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4 Ways To Get Freedom Through Forgiving Your Self


The only man who never makes a mistake, is the man who never does anything. ~ Theodore Roosevelt

Good news stories are the once that cover how tolerant, selfless and heroic we can be towards others. Which is great, but how often are we the hero in our own life? How often do we look in the mirror and are at peace with what we see? How about that one mistake/ failure we can't shake and that we drag with us everywhere we go? That one secret that is so shameful that we don't want to think about let alone talk about?

We ALL have those; even when we don't want to acknowledge them. All those secrets wear us down and limit us to enjoy life. What we need to realize is that;

  • In any given moment we make decisions based on the knowledge we have and we do the best we know how.

  • When we make an unfavorable choice doesn't make us a "bad" person, it makes us human.

  • Overcoming mistakes and failures are designed to make us grow as a person.

  • It gives us opportunity to practice forgiveness towards others and ourselves, and gaining courage, strength and stamina in the process.

Yeah there will be moments in our lives we can't be proud of; we did or said something that hurt others and ultimate they hurt us. BUT, to set our self free we need to forgive our self, and treat that mistake as a learning tool. We are inclined to forgive others quicker then we forgive ourselves, we are our own worst critic and we have a hard time in letting go of the foolish things we said or done.

In holding on we limit our self in moving on, learning and growing as a human being. It makes us bitter, resentful and self righteous, it even can become self destructive. Take your secret, failure or mistake and ask yourself: If my friend had made this mistake would I be able to forgive him/her? Often the answer is yes, so why do you give somebody else a free card and not yourself?

Forgiveness is letting go of the negative attached emotions that are coming up when we remember a challenged episode in our lives. Luckily we can choose to forgive anybody, including our self by doing the following steps:

  1. Be honest with yourself: You can't fix what you don't acknowledge. Often our skeleton in the closet appear bigger in the dark, so when we gain courage a really look at them and bring them in the light we will discover that they are smaller than we thought. Therefore easier to face and deal with them until our negative attachments are gone.

  2. Revaluate our values and morals and start acting accordantly. Only acknowledging our values and morals is not enough, we need to act on them every single day. This will take practice; humans are prone to take the road of the least resistance , my advice is then: Fake it, till you make it.

  3. Make personal challenges and be accountable for them: This brings us from thinking about it, to doing it. Collaborate with somebody like a coach or a therapist who is able to keep us on our toes without a personal agenda. This can be as short or long term relationship as you need to get back on track.

  4. Do exercises like one of those two: Take 15 minutes a day, pen and paper and write all your shame and guilt; after that destroy the letter by burning or shredder, for as long as the negative feelings are present. Or, write down your shame and guilt feelings on a note, put that in a balloon and sent it up in the air.

Forgiving of the self is not something we should take lightly, it affects everybody and everything we say and do in a day if we do this or not. Be the hero in your own life, acknowledge you are human and therefore you make mistakes.

Need help to claim your freedom Contact Ellen Nyland for a free 30 min session.


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