How to Forgive Yourself for the Past

We all have those moments in our past that we are deeply ashamed of. The ones that cause that heart aching feeling when we think of them. The choices that bestow the deepest sense of guilt and regret in our hearts.. You are not alone and you can learn to forgive yourself.

When we forgive ourselves, we free ourselves from the anguish that rests deep inside of us. Oftentimes, we forget it’s there but ultimately it is affecting the way we love ourselves. It is affecting our sense of worthiness, our self-esteem and the choices we make. It is limiting our self-love and our freedom that our souls desire. To learn more about self-love click here.

You no longer need to be confined by the limitations of guilt, regret and sorrow from the choices we made in your past. Did you know that the prefrontal cortex of the brain does not fully mature until age 25? This is the reasonable part of your brain that helps you make cognitive decisions. Did you know that your cells replace themselves every 7 years and that every minute of everyday your body and mind are changing based on your thoughts and experiences?

The truth is you are not who you were yesterday, 1 year ago or 10 years ago because you are an ever changing human being and you are here on Earth to experience, to learn and to grow. So how can you forgive yourself for your past mistakes that supported your growth?

make a choice to forgive

We can choose to grieve the mistakes we made when we didn’t know or have access to what was right in the past and why it was important. Or we can choose to embrace the lessons learned and apply them to our current reality. We cannot go back in time and change the choices of our past but we can decide to make better choices for our future.

I have spent a significant amount of time learning to forgive myself, learning to forgive others and learning how to help others to do the same. Throughout this time, I discovered three practices that have proven to have the greatest impact on finding forgiveness for oneself.

write it all down and say it out loud

This may sound like an easy thing to do but facing the reality of some of the things you have done is very hard. When you write it down and when you hear your own voice taking responsibility, this allows you to truly and fully acknowledge what you have done. It makes it real, in a sense.

ex. I betrayed her, I broke his heart, I lied, I cheated, I gave up, I made judgments, I bullied

Oftentimes, our minds try to forget about or shadow over some of the bad things we have done to protect our ego, to spare us of grief and to avoid facing harsh realities about ourselves. Be honest with yourself, face yourself and accept yourself. This is the only way to truly forgive and love yourself.

Reach out and Make amends

Reach out to those you hurt. The power of taking responsibility and acknowledging that you hurt them in certain ways holds so much healing power for both individuals. You may not hear back from them or they may not be on earth anymore, so you may reach out to them in prayer. In any case, make the effort on your end to make amends.

Whether they grant you forgiveness personally or not, you took the responsibility to ask for it and they will appreciate that on some level. Even if it doesn’t show. So please, never underestimate the power of planting a seed of love, compassion and understanding for someone else.

Acknowledge and appreciate each lesson learned

We need to redefine our perception and our emotions that are linked with each mistake we are forgiving ourselves for. Write down each mistake and then write down three things you learned by making that mistake. It’s quite possible that the mistakes you made when you were younger taught you the importance of being a good friend, a faithful partner or an honest person. Subsequently, sparring you the troubles and the pain inflicted on others by not carrying on with that selfish behavior as you grew older.

Normalize asking yourself “What did I learn from that?” when you are reflecting back on your past and you will find that gratitude is waiting for you. As cliche as it sounds, we have to be grateful for the lessons we learned from our biggest mistakes because those same mistakes provided us with the awareness we have now. We can now understand that those were mistakes as we strive to become better people.

You wouldn’t be here reading this right now if you hadn’t learned from your mistakes and realized that they weren’t the best choices you could have made. Do you see it now sweet human? To get to this place of acknowledging, healing, forgiving and loving yourself you had to have made some mistakes in your past. Do your part in taking responsibility of the pain you may have caused others, make the amends to clear up your space and positively transform the energy associated with your past choices.

As always I am sending you love and continued support on your journey. Please share this article with someone who needs it and make sure to subscribe to Join the Tribe!