A research-backed map of how readily you let go of resentment. Developed by the psychologists Laura Yamhure Thompson, C. R. Snyder and colleagues in 2005, the Heartland Forgiveness Scale treats forgiveness not as a single act but as a lasting disposition, and measures it across three separate fronts. The first is forgiveness of yourself, easing the self-blame that can linger after your own mistakes. The second is forgiveness of other people, releasing the grudges and the wish for payback that a wrong can leave behind. The third is forgiveness of situations, making peace with hard circumstances no one chose — illness, loss, bad luck, the way things simply turned out. Forgiving here means freeing yourself of bitterness, not condoning, excusing or forgetting what happened, and not necessarily reconciling. You can sit high on one front and low on another, so this describes the shape of your forgiveness rather than a single score.
Empirical. The Heartland Forgiveness Scale was developed and validated by Laura Yamhure Thompson, C. R. Snyder and colleagues (2005), who defined dispositional forgiveness as the freeing of oneself from negative feelings toward the source of a transgression, and measured it across three independent domains — forgiveness of oneself, of other people, and of situations beyond anyone's control. Forgiving here means releasing your own resentment and ill will; it is not the same as condoning, excusing, forgetting, or necessarily reconciling. The scale's three-factor structure, reliability and validity are well established. (Heartland Forgiveness Scale (Thompson et al., 2005))