Hoponopono (Ho’oponopono): healing through forgiveness

The Hoponopono (also known with the writing Ho'oponopono) is a philosophy of conflict resolution and spiritual healing based on forgiveness, reconciliation and love.

Hoponopono (Ho'oponopono): forgive yourself

Its origins date back to the first inhabitants of the Polynesian island of Hawaii, who used to practice healing rituals based on the Hoponopono philosophy. In the 20th century, Nalamaku Simeona adapted ancient teachings and techniques to modern times and popularized what we now understand as Hoponopono.

Although in the ancient versions of this healing art the figure of the healer was instructed by priests, in the current version the action falls on the individual who wishes to be healed, so we can understand this spiritual art as a method of self-help.

Polynesian beliefs

In the popular cultures of the Polynesian islands it was believed that the errors that people committed were the cause of diseases, since they enervated the spirits of the gods. Moved by this dogma, they thought that to debug errors the individual should

confess. If the confession is not accepted, the person could become ill and die. Keeping the error a secret is what stimulated the disease to continue to develop.

In the paradigm of psychoanalysis, we could translate Polynesian beliefs by the concept of repression. By not having the consciousness of these negative elements for health, the tensions they cause remain anchored in the psyche, and later they become somatized. By confessing the error, the detrimental effect on the person is nullified, neutralized.

Ancestral practice of Hoponopono

"Ho'oponopono" means, in Hawaiian, something like mental hygiene: family assemblies where relationships are channeled and balanced through words, discussion, confession, compensation, repentance, sincere understanding towards others, the forgiveness and, ultimately, the love.

While the particle "ho'o" is a prefix that turns a noun into a verb, the noun "pono" can be defined as "goodness, morality, correctness, virtue, fair, ethical ...".

Thus, "ponopono" means "redirect, correct, reorder... ”.

One of the leading researchers on Hawaiian tradition, Mary Pukui, described the first steps of Hoponopono in Polynesian culture as “a family tradition consisting of family members they reunited with other distant members of the same family and redirected the entrenched problems between them, managing to forgive and understand the other ".

Hoponopono was conceived as a spiritual method to restore bad interpersonal relationships that led to pathologies and diseases of the individual, and therefore of the group. It was possible to get to the origin of the problems, and it was believed that this also improved relationships individuals and families with the gods, who provided certain essential elements for peace spiritual.

Hoponopono today

Of course, the concept of Hoponopono is not due to experimental psychology and the psychological intervention practices that contain it are not endorsed by science. Despite this, it has been used in various contexts during the last decades.

Traditional application with criminals

During the second half of the 19th century, a prison program was implemented in Hawaii in which offenders had to work with a old man who led Hoponopono meetings with his families, as an alternative method of debugging inter and intrapersonal.

Karma catharsis

In the 70s of the last century, the traditional Hoponopono was adapted to the needs of industrial society. The philosophy of forgiveness and conflict resolution was extended to social problems, and also acquired, on the other hand, a psychospiritual character purification of emotional drag of each individual.

This adaptation put a lot of emphasis on the effects of negative Karma. Being aware of and experiencing for yourself the pain you have caused to others is one of its foundations. The Hoponopono philosophy has elements of the solipsism, going so far as to affirm that “each one is the creator of his own life and his circumstances. Every immoral action leaves its mark on one's psyche and is reflected in every object or living being that witnessed that moment ”.

The cleansing or purification of karma becomes an indispensable requirement for expansion of consciousness.

Hoponopono: no limits

The 21st century versions of Hoponopono underline the importance of reaching "the state of zero, where there are no limits or ties, no memory, no identity. To reach such a state, called "Self-I-Dentity" (self-identity), one must repeatedly repeat the following mantra:

Please forgive me. So sorry. I love you.

The philosophy underlying today's Hoponopono advocates the assumption of full responsibility for our actions and that of others. Conflicts, then, arise from oneself and never by force of an external reality. If you want to change your personal reality, you have to change yourself. Although this postulate resembles solipsism, the truth is that Hoponopono does not deny the reality of the consciousness of other people.

Instead, Hoponopono conceives the computation of the consciences that inhabit the world as interlocking pieces. If one clears his own conscience of the mistakes made, he will be clearing everyone's conscience. Without a doubt, a philosophy that can help us understand ourselves better and be more connected with the people around us.

Introductory book

Do you dare to try this philosophy? I invite you to get the book of the Dr. Mª Carmen Martínez coming into this link.

Bibliographic references:

• Pukui, Mary Kawena and Elbert, Samuel H., University of Hawaii (1986) ISBN 978-0-8248-0703-0
• Simeona, Morrnah, Self-Identity through Hoʻoponopono, Basic 1, Pacifica Seminars (1990)