The Need To Forgive Yourself, Frequently

“Take a walk through the garden of forgiveness and pick a flower of forgiveness for everything you have ever done. When you get to that time that is now, make full and total forgiveness of your entire life and smile at the bouquet in your hands because it truly is beautiful.”
― Stephen Richards, Forgiveness and Love Conquers All: Healing the Emotional Self

If you are like most people, you probably have emotional baggage that is weighing you down. You might not be aware of those emotions, but they are there and are causing you to react in a certain way to certain triggers. Regret, guilt, anger, shame, fear of something from the past, past relationships, unfinished business, etc., are emotional baggage. If you intend to live a stable and productive life, you need to address those past feelings in a holistic approach. It is important to remember that to even be rational, to be able to maintain a healthy state of mind, we need to forgive ourselves.

There are many ways to deal with the past, some will suggest regression therapy etc., but the surest and most effective way to deal with the past is to let it go. No revisiting, no storytelling your trusted friend about you felt about it, no past life regression, because when you do those things you are only going to open that smelly Pandora Box. Just let the past go.

“The secret to change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.” – Socrates

Now, sometimes letting go of the past is not so easy, because emotions are too strong to ignore. And the stimuli reappear now and then, I mean they do reappear. Personally, I don remember exactly when I consciously learned this but there comes a time when I would say “it’s OK” immediately after I just minced swear words. I mean, however strong a negative word I just used, I would immediately say ‘it’s OK’. I say that not in an angry way, nor with arrogance, but by focussing on the moment. Sometimes, I even physically stop whatever I was doing and say those words. Trust me, it has been my most emotionally beneficial practice ever! I still do every time. It does help, try it.

They say lessons keep reappearing until we learn our lessons, i.e until we heal from those. You start healing when you are able to let go of the past. This is where your focus comes into play. Having a goal, a mission or a vision of the future, you can focus all of your energy there, the future. You can distract yourself from the thoughts of the past and take them to the present moment. With a goal, you can link your thoughts and emotions to your desired future.

The need to forgive yourself need no emphasis because your present and future are strongly linked to your self-image. That means your present self-image. When you believe you are good now, you will feel that you deserve nothing but the good. When you see yourself as bad you will feel that you deserve bad experiences. And the law of sowing and reaping never fails. You reap what you sow, when you sow seeds of positive thoughts, you will reap positive outcomes.  Heaven helps those who help themselves.

Remember, the golden rule says, ‘treat others as you would like to be treated yourself‘. People will always treat you the way you treat yourself. No one cares for your emotional wellbeing more than your very own soul. Listen to that inner self, not the ego that always wants to be right. Not arrogance, LOVE. It may be hard to accept this, but I hate others only during the times when I could not love myself, hundred percent of the time. No person who is loving towards himself can hurt or harm others. You cannot possibly love others if you cannot love yourself. And you cannot love yourself fully if you still have any negative emotions toward yourself. It is only when you learn to forgive yourself that you will learn to forgive others.

“If I hadn’t forgiven myself, I wouldn’t be strong enough to love someone this much.”
― Dawn Lanuza

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