Forgiving yourself

Why it needs to happen

As humans, we can never progress forward while carrying regrets or pains from the past. In life there are things that will happen, things we may do or say that we find hard to forgive ourselves for. Walking around with unforgiveness is like trying to swim to the surface with an anchor attached to you, there will always be this weight and this hinderance which stops us and that is why forgiving yourself needs to happen.

My experiences

There was a time early on in my life where I lived recklessly in my manner, my words and actions. In this time, I hurt several people and for a very long time I couldn’t help but think how I’ve affected the lives of those people I spoke into. Even though some may say my actions weren’t that drastic and they were for a short period of my life and that I was too young, I still held myself accountable for all I had done, whether it was deemed minor or major. I couldn’t forgive myself for what I had done, and this affected every single one of my relationships in teenagehood and then adulthood. I was always especially careful and hard on myself to the point all my relationships were affected because I didn’t believe in myself or trust myself to be with people and actually have successful relationships. I blocked myself from making a lot of memories with people by isolating myself out of fear but that only gave room for a toxic mental space.

Establishing trust

Without God, the new chapter of my life I started wouldn’t be possible. He taught me how to see the good in me while He corrected the bad and healed me with His love. Through Him alone I was able to forgive myself for all I had done because He showed me that He’s forgiven me and that that is the most important thing. It wasn’t an easy switch out of that mental state of fear and isolation & to completely turn around my way of thinking but it was only possible through God. God showed me that He’s created me for good and that He never made me bad and that His plan is rich with goodness and prosperity and that through him all things have become new. The most important step to forgiving myself was also realising that that person didn't exist anymore. The minute I met God and accepted Jesus, I became a new creation, completely transformed by Him and because of this, I couldn't let my new self be suppressed and held back by someone who I was not.

Taking God’s hand

To all those who are in this process of forgiving yourself know that it is possible, it is necessary and it’s only through Him. For me, all it took was giving Him a chance, a chance to work and to let Him in and that’s all it really takes…