BY STEPHANIE DOYLE

Dick Tibbits has come a long way since his more angry days.

Not only has he learned to "let go" and seen a drop in his blood pressure, he's teaching others how to "forgive to live." Tibbits has been taking his message across the country, from boardrooms to jails. He recently visited inmates at the Orange County Jail in Orlando. Tibbits reviewed their "homework" — completing the workbook that goes along with his book, Forgive to Live: How Forgiveness Can Save Your Life — and heard poems they had written and their reactions to the book.

Tibbits, a licensed professional mental health counselor who has a doctoral degree in psychology, has worked in the behavioral and spiritual health fields for more than 30 years. But about eight years ago, he grew bitter after being laid off from a vice president position and taking a pay cut at a new job. He gained weight. He was losing his usual optimistic personality. A physician warned him of his rising blood pressure.

"I was angry, and I wasn't letting it go,'' Tibbits admitted. He realized he needed to forgive his former employer to truly be able to move on and heal.

During his seminars, people often ask Tibbits, now CPO (chief people officer) at Florida Hospital, how soon they should forgive. "You will forgive when you are ready to be healed," Tibbits replied.

Tibbits forgave and watched his blood pressure drop. Already intrigued by the "mind-body connection"— Tibbits studied at the Harvard University Mind/Body Medical Institute — he decided to study the relationship between anger and heart disease.

He reviewed research showing a correlation between anger and heart disease, and wanted to prove that forgiveness can mitigate the toxic effects of anger. Tibbits designed a study for 50 Florida Hospital patients with high blood pressure, dividing the patients into two equal groups. The first did nothing but monitor their blood pressure. The second group went through an eight-week course during which Tibbits taught them how to address their "grievance stories," the events from the past that stirred anger within.

Those in the second group who also during that time made some kind of lifestyle change (they quit smoking or began an exercise regimen, for example), were excluded from the final findings.

Although there was no change in the control group after eight weeks, the group that had forgiveness training "had a slight but measurable improvement in their blood pressure." But for the angriest people taking the training, the results were much more dramatic, Tibbits says. The participants with the six highest anger scores all went from diagnosed stage one hypertension to normal blood pressure in eight weeks.

Compared to what Tibbits refers to as "a state of anger," or a temporary elevation of anger such as road rage, the type of anger that needs repair is a more chronic anger. "It's the kind of anger that is constantly below the surface,'' he said. And it's a type of anger that most people deny they have.

"When I ask a group of people if they are angry, very few hands go up," Tibbits said. "But when I ask the same group if they know someone who is angry, just about every hand goes up. What does that mean? It means we don't recognize our anger. Most people only recognize anger in its explosive state."

But anger, Tibbits pointed out, is any reaction to hurt. Grievance stories can include a variety of people or experiences: the 9/11 tragedy, divorce, random violence, a boss hindering success, or any number of other situations. Each time a person's own unique grievance story is repeated in his or her mind, the hormone cortisol is produced by the adrenal cortex and released in the body, causing blood pressure to rise and the immune system to weaken. "Repeating the same story over and over keeps you trapped in it," he said.

True forgiveness — more than simply forgetting — can "untrap" an individual from his or her grievance story. "Most of us believe that if we haven't forgotten it, we haven't forgiven," Tibbits said. "But forgiveness is not forgetting. And forgiveness is not letting someone off the hook; it has to do with letting yourself off the hook."

Most people have tried to forgive the offender and forget the pain, he said. But the pain is still there. Unless the grievance story is revealed and redefined, people will face an emotional despair and serious health risks. So the key to forgiveness, Tibbits emphasized, is reframing the issue — widening it to be able to view the person that the anger is directed toward as someone with negative and positive characteristics, and having empathy for that person. "Think about what may have happened to them to bring them to that point,'' Tibbits said. "Be careful about how self-righteous you think you are."

This act of forgiveness will take practice, Tibbits said. "Forgiveness is like a muscle that needs exercise,'' he explained. "Forgiveness is a journey, or a process, not a one-time event."

Tibbits, who grew up in New England and began his career as an ordained minister, has served as an adjunct professor at Fuller Theological Seminary, United Theological Seminary, and Andrews University Theological Seminary. Early on, he said, he could give scriptural advice, but felt inadequate to help people.

That feeling of inadequacy, combined with the death of his mother, a nurse, from cancer at a young age, led him to study mind-body connections, everything from how the mind affects pregnancy to how thoughts can hinder weight loss.

To keep his own life in balance, Tibbits, whose dad is a motorcycle dealer, rides a Harley-Davidson, enjoys tennis and plays saxophone in a quartet. Tibbits has spoken around the world about the healing power of forgiveness, and has appeared on several radio and television talk shows.

"And now I am a VP again,'' he said of his position at Florida Hospital, where he has been for 12 years. "If I'd have remained stuck in my grievance story, I may not have healed and be using my talents and skills today."




December 2006