ABSTRACT
In their 1997 review, McCullough, Worthington, and Rachal pointed out that most of the forgiveness literature has focused on interpersonal forgiveness, the form of forgiveness that has as one of its goals the possibility of restoring relationships, provided that it is wise and safe to do so. In this chapter, we depart from this tradition by reviewing the theoretical and empirical literature germane to unilateral forgiveness, the form of forgiveness that may be facilitated in individual psychotherapy as an approach to resolving interpersonal emotional injuries when restoring the relationship is not a goal of therapy, either because it is not possible to restore the relationship (as is the case when the injurer is dead or unwilling to reconcile) or because doing so is likely to expose the client to the risk of reinjury.
