Have You Forgiven Yourself This Year?
“I don’t know if I continue, even today, always liking myself.
But what I learned to do many years ago was to forgive myself.
It is very important for every human being to forgive herself or himself
because if you live, you will make mistakes – it is inevitable.
But once you do and you see the mistake,
then you forgive yourself and say,
‘well, if I’d known better I’d have done better,’ that’s all.
So you say to people who you think you may have injured,
‘I’m sorry,’ and then you say to yourself, ‘I’m sorry.’
If we all hold on to the mistake, we can’t see our own glory in the mirror
because we have the mistake between our faces and the mirror;
we can’t see what we’re capable of being.
You can ask forgiveness of others,
but in the end the real forgiveness is in one’s own self.
I think that young men and women are so caught by the way they see themselves.
Now mind you.
When a larger society sees them as unattractive,
as threats,
as too black or too white or too poor or too fat or too thin or too sexual or too asexual,
that’s rough.
But you can overcome that.
The real difficulty is to overcome how you think about yourself.
If we don’t have that we never grow,
we never learn,
and sure as hell we should never teach.”
- Maya Angelou
What kind of thoughts and feelings have you had to yourself in 2009? Have you felt good or bad? Have you thought of positive things or negative ones? Have you blamed yourself? Have you felt that you’re not good enough, not worthy enough? Have you felt fear, frustration, anger and rage? Do you feel guilt, sorrow or depression? Have you let complaints and excuses run your life? Or have you lost all your feelings and become numb, apathetic and indifferent? All these things are how you think about yourself. We have become a victim of our own thoughts.
“Something happened and I can’t let it go – I can’t get it out of my head.”
“I’ve got these painful memories and I can’t stop thinking about them.”
“I just want the pain to go away and leave me alone.”
We are only human to feel and experience all these emotions. What we sometimes don’t realize is how having these thoughts and emotions hurt us more than it heal us. It’s what hindering us from our deserved happiness.
As we’re approaching Ied, let us learn to forgive ourselves,
to let go of our own judgment of ourselves.
I have learned that it’s easier to forgive others than to actually forgive myself.
Let us change the way we see ourselves, the way we judge ourselves.
So what if you think that you’re not a good enough mother/father/friend/daughter/son?
So what if you think that you’re not smart, beautiful, successful or lucky enough?
So what if you think that you’re not dedicated enough to God?
So what?
Those are just thoughts. Those are guilt hidden in thoughts. Those are the past.
As of this moment, the moment you forgive yourself, you are reborn.
Forgiving yourself is simply letting go of what you are holding against yourself so that you can move on with God.
Forgiveness is a choice that takes courage and strength, and it gives us the opportunity to become an over-comer rather than remaining a victim of our own scorn.
This Ramadhan, I encourage you to change your thoughts, especially thoughts you have about yourself. Say to yourself, “I forgive myself for having such negative thoughts all this time. I want to love myself more. It is time to love myself more.”
“Each morning we are born again.
What we do today is what matters most.”
– Buddha
Today, at this moment, you are not attached by what has happened in the past – you are reborn. You can be whoever you want to be. Do not feel guilty about all these feelings, it is only human to feel. Be aware of them then forgive yourself for you have felt that way. Because as Jack Kornfield sums it, “To live fully is to let go and die with each passing moment, and to be reborn in each new one.”
It is time to forgive. It is time to be reborn. Tell me about your experience. Love to you.
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By forgiving yourself it also makes it easier not to get hung up on people who judge you. I love that you’ve helped me with that and that you love me regardless of my mistakes!
@Kelly: isn’t that what love is? To embrace, allow and accept as a person as their already perfect being? And oh trust me, you are very easy to love, hahahaha.. and i’m just a mirror, reflecting what you’ve been given me
Hai Ika….sy suka dg tulisan kamu disini, saat sy butuh motivasi sy sempatkan ngintip blog kamu. Artikel ini sungguh menyentuh sekali sejak pertama kali sy baca judulnya setahun yg lalu. Benar adanya kadang begitu mudahnya memaafkan orang lain tp mengapa sangat sulit untuk memaafkan diri sendiri. Tks