While being sorry is for both you and the harmed “other” involved, forgiveness is only for you. Other people do not need your forgiveness, even if they think they do. Usually if you are waiting for another person to forgive you, what you are really waiting for is to forgive yourself. The same is true for others. Some people cannot move on without your forgiveness, or so they believe. What they really need to do is forgive themselves. What you do in that regard is on you.
Why then forgive other people if they do not need this? Ah, because as mentioned, forgiveness is for you. Until you can accept another person’s wrong doing, harmful act, neglect, abuse, etc. as being a part of them being a flawed human and hold them in your heart with compassion and love, you will be putting yourself in danger of further harm. Your anger, harboring of hurt feelings, festering of regret, etc. do not hurt the other person. They hurt you. If you then also spend time thinking about or actually punishing them, or taking our revenge on them, you further harm yourself, that relationship, and the energy of the universe.
All stressful thoughts and emotions are harmful to your body when you hold onto them. Being angry in the moment isn’t a problem. It is natural and human to do that. (It is also fine to realize in the moment that your anger isn’t really necessary, but you are human, and of course, that won’t work every time.) The question is, what do you do in the next moment with that anger? Do you work hard to hang onto it? Do you let it go? That is where you take what someone else did, that might have harmed you in a moment, and make it hurt you more. You hold onto it. You try to figure out how to make sure they pay for it. You want to make sure they know they hurt you, make them take accountability and responsibility for it, and if they don’t, you will try harder to make them.
Sometimes you think you let it go, but then the next time you interact with them, are you waiting for them to do it again so you can catch them at it, prove they did it before? Are you also then looking out for others in your life who might treat you the same way so you can avoid getting hurt by them? Are you preemptively striking out at others who have or might hurt you to head off the hurt? These tactics hurt you, and also sometimes do hurt others. Truly forgiving someone might help you make a decision to not spend time with that person or trust them with certain aspects of your life, but the planning and worrying about them or others hurting you is not part of forgiveness. It is a result of not forgiving that person fully. It keeps you from not only loving them fully, but also loving yourself and others fully too.
Forgiveness is letting go of the hurt, the pain, the anger, truly letting it go, and replacing it with love and compassion for the other person. You have hurt people too. Whether in the same way, worse, or less serious as they hurt you, you are not innocent. None of us are. Forgiveness shows the universe that you are accountable for your actions by being loving and compassionate when others make mistakes too.
The energy you put into the universe is the energy you get back. It’s not so much about what comes around goes around, but it is a law of attraction. You will attract what you are focused on seeing. Looking for pain and suffering to avoid it, you will more likely find it. Looking for ways to be loving and kind, you will more likely find love and kindness. It’s energy of attraction. Hold onto anger and pain, you will find more of it. Release it and replace with love and compassion, you will receive it.
The same applies to forgiving yourself. Holding onto guilt or suffering because of something you did wrong, a mistake, etc. is not good for you or others. It will cause you pain and often more mistakes. You are human. Say you are sorry. Be accountable. Be responsible for amends, and let go of the pain you are causing yourself.
Namaste, I forgive you, as an act of compassion for myself.