Forgiveness is a combination of acceptance and compassion. Compassion helps us remain open to pain; acceptance has to do with allowing identities and beliefs to relax. Forgiveness is necessary to stop living in the past – no longer identified as the one who is hurt. A vicious cycle is established: first, one is hurt; then, to protect oneself from feeling the hurt, one creates self-identities and beliefs about others that create the limited reality in which one lives; this self/world view then creates more suffering of the same kind, and the repetition of the pattern gives one ongoing opportunities to heal the original pain. Inquiry (wanting to know the truth) at any point breaks the cycle. For forgiveness to be complete, one needs to be open to fully experiencing the pain, and be able to discriminate the pain from the story about the pain and the identity that has formed around the pain. Ultimately, the only real way out of this cycle is to see that who we really are can’t be hurt.