How To: Forgive Yourself

We make mistakes and we do things we ultimately regret. In order to move on, we must first forgive ourselves otherwise stand at risk of letting our past haunt us.

How To: Forgive Yourself

1. Acceptance. It is one thing to make mistake and an entirely different thing to accept your mistake. The first step is to realize you have done something you are not proud of and understand that you can not go back in time to change the past but you can come into terms with your actions in hopes of a better tomorrow.

2. Decide. Decide that you can not continue to wallow in self pity and continue to hate yourself. Decide that its time for you to brush yourself off and do whatever it takes to rise above.

3. Analyze. When you make a mistake while solving a math problem, the best method is to check your answer step by step. Likewise, you need to analyze what you did wrong and what you could have done differently so next time, you are better prepared.

4. Understand. A mistake is a mistake as long as you have not learned a lesson. Do not let your pain go in vain, let it offer you a way to become a better person.

5. Closure. When someone else is involved, if you have directly or indirectly hurt someone then you need to let them know that you understand the error of your ways and you want to make amends. There is a chance that you may not be forgiven by them but you need to at least try so one day, you will have less regrets.

6. Don't be your own worst enemy. We have the tendency to be harder on ourselves than we are on others. We beat ourselves up more than we deserve. Sometimes, we give our mistakes more importance as compared to another person. Learn that you are no less and no greater than anyone else. If someone else made the same mistake that you did, would you be able to look past it?

7. Sort your energy. All the energy you use to hate yourself or bring yourself down, put that energy into something else. Try to help someone, paint about your feelings or focus on something that makes you feel like you are working to make amends for your mistakes.

8. Do not bottle your feelings up. It never hurts to have someone to talk to and in fact, sometimes just having someone listen can help you release the burden. You don't have to battle everything alone.