incapable of forgiving. And, on top of everything else, this anger will wend itself deeper and deeper in your psyche, precluding you from ever knowing what it’s like to be truly emancipated.

The Truth Will Set You Free
Sometimes it’s the way we’ve been raised. Society also sends a barrage of mixed messages. You know how it goes. You feel guilty for feeling this way or that way. But the truth is that you have every right to feel the way you do, even if your feelings are unattractive and less than edifying.

You are a unique individual – a true original. It’s not for others to tell you that your feelings of anger and hurt are off base, silly, or irrational. By accepting the depths of your genuine feelings, you allow yourself to forgive others. If you deny your bona fide feelings, forgiveness will never be possible.

Honestly Assess Your Role in the Transgression
Life is a far cry from a seamless odyssey. Often it’s a misadventure. It’s therefore critical that you painstakingly appraise your role in the offense committed against you – the one that has so seared your heart and soul. You might uncover that you were anything but an innocent bystander.

By allowing yourself to see the big picture – the rest of the story, as it were – you immediately reap a greater understanding as to why you’ve been offended, and how you may have contributed to your own wound. In being totally honest with yourself concerning what happened and why it happened, the act of forgiveness automatically becomes more sincere and heartfelt.

The Decision
There will ultimately come a moment when you must decide whether or not to face the person with whom you want to forgive. Very often, this decision is clear-cut. That is, if it’s a relationship of legitimate value to you – one that you want to save or make better – meeting and forgiving the person in question is the obvious road to travel down. If, however, the individual does not fit into this category, there is nothing wrong with forgiving him or her in your heart of hearts, and getting on with your life.

Forgiveness is in essence a release – an act of conscience. The fact that you’ve found it in yourself to unconditionally forgive a person is an uplifting experience in and of itself – enriching to your immediate circumstances as well as to your future days and nights.

Forgiveness Is a Process
We live in an age of instant gratification. Nowadays, it seems like everything’s got to be faster than fast, from Internet speeds to communicating via tweets. But there’s no such thing as high-speed forgiveness. Genuine forgiveness takes time.

It’s a healing process. And depending on the gravity of the transgression against you, it could take a very long time at that. Allow the seven steps to forgiveness to unfold at a pace that’s right for you and what you want to accomplish. There are absolutely no time constraints.

When all is said and done, we are all imperfect human beings who need to both forgive and be forgiven. The seven steps to forgiveness is a beneficial roadmap. Its directions lead to a much better place – a healthier and happier place.

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Fortunately that is just fiction. In real life we don’t turn green when we let anger control us. The rest is fairly accurate, though. It may not manifest itself physically as it did with the Hulk, but anger does transform a person in some very unpleasant ways.

In the show, the enraged Hulk would stomp around growling and smashing things indiscriminately in his attempt to get a measure of revenge on the person or thing that angered him. More often than not, his wrath was not spent exclusively on his nemesis. What started out as a direct reaction to a perceived attack turned into an all encompassing rage that showed no partiality. Everyone around him, regardless of guilt or innocence, friend or foe, suffered whenever he would “Hulk out” and explode in a fit of anger.

The Hulk’s angry rampages caused a great deal of damage to his physical surroundings, but also caused immense stress in his relationships with other people. Because he could not control his anger, he found it impossible to maintain friendships for any length of time. Every week, his anger wore out his welcome wherever he was. At the end of every episode, Banner would walk down the road as sad music played, trying to hitch a ride to somewhere else.

Banner’s famous catch phrase was “Don’t make me angry. You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry.” Despite the warning, within moments of giving this advice to the local bully Banner would inevitably give in and get angry anyway, transforming into the mindless Hulk. The Hulk would dominate Banner’s personality until he found a moment of calm contemplation, at which point the green behemoth would fade away and Banner’s faculties would return.

Sadly, his return to clarity and peace always came too late. The Hulk had lashed out until his anger was exhausted. Anyone who had crossed his path had felt the effects of his anger. By the time Banner regained control, he would soon be hearing the sad walking away music as he ran away to once again seek a fresh start someplace new.

Each of us has a Hulk inside, just waiting to be let out. There is, however, an anti-hulk formula that will keep the monster at bay. There is an opponent that the brute strength of the Hulk cannot overpower. The one thing powerful enough to defeat the mighty Hulk is forgiveness.

It may not have made very compelling TV, but Banner could have prevented many an outbreak and saved millions of dollars in collateral damage, not to mention his relationships, if he had the capacity to forgive a wrong done. Dr. Banner was a prisoner to his own anger, and it ruined his life. Forgiveness is the one and only balm that can sooth the pain and hurt that leads to and flows from anger.

Just as the Hulk’s outbursts caused damage to more than just his intended target, so too we hurt those around us when we let anger rule us. The Hulk caused tremendous physical damage by smashing mailboxes and police cars. Our collateral damage tends to be more emotional, and the recipients are our friends, our family, and our coworkers. Those closest to us suffer the most.

Also like the Hulk’s hapless alter ego, we will wear out our welcome with friends and coworkers if they repeatedly find themselves suffering the brunt of our anger. Even good friends who care deeply for you have their limits. No one will tolerate such undeserved abuse forever.

And like the Hulk, if we allow anger to control us until the rage is spent, it may well be too late to repair the damage done and restore our relationships. You cannot un-ring a bell, the Hulk couldn’t un-smash a building, and you can’t un-say hurtful words. The only way to preserve our relationships is to control our anger before it can control us.

Which brings us back to forgiveness, the one true cure for anger. It is almost impossible to remain angry once you have really and truly forgiven someone. Not the significant use of the words ‘really’ and ‘truly’ in that sentence. Forgiveness has to be sincere. Faking it will only deepen the anger and mix it with an unhealthy sense of resentment and bitterness.

Anger is a deceptive emotion. It pulls us in and gives us a false feeling of righteousness. Everyone gets angry, but anger has a devious way of feeding upon itself and keeping us angry. Anger is like an addiction. It has nothing but detrimental effects on us, but sometimes we continue diving deeper and deeper into our inner pool of rage until we find it very difficult to change our mindset. Unless we take the proper steps to counteract it, that lingering anger will block our path back to our natural state of happiness.

If you can find it deep within you to forgive, the anger melts away. Just as the Hulk transforms back to mild Dr. Banner when he calms down, you return to who you truly are when you can move past the anger to see the world as it is. When you forgive the offender, you free yourself to be yourself. You spare your loved ones the brunt of you unfocused anger. You can cross the bridge from despair and anger to a healthy balance in your life.

The next time that anger threatens to control you, remember the lesson of the Incredible Hulk. The show has long since been cancelled, but you can still learn from his experiences. You can tame the angry Hulk within you with the healing power of forgiveness.

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What is Resentment?
Before we can deal with resentment, we need to understand what it is and how it affects us. Resentment is a feeling of displeasure or indignation that stems from an incident, real or perceived, that is hurtful. When you resent someone it will color all your future interactions, no matter how trivial, with that person.

Resentment can be open or concealed, immediate or delayed.

Sometimes resentment sits right on the surface. You may resent a coworker who gets ahead by taking undo credit for your work. You may resent a friend’s patronizing attitude toward your hobby or maybe your ex’s new beau. There is no end to the number of issues, large and small, that have fired a sense of resentment in people. Resentment can sneak up on the best prepared of all of us. It is how we handle it that matters – how and how soon. The longer we let resentment linger, the more powerful it becomes.

The Cure for Resentment
The cure for resentment, as with many other negative emotions, is forgiveness. The only way to get past resenting someone for something is to forgive that one for that thing. As devastating as resentment is, if it is open and on the surface then resentment is usually a relatively easy cure once the resent-er acknowledges his need to forgive and deal honestly with the resent-ee.

Hidden, or unrecognized resentment is a thornier issue. Resentment can be a subtle but devastating obstacle on the road to happiness and self-fulfillment. Unlike outright anger or contempt, resentment can linger in our thoughts and on our hearts without us realizing that it is there.

Because it is harder to spot, some people will harbor deep resentment toward others without any conscious knowledge that there is a problem. But when situations become tense, those old resentments find their way to the surface, impeding resolution and fueling the fires of conflict.

If left unchecked, resentment can linger after the situation is seemingly resolved. Often resentment will still fester long after apologies are exchanged and all is superficially forgiven. This concealed resentment poses a real danger to our happiness. The first step to releasing the negative emotion and moving toward happiness is recognizing that there is a problem. There are three common signs of concealed resentment: distrust, questioning motives, and bitterness.

Someone holding on to resentment will often demonstrate an unfounded distrust and suspicion of the other person, sometimes without consciously realizing it. It may be in matters completely unrelated to the initial incident.

Resolving a Conflict between Two Teenagers
Say two teenagers, Janie and Susie, have a conflict over who misplaced Susie’s favorite hairbrush. They may make up. They may apologize. They may appear to move on completely.

But if Susie holds on to her resentment, believing deep down that Janie really did take her hairbrush, that resentment may boil over into other matters altogether. She may hold Janie accountable for more than her fair share of their homework project; she may think Janie is making advances on Susie’s boyfriend.

If there is a lingering resentment, it could show up in any interaction between the two, even if it is completely unrelated to the original issue. In fact, many times it is more likely to come up elsewhere because Susie feels secretly ashamed for still resenting Janie after they made up.

Fixed Attention
Another common sign of unsettled resentment is an unusual level of attention to the other person’s motives in mundane actions. This is really a manifestation of projecting one’s own feelings of displeasure onto the other person. Going back to the previous example of Susie and Janie, Susie may think that Janie is suddenly acting “fake”. Susie finds herself questioning if Janie really meant it when she said she liked her earrings, or the real reason that Janie offered to drive them to the mall.

The motive behind the other person’s actions becomes more and more suspect as time goes on. Soon, the offender is simply assumed to be duplicitous in everything. Resentment like this can ruin a relationship quickly if it is not dealt with properly.

The Sign of Bitterness
The third sign is simply a bitterness that shows itself whenever the other person is around, though it may not necessarily be overtly directed at that person. Many times resentment couples with the previously mentioned sense of shame when a person knows that they should not feel that way.

The result can be an unfocused, unproductive sense of bitterness every time the other person is around. Because the bitterness has become detached from the real issue that sparked the resentment, it has no real focus and we tend to lash out at anyone in the vicinity.

This presents a great danger to our happiness because it affects not only our already troubled relationship, but our other relationships as well. This can begin a downward spiral, or domino effect, that works its way through the resentful person’s entire life.

Resentment does not always focus on a person. We can resent a pet, a company, a religion, even our own bodies. In order to get past the feeling of resentment we need to look at the root cause of our resentment.

Do I really resent the dog, or do I resent my wife for buying the dog without consulting me? Is it the church, or the gossipy neighbor who goes there? Not always, but usually, there is a person on the other end of our resentment, a person who needs our forgiveness just as much as we need to forgive them.

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We’ve all heard the expression “I can forgive, but I won’t forget“. What that really translates to is “I’m forgiving you for now, but I reserve the right to un-forgive at some point in the future.” Forgiving without forgetting is not truly forgiving. You cannot sincerely and completely forgive someone if you continue to blame the person for the offense.

To truly forgive a thing, you need to let go of the offense as if it never happened. Obviously, we cannot force ourselves to literally forget a hurtful incident, at least not without a rock and a sharp blow to the head, which is not an advisable strategy. But we can “forget” the offense in that we act and think as if it had never occurred.

There are many different kinds of situations that can lead to a conflict necessitating forgiveness. Oft times, a story has two sides. You are hurt, he is hurt. Out of an incident arose anger and resentment. Each of you is convinced that you are right, but you know deep down that there is enough blame to go around.

In those cases, we still tend to want to affix the blame to the other person. But we cannot completely forgive if we are still clinging to the idea that it was all his fault. Or even mostly his fault. All blame must be released before we can move past a superficial forgiveness to a true and genuine forgiveness.

A good litmus test to check whether or not you are ready and able to forgive without blame is to apologize to the other person. If you can’t bring yourself to apologize for your role, even if you think it was small, you aren’t ready to forgive. A heartfelt apology for your part, coupled with a genuine offer of forgiveness for his part is generally an outward sign of true forgiveness without blame. When that happens, the healing can begin.

There are other times when the actions of the other party are simply indefensible. Sometimes the issue is black and white: you are all right and she is all wrong. In those times it becomes all the more difficult, but even more important, to resist the temptation to fix the blame on the other party.

That is when the “forgive but don’t forget” doctrine seems the most appealing. But that refusal to forget equates to a reservoir of bitterness and distrust. We find ourselves giving lip service to forgiveness, but lying in wait for the offender to slip up again and justify our suspicions.

This point was driven home in the real life situation of Jon and Sheila (not their real life names). 5 years into their marriage, Jon had an affair. It wasn’t a one time thing; it was an on going affair with a woman in his office that went on for months. Eventually Jon got caught. It was devastating to Sheila, who thought that all was well in their marriage. The affair nearly destroyed their marriage then and there. But, with significant assurances from Jon and the support of her friends and family, Sheila made a difficult choice. Despite the damage that his actions had caused to their relationship, Sheila chose to forgive Jon.

Jon repented, truly repented in a way that you seldom see. He never saw the woman again. He quit his job and took another closer to home. They went to counseling. He accepted full blame and did everything he could to make amends. At the time, it looked like they were going to be one of the truly rare couples who overcomes a marital infidelity.

Sheila blamed Jon for the strain on their marriage. How could she not? He was the contemptible adulterer; she was the dutiful wife. As part of Jon’s commitment to fix what he had broken, he changed jobs. With the new job came a significant cut in pay. Money quickly got tight, and Sheila then blamed him for their financial distress. After all, he had been making good money until he screwed it all up by having an affair. She blamed him when their daughter had trouble in school. Surely that, too, was the result of the affair he had carried on three years prior.

Within a few years, everything that went wrong with their family, their home, and their careers was Jon’s fault. Sheila, although she made the right choice in forgiving Jon, held onto the right to blame him for the incident and for everything that followed. Ultimately, it was her bitterness and distrust that doomed the marriage, not the actual affair.

That story is just one of many similar tales that illustrate just how poisonous blame can be to a relationship. Whether you recognize it or not, holding on to blame obstructs your ability to completely forgive. The full extent of the problem may not become evident right away but it will remain, seething beneath the surface, until circumstances create a window to bring it back out again. It will come back around unless you release the blame and move on.

It is a daunting goal to forgive an offense to such a degree that we can let go all blame and allow the incident to lie in the past. If we are able to forgive completely, we need to five the other person tabula raza, a clean slate with no baggage of past indiscretions to cloud our future interactions. Forgiveness means that you look upon the offender as if that person had done no wrong. True forgiveness casts aside blame, recrimination, and guilt until only love remains.

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Emotion Seems to Have a Life of its Own
In most cases, you can only experience them and not control them. You are no longer in control – the emotions are! They act collectively as a kind of psychic clone of the more complete, more human you.

That’s the reason why we have emotional reactions to things that we sometimes later regret. We scream at our partners, we leave our friends, and we smash things until they break. Mostly, this emotional clone is reactive, uncontrollable, and seemingly independent from our core selves.

The Wolf Story
A sage once said that each person has both a white and a black wolf inside himself that constantly fight each other. The black wolf is aggressive and reactive and the white wolf is calm and social. The winner of this battle is simply decided by which wolf we feed. Most of the time we are not aware that, more often than not, we feed the black wolf and not the white one.

What can be done about this?

The black wolf can only live inside when you create it in the first place. A black wolf is a black hole that sucks up your energy.

1. The Black Wolf Called Anger
Anger is the result of not taking 100% responsibility for your life. You created the this wolf by reacting to an experience. Then you forgot that you created it. If you decide to take ownership of your creation, you must simply feel your way through the original experience. That feeling could be sadness, for example, but not anger. Sadness is the original feeling and an angry black wolf is the emotional result.

Perhaps you blame someone else for your anger. By doing so, you make another person responsible for the wolf creation that is yours and yours alone! It’s important to remember that everything in this world is a creation of yours in one form or another, even things that seem to have nothing to do with you directly.

2. The Black Wolf Called Resentment
Resentment is very close to anger. When you harbor resentment, you limit the spectrum of your feeling nature and a major part of you closes down. When you resent someone, you are saying very forcefully that the other person is the problem, the cause and the fault, not you. You forcefully blame the other person so you don’t have to look within.

You are declaring the other person, group or institution to be your enemy.

The problem is that resenting your enemy creates a dilemma that centers around the conflict that come from not taking full responsibility for the the situation. Ultimately, it is you who has the conflict, you who faces the dilemma, and you who began to harbor resentment.

3. The Black Wolf Called Blame
Like resentment, blame is not much different from anger. In both cases, you attempt to make someone else responsible for what you feel by creating an emotional reaction. Resentment and blame are different faces of this type of emotional reaction.

Resentment is a form of disappointment that seems to have its source on the outside. For example, should you get fired it seems logical that the cause is your employer. If such a calamity happened, there probably wouldn’t be much you could do about it. The cause seems to be external (your boss) even though your emotional reaction is generated within.

Everything changes when you accept that the cause is always you. You created it (you took the job), you experienced and accepted the situation (you created a positive or negative environment in which to work), and you reaped the results (you got rewarded or fired). You alone are responsible for this wolf. Why did you create a black wolf when you could have just as easily created a white one?

4. The Black Wolf Called Guilt
Guilt is much like blame of others, but turned back on yourself. When you’re guilty, you actually take ownership of what you did. So why would you feel bad about it? Because you judge yourself as having taken the wrong action in a given situation.

You did it and now you are convinced it was wrong.

With a little introspection, you’ll realize that guilt does not come from the original situation or action itself, but from the self-imposed judgment after the action. This judgment is, in fact, an emotional reaction that questions the original action you took in a given situation. When things fall apart afterwards, you tell yourself, “I made a mistake; I did not want to cause this.” You blame yourself.

5. The Black Wolf Called Betrayal
This is one of the hardest beasts to tame. The emotion of betrayal runs deeply. Betrayal occurs mostly after you have trusted someone close who then fails to satisfy that trust in some fashion. By trusting someone, you opened yourself up to be in a vulnerable state.

At some point, your trust is betrayed or even used against you. You thought that you had correctly judged your confidant as trustworthy, but now you are being punished in some way. It just makes no sense – it hurts! Betrayal is the emotional reaction to this (perhaps completely justified) feeling of being hurt by another.

Negative Emotions are a Pack of Black Wolves

This pack is vicious, fast, and can be deadly. They hunt you from the outside, circling closer until they can attack within. They may stalk you for days, months, or even years. This pack follows some people to their graves, snapping and snarling all the way. The pack is energetic and invincible. Like black wolves, e-motions are negative energy in motion.

It’s part of your creative manifesting power used against yourself!

You can eliminate them in a very short time – given the correct understanding of their nature and the techniques to vanquish them. The most potent weapon against them involves a miraculous inner process few practice completely, let alone fully understand.

The magic word here is ‘forgiveness’. We’ve just released a new mini course on CD – called The Choice of Forgiveness, and I would like you to be the first to get your hands on it.

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