How to Forgive Yourself?
Let it go. Forget about it. Move on.
Forgive yourself. It’s easy to say, but so much harder to actually do! We all mess up sometimes, whether it’s lashing out at a friend, engaging in a self-destructive behavior or cutting corners at work.
And with those mistakes often come overwhelming feelings of guilt. Shame. Self-condemnation. Humiliation.
Counselors and life coaches have found that these emotions can lead to stress, depression, anxiety disorders and even heart disease, if ignored.[1] Not exactly the formula for a happy life!
Forgive. We’ve all heard the word before, but what does it mean? And why is it so important?
Dr. Frederic Luskin at Stanford University reports that “learning to forgive helps people hurt less, experience less anger, feel less stress and suffer less depression. People who learn to forgive report significantly fewer symptoms of stress such as backache, muscle tension, dizziness, headaches and upset stomachs. In addition people report improvements in appetite, sleep patterns, energy and general well being.”[2]
If self-forgiveness is such a good thing, why is it so hard?
Too often, we punish ourselves for past mistakes, as if we could somehow “make up” the wrong that we’ve done. We walk through each day feeling less-than. We call ourselves losers. No good. We live chained to our past, holding on to hurts and grudges. And though no one else may know about our secret pain, the negative emotions we feel gnaw away at our joy and satisfaction in life.
Counselors and life coaches report that the hardest person to forgive is yourself. Not the friend who backstabbed you. Or the dad that wasn’t there for you. Or even the ex who broke your heart.
Why? Because you know yourself and you live with yourself every day. Go figure.
If you feel stuck in the rut of your past failures, try these tips for embracing forgiveness.
1. Talk about it.
When it comes to the past, silence can be deadly. So stop pretending. Free yourself from the bondage of holding it all in. Talk about what’s tearing you apart inside. Express the emotions you feel to a counselor, mentor, or friend you can trust. Forgiveness starts with being honest and vulnerable about who you are…the good and the bad. So say what you need to say.
2. Be honest with yourself.
“If I just pretend it never happened, maybe it will all go away,” we tend to think. Sounds nice…but not true. Choose to break out of denial. Be honest about how you’ve messed up and the consequences of your behavior. Journal out the specific behaviors and actions that are causing you angst.
3. Accept it for what it is.
As an imperfect person, you will make mistakes in life. Face it. You will hurt people sometimes. Youwill have regrets. It’s part of living in a less-than-perfect world. But you have a choice.
Either your past will keep you in a rut of guilt and shame…or you will accept it for what it is and experience the freedom to move on and enjoy the now. Self-acceptance is critical to your emotional health, so don’t miss out!
4. Let go.
Don’t hold on to guilt. You don’t need to justify your past actions or try to prove yourself. Letting go of the past means burying it and giving up your right to engage in self-condemnation. Forgiveness is a choice, but also a process. It’s choosing to stop hating yourself and cutting yourself down, but instead, seeing yourself as a valuable human being.
One of the first steps of letting go, is to just get it out there. Please feel free to use the form below to let it go, or apologize for something that has been on your chest for years.
You can use an anonymous name (and the email will NEVER be shown). Your post will be added to the wall below.
It’s okay. You can let go.
Develop realistic expectations.
Evaluate the expectations you (and others) set for you. Are they healthy? Or unrealistic? If you find yourself never being able to measure up—no matter how hard you try—you may just need to change a few things in your approach to life. Healthy expectations are achievable and fulfilling, not draining and overwhelming.
Forgiving yourself is tough. It means striking a deal with yourself …
- to let the past be past and live in the present
- to stop beating yourself up about something that happened two or five or ten years ago
- to banish guilt and shame from controlling your thoughts and behaviors
- to accept and respect yourself as you are…in spite of your screw-ups
Counselors and life coaches tell us that “to forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.”[3]
Tired of living as a prisoner? Click below to download our free forgiveness ebook.
Notes:
[1]Dr. Frederick Luskin, Research from Standford University, learningtoforgive.com/ [2]Ibid. [3]Lewis B. Smedes
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Anthony Centore
Encoraging my dog to give me oral sex as a 13 year old.
To start out, I am 22 and I have been doing so well at letting the thoughts and memories of my ex boyfriend Sean (27) gradually fade away in the past 5 months…. until tonight. I was transferring pictures of us from the 15 months of living together and all of a sudden our memories, good and bad, started to come back along with the guilt that I’ve been trying to let go of. All of my guilt came from abusing him verbally. I was miserable because I bought into his expectations of me to also be as sporty as he was which I was never able to meet. I felt like he was controlling and wanted to change me to be the “ideal version” that he imagined in his mind: keep active physically (by walking or jogging outside with him without warm enough clothing when it’s 14 degrees outside), know what I am passionate about and what I want in life (I was 21 for fuck’s sake I don’t think anyone can EXPECT me to know what I want in life, I am 22 now and I still don’t) , have a steady job and attend college. All very reasonable and good intentions right? But what good would it do when he was all in my face FORCING me to do so? It just made me resent him and want to find a way to snap back at him. I was doing the same thing in my head, expecting him to be the “ideal” person that I WANTED, instead of grow to love him for him. Often I would call him stupid or idiot or even useless or worthless when he can’t do a task that I request. This habit came from my interactions with friends in the past. Little did I know, I can’t use the “sass” I do around my girlfriends calling each others “hoes” “bitches” or “stupid” in a joking way with my man, especially when he have had bad experiences with it in the past. He brought it up a couple of times….but I never understood how much damage it was doing to him and insisted that he just needs to be less sensitive. I didn’t get how relationships work anyhow at the time so I feel like if I have the chance to do it all over again with the same exact knowledge I knew at that time, I’d end up doing the same exact thing I did. I was also in deep fear of having a 9 to 5 job that pays the minimum wage that I settled for a part-time online job that was paying $12 – 30 an hour working only 2 – 5 hours a day, a couple days a week….making under $900 a month. I was so afraid of failing or being not-enough to keep a job that I just hid behind the excuse of, I am okay….when I wasn’t….both of us knew that. Now the negative belief of I am not enough or I am worthless came from being criticized all the time and the feeling of being abandoned as a kid. My mom passed away when I was 10 and my dad was not there for me in the next few months following that…and it has caused me to feel a deep sense of betrayal and abandonment from both of my parents. All of those things have caused me to be triggered emotionally whenever I felt like Sean didn’t care. I would blow up and shift into anger almost immediately. He expressed that he felt like he was walking on eggshells with me all the time and it has stressed him out greatly. And being the ignorant person with no relationship experience I was, his concern just flew right past my head. I pretended like the relationship was okay…and actually believed that it was fine. My cup was filled by him and his attentions but he was drained. I just didnt fill his cup. But of course there were other good and bad things in our relationships. There were many compromises, and many healthy commitments that at least balanced out the bad….or so I thought. However, things got worse because we didn’t know how to efficiently communicate, mostly because when I presented my concerns, he just say “I am sorry” and EXPECTED me to forgive him without further discussing. And his concerns were so poorly expressed that I never grasped what he was talking about 90% of the times. We got to the point of screaming at each other at 3 in the morning, calling each other the most horrible names imagined because we were so hurt and broken inside that all we wanted to do was to get at each other and inflict pain in any possible way. And after 4ish months of misery and constantly putting each other down and getting on and off saying let’s break up but never have the strength to actually let go….he finally made up his mind and broke up with me…and this time it was real). We continued to live for 3 and a half miserable more months together because I did not have the courage to let him go. I thought staying there would somehow change his mind, but it only made things worse. All of those guilt and emotional roller coaster aftermaths of a breakup slowly devoured whatever respect and love we had left for each other.
I finally moved out almost 2 months ago, focusing and focusing and focusing on keeping busy and filling that void left behind by that relationship with physical exercise, personal development programs, learned as many tools to get me back on track. And still… that guilt of “I could have done better” lingers. Perhaps I need to remind myself that I am only human and I will make mistakes… just like everyone else. Choosing forgiveness and peace would free my present and future from the negative belief of “ya but what if I did things differently?” because…. like mentioned above, with the knowledge I had at the time….most I wouldn’t have done it very much differently.
So I choose to forgive myself and let go of regret that will get in the way of my self – love and self – acceptance.
Lord, I need forgiveness from you and for myself for not setting boundaries from the beginning in my relationships. Now, I have compromised my values and the man that I love seems to have lost respect for me. We used to be such good friends before and at the beginning of before our relationship. I should have listened to you and the people that you sent to me to set boundaries . Now I am trying to set them and he feels like I don’t love him and am taking things away. I thought we’d agreed about this as believers. I remember when he had other Godly men around him discussing this, we were on the same page. I’m not sure what happened, but it’s back to square one. I need your forgiveness and help to fix the mess that I created and to let it go to you. Help me to be strong and courageous for you are The Lord, my God and you are with me wherever I go. Help me be strong enough to not hang on to my past mistakes and to move forward into your will knowing that what the devil meant for evil, you can turn it into good. Lord, you know my heart, and you know my true intentions and how I just wanted us to spiritually grow together, but not my will, but your will be done. I am human, fall short, and makes mistakes. Thank you for understanding this, loving me anyway, and being so quick to forgive me always. Thank you for your love and your peace. I forgive myself because I fall short. That’s what I have Jesus for, to remind me how much I need him. Forgive me Jesus for not putting the focus on you, and expecting so much from a man who also falls short. Help me to be strong from here and to let him go to you, so our lives can be better whether together or apart. Although that sounds sad and scary, help me to trust you and let him go to you. I pray that during this time, you teach him to be slow to anger, be quick to forgive, develop patience, self-control, understanding, and wisdom. Again, please put the right Godly men around him to develop him spiritually. Lord, let him be willing to go to events together as a couple that talk about purity if that’s in your will.