Last week I shared a blog post on the concept of self-forgiveness. (If you’ve not read that, I suggest you read that first, here.)
Believe me when I tell you, I was immediately to put to the test and the irony was not lost on me. The fact that I had to practice self-forgiveness while writing on the topic was a reconfirmation to me that life indeed is the best teacher and experience, the best lesson.
So how did that happen?
Just like you, I’m on this self growth journey. Just like you, I am learning these concepts hoping to apply them when the time comes. However, I’ve noticed that we never really know when that time comes. Oftentimes, we’re unaware that the test has begun especially when new to this.
As I become more aware, I get better at recognizing those moments. The only problem is that I react and make wrong choices before I even connect the dots and realize that it’s a test. I swear this happens every time I learn a new concept. I am immediately put to the test to ensure that the message sinks in.
For instance, this morning, I learnt that to be confident, do not react or let small annoyances get to you. As usual, I thought lesson learnt. Hours later, I was with my sister trying to get her Identity card at the local office and the officer started to scold me for arriving in the afternoon. I immediately reacted because it obviously got to me. It wasn’t until a few seconds had gone by I realized that that was a test and I had failed it. This was not the first time and I know it won’t be the last. This situation reminded me of a social media post that said
Life will continue to teach you the same lessons over and over again until you learn.
Just like the incident above, I was placed in a similar position while I was working on this blog post. After I wrote that piece of self-forgiveness, I was so pleased with myself because I was convinced I had it under control. I was confident that I could practice self-forgiveness any day, anytime. I believed I had the grasped the concept. I was wrong because that same day, I did something that made me so disappointed in myself and I fell into the old patterns of self deprecation and believing that I was not worth the fight. I almost started to lose faith in myself when I immediately reminded myself that this was all a test. It took a minute but I brought myself back on track and focused on practicing what I had learnt. It helped tremendously because I was able to move past that feeling of guilt and I was able to make better decisions afterwards because I had learnt from that mistake.
Which is why the first thing I’d love for you to understand is that forgiving yourself is a process that takes time and commitment so you have to focus on your progress over perfection. (I bet the commitment phobes reading this are thinking ‘not for me’. Calm down.) Like any goal in life, if you want to accomplish, you must be ready and willing to do the work. The more you practice, the more aware you become, the better you get at making better choices and letting go of past mistakes.
Are you ready?
Here’s how you practice self-forgiveness.
1. Ask yourself what forgiveness means to you
Self-Forgiveness is not about releasing you from responsibility or convincing yourself that you are not at fault. It also does not mean that you automatically forget or that you force yourself to forget what you have done so you can move on as if nothing has happened.
To be honest, I used to think that forgiving myself meant trying to forget what had happened or pretending it never happened. I used to struggle with the concept of ‘forgive and forget’ because I just couldn’t bring myself to forget or ignore the guilt and that made forgiving myself almost impossible. I would hold on to that guilt for years. Of course, time and other events would distract me from that feeling . However, that dreadful feeling would pop randomly into my mind even though years had gone by making me relive the same situation time and again. Now I realize that was only happening because I didn’t understand the concept of self-forgiveness and I held onto to the grudge without ever truly letting go.
Now that we know what forgiving yourself is not about, let’s talk about what it’s about.
Forgiving yourself is about accepting that you are not perfect, that you have made poor choices and acknowledging that that does not make you a failure. Neither does it make your mistakes your identity.
So instead of beating yourself up, self-forgiveness makes you treat yourself with kindness and compassion. You get to understand through positive self-talk that this is an experience to learn from in order to be better moving forward. Accepting responsibility but with kindness.
2. Be honest with yourself and acknowledge how you’re feeling.
Often times we lie to ourselves because we feel too much shame and we don’t want to face the truth about ourselves. Sometimes it could be that we have a distorted view of who we are. To practice self forgiveness, the second step is be honest with yourself. You can’t grow if you’re not willing to take the action that ensures your growth.
Holding yourself accountable makes it easy to release unwanted feelings so they don’t get you. I’ve been learning that one of the fastest ways to change is to face yourself. Like Eminem,
Go to war with the man in the mirror.
To do this, meditate. It helps you acknowledge your feelings and notice what is going on within you without judgement. If you’re angry, allow yourself to feel the anger, or the shame or the sadness and then start to accept them as normal. You do not need to react the way you feel. Your feelings do not define your response to the situation.
I know it is definitely easier said than done but you have to ask yourself what you have to lose for trying? When you accept how you feel, you’ve taken a crucial step towards understanding what has occurred and what you can do to fix it. And if it can’t be fixed, it’s a lesson learnt so you’re better prepared when faced with a similar challenge next time.
3. Owning up to your mistakes.
Taking responsibility for your part in whatever happened is a crucial part of self forgiveness. It allows you to understand why it happened and you gain valuable insight into what could be prevented next time you find yourself in such a situation. Believe me, there will always be a next time. Situations where you feel like you have let yourself down for the umpteenth time.
When you fail to accept your faults and blame everything else, you will be stuck in the same vicious cycle that you never evolve from. Once you acknowledge your mistake, you’re able to understand which trait of yours caused the problem. I’m not saying you should replay the incident in your head a million times focusing on what went wrong. Rather, I’m saying you should focus on what actions or traits led to the problem, write that out and then work on it.
As Yoruba’s say
The first step to becoming sane is to acknowledge your insanity.
4. Apologize to yourself or others
A lot of people grew up never understanding the importance of an apology. Mainly because their parents never showed them how to accept their faults or they never learned how to express their remorse to others. So, regardless of how they feel, they believe in sweeping everything under the rug.
Stop that now!
If you hurt yourself or anyone else for that matter and you feel bad about that, don’t try to sweep it under the rug as though the incident never occurred. That’s a great way to create issues that causes strain in your relationships(a trait most African parents’ exhibit). If you’re committed to the self-growth journey, being emotionally intelligent is very Important. You must understand how your actions affect you and others around you.
To forgive yourself, you must apologize to the yourself or the person you hurt. This concept is very popular in Islam. If you hurt someone either through slander or backbiting, its recommended that you seek the person’s forgiveness.
While your apology may necessarily not be accepted by the person you’ve hurt, it is still important you say it to the person in order to let go and forgive yourself. If you are unable to reach such person, writing it out in the most sincere form helps you to purge and release.
For it to be sincere, you must acknowledge your wrongdoings, express your regret, acknowledge the impact of your actions on the victim (you or another) and describe what you would do differently to ensure it does not repeat itself.
5. Focus on the lessons
In the past, every time I did something I was not proud of. I would ruminate for days about how much I messed up. However, this torment and wallowing didn’t help me because I was too focused on the mistakes I made that I failed to see the silver lining ie the positive outcome of a negative situation.
The positive outcome were the lessons I had learnt. The best thing about making mistakes is that your mistakes teach you profound lessons that your wins rarely do. When you do something well, you’re caught up in that euphoria and celebration that you oftentimes forget to analyze what you did well. Even when you do analyze, the lessons aren’t as impactful as the ones your failures teach you. When you do something wrong and you focus on the lessons, it becomes easier for you to forgive yourself because you know what to avoid in the future.
6. Do something about it
Your self forgiveness journey is not complete until you take action to make things better. Practicing self forgiveness while continuing with the same self sabotaging traits will only keep you in a vicious cycle. The worst part is that you stay in denial never making any real progress.
If it’s a bad habit you hate yourself for and are trying to quit, practice self forgiveness by acknowledging it and taking steps to remove the cues of that habit from your environment, reframe your mindset, make it difficult and whatever you do, commit to sincerely to getting better. Also read the book Atomic Habits for more tips on how to quit bad habits. (I promise you, it’s life changing)
Although the possibility of a relapse is high, the most important thing is to focus on how many times you get back on track rather than how many times you fall off track and when you do this, you’ll notice that the frequency at which you come back on track is gets higher and the frequency at which you fall is getting smaller and wider. At the end of the day, prioritizing progress over perfection is the best way to practice self forgiveness.
7. Practice compassion
Once something is done, its done. Since we can’t erase the past, what we can do is understand that we control the future. It’s important you check how you speak to yourself. When you beat yourself up, you’re reinforcing the negative belief that you may not worthy of forgiveness. Even worse is the belief that your mistakes define who you are making you give up on trying.
Practice self forgiveness by talking to yourself like you would talk to someone you love and respect. With acceptance, kindness and respect. Recognize the fact that you’re not your negative thoughts and your mistakes do not guarantee who you will become in the future.
Take control through the way to speak to yourself, acknowledge yourself, accept yourself, show yourself mercy like you would want Allah (SWT) to show you.
I know that we are often our own biggest critic but we have the power to choose how we treat yourselves. So choose to speak to yourself with kindness and understanding so you’re able to forgive yourself and let go.
When you forgive yourself, you allow yourself to experience growth and change that will impact the rest of your life in the long run.
Why forgiving yourself can be hard
Sometimes inability to forgive yourself arises from the fact that you’ve repeated the same mistakes so often that you have lost faith in your ability to change. So it becomes difficult to trust your ability to make better decisions.
Understand that your life is governed by the choices you make. You have the power to create the best life for yourself through the choices you make. My faith helped me in this regards. Placing my focus on God helped me to acknowledge my faults and make better choices every time I faced a test. As a convert Muslim, I struggled for a long time with irregular Salat and the fact that my actions were not reflecting my identity as a Muslim. The guilt was killing me because I knew I had made a choice to be a part of this religion and I had very little to show for it. With time, I kept coming back even after I had made the worst choices. I kept trying even when I failed and finally I got better. I went from not praying at all to never missing a salat. I went from indecent dressing to wearing the hijab and dressing modestly. The more I came back to the right path, the better I got at dropping the bad habits that led to self-resentment. Islam teachings helped me to place my focus on consistency and progress over perfection.
What this means is that the more times you’re faced with the same test, the more opportunities you have to choose the better option or make the better choice. With this realization in mind, you become more mindful of your actions and fight harder to make better decisions.
It’s easier said than done!
I acknowledge that self-forgiveness can be very hard because as people we are prone to fixating on negative thoughts and wallowing in negative emotions.
Also, it can be difficult when we’re not ready to change.
Pseudo self-forgiveness will not lead to true self-respect and happiness so it’s necessary to commit to the act of self-forgiveness in order to experience positive self growth. Engaging in fake forgiveness means you’re not ready to confront yourself or accept your flaws.
Listen though!
If you unfairly blame yourself for something you’re not responsible for, then this practice is not for you. If you have suffered abuse, trauma, loss and you feel guilt even though you had no control over the situation, then you have no business forgiving yourself because whatever happened is not your fault.
While self-forgiveness can be an empowering tool, in this situation it may lead to more problems as it would only be reinforcing the negative and untrue belief that you’re at fault instead of focusing on the best coping mechanisms for the trauma you might have gone through. If this applies to you, click on this link to access a qualified therapist who can help you through this.
Now before I leave, I want you to remember that self- forgiveness is important to self-improvement and emotional health. You can practice self-forgiveness through the self-help method I outlined above or through counselling.
You do not have to be ashamed of making mistakes or seeking help through counselling. It is not a waste of time, neither is it ‘see finish’. It allows you to learn healthy ways to forgive and improve your mental well being and outlook on life.
So, would you be willing to give it a try?
Just remember Progress over perfection!
Download this self forgiveness affirmations and read every morning to kickstart your self forgiveness journey!
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