Giving Within For-Give-Ness
People often say that Jesus taught, "You should turn the cheek if someone smites you; you should turn the other cheek if they wrong you." Many people interpret this as saying that if someone hits you, you should turn the other cheek and let them hit you again. I don't think he meant that.
I think he meant that you are supposed to give back a different form of energy. If you are given hate or indifference, you are to give back love, patience and compassion. Turning the other cheek means you're giving back another energy. If someone gives you negative energy, you give back positive, affirmative energy -- such as forgiveness. If someone has done something wrong or destructive to you, you give another energy back. Instead of "giving as good as you get," you give back a higher form of energy.
This is the giving within for-give-ness.
You should disengage then from the ego's point of view, which is always saying that you're right, and that as you've been given negative, so you should double it back on the other person. This is oftentimes where nations live: in revenge.
But the practice of forgiveness is a higher state of consciousness because you're acknowledging that someone may have done something wrong, destructive, or not life-enhancing, but you are still going to give back an affirmative energy in their direction.
--Michael Bernard Beckwith, in Beyond Forgiveness