Self Forgiveness

We all deserve forgiveness. Forgiveness is usually focused on forgiving others. In this episode, we discuss the powerful act of forgiving oneself. Why would one forgive oneself? We share intimate areas that need self-forgiveness, exploring self-hatred, critical judgments, regrets, and unrealistic expectations. Practice soothing phrases, empowering mantras, and meditation to learn the value of self-forgiveness. Let's hone our skills of self-forgiveness as a pathway to greater self-love. Join us!

Transcript

You've arrived at Pretty Spiritual Podcast,

Where we share our spiritual journeys to empower yours.

Come on in.

Yeah,

Okay.

No,

Seriously,

Come in.

Hey,

Everyone.

Hey,

Hi,

We're so glad to be back together.

This is spoiler alert.

This is the second year that we've been doing this.

It always happens around my birthday.

I'm feeling very nostalgic.

And I'm just so happy that we can be together for this season two of Pretty Spiritual Podcast.

And today we are going to talk about self forgiveness.

And we're really,

I think what we're trying to do here is talk about self forgiveness because I believe that it is part of the pathway that is required for self love.

Okay,

I know these are really big topics.

We already did the self love.

We already did the forgiveness.

They're great episodes.

Go have a listen if you haven't.

But I think in our evolution,

Our spiritual evolution that we've been trying to eke out here,

I have found that the forgiveness of self,

Even contemplating forgiving oneself,

Brings up so much for me.

And I think that this isn't something that is talked about a lot.

So I'm excited to get into it today.

We talk about forgiving others,

And I'm excited to touch into how looking at the areas that forgiveness could soften our insights and bring us closer to loving ourself is my thoughts,

Is my hope.

Back when we touched into the depths of what the starting of a self love journey is,

I had no idea the abyss that was upward and outward for me to explore.

That is what I realize now.

All those Google searches of how to love yourself came up short.

Because learning to love myself the way I need to be loved is a very intimate personalized journey.

One must make the concerted effort to get to know,

Understand,

Observe,

Pay attention to,

Accept,

Forgive,

Build up,

And practice the art of truly knowing how to love oneself.

And then,

Of course,

To attempt to remember to do that in real time.

So today we are going to talk about self forgiveness as a pathway to cultivating more self love in hopes of.

I love it.

And I believe that these topics make sense to keep touching on in our episode themes because we've changed so much in one year.

I changed so much in one week.

Exactly.

And it's this cornerstone foundational stuff.

So it's not like I do it once and then it's solved.

It's just this revisit,

Re-understand,

New perspective.

And Lindsay,

You'll use that metaphor of the spiral staircase.

So it's like we're seeing the same things as we go around,

But we're kind of keep ascending and seeing it from a different perspective.

And I do mean ascending into nirvana because we are reaching spiritual enlightenment.

Don't worry.

JK.

Don't worry.

That's not us.

We sure are trying some stuff though.

Although we have been wearing some sequin robes.

Okay,

That part is true.

I wanted to bring up a quote first.

I love that.

So here we go.

So this is by Don Miguel Ruiz.

Forgive yourself.

The supreme act of forgiveness is when you can forgive yourself for all the wounds you've created in your own life.

Forgiveness is an act of self love.

When you forgive yourself,

Self acceptance begins and self love grows.

Well,

You wrapped it up.

The end.

Don did.

Thanks Don.

Thanks Don Miguel.

Yes.

I love that quote and I have been working on self love.

What a great topic you picked because I didn't even realize it wasn't there until I started hearing and learning and seeing what it could be like.

So what I'm starting to unearth is that there are parts of myself that I have been holding as unforgivable subtly for a really long time.

And so there's a couple themes like one that's really up for me as I try to write this book and become something I have never been,

Which is a published author.

I see myself as not living up to the opportunities that have been provided to me.

So that's one example of what I find unforgivable.

There's lots of little themes.

So that'll come up and then I have shame.

And it's also come to light that I judge others around this.

And when I'm feeling that anger and judgment towards other people,

It's really about this deep discomfort in me and an inability to love myself in those same patterns I see in myself.

And this isn't a new concept.

I've heard it a lot,

But for some reason it's just really making sense to me right now.

So I'm just in the thick of even recognizing this disdain for myself and then beginning to tap into the tools to shift it.

So I specifically have this really big anger at myself for what I see as my self-indulgence,

My entitlement and my emotional demands,

Especially the emotional demands from past relationships.

And then that self-indulgence and entitlement of how I've carried myself in the world,

Not as much now,

But I can still fall into it.

And there's part of my brain that tells me if I don't continue to hate and berate these parts of myself,

I will repeat these patterns.

So it's like a self-protection,

Right?

I'm like loving myself,

But keeping myself safe from being this person that I've decided is bad.

So somewhere under there is this weird formula that will get me to love myself.

I know that math.

It's a really exciting math.

It's deeply complex.

And I just now beginning to get what I've always heard people use this term,

Like hole in the soul or God-sized hole.

And they were trying to fill it with food or booze or sex or shopping and whatever.

I understand that concept,

But I never really could feel the immensity of like a God-sized hole is pretty big,

Whatever that word means to you.

It's just like this unfillable,

Right?

And so just yesterday I had this realization that for me,

So my deep dark hole is I don't see myself as good enough or deserving enough of the life I have.

So I have this really beautiful life.

And underneath of that is this sense that I just don't deserve it.

And that if I was just more,

You name it,

Successful as a writer,

That's the one that I keep harping on is my professional career.

It can pop up in all kinds of different forms.

That means no matter how much I do like community service,

Publish this book I'm suddenly terrified about again,

Have a fancy job with a high income,

I don't see myself as deserving of my own life.

And like,

What a rotten way to feel because this is actually my life.

Does hating myself subtly change it or make me deserving of it?

So this God-sized hole is making sense because whatever I put in there,

Success,

Career,

Love from others,

Approval,

Positive feedback from the internet,

Whatever I put in there,

I'm still unworthy.

So I can't use my any thinking to heal that lack of self-love.

So where I'm at now is like,

Okay,

What if I can turn to a new understanding,

A God of my understanding,

A perspective shift,

An unsuspected inner resource to be filled and love and accept myself as I am.

So I have a couple of tools I've been experimenting with.

This is all very new for me.

Annie,

Thank you so much.

I related with that and the topic is so deep and big and dense and personal.

So thank you for really getting in there and putting into words a lot of the things that I'm feeling.

So thank you for the language.

Just like you were saying,

I've got to forgive myself for trying to hate myself into being a better person.

And then I also have to remember that I hate myself and I'm trying to make myself into being a better person.

But I can't remember the word that rotten.

You're like,

And that's rotten.

And that really explains the feeling tone that I am steeped in and living from.

And it's quiet,

It's ubiquitous,

It's nuanced.

And then it just spins all these ways,

Whether it be my career that I didn't finish school,

That I don't have parents,

That it doesn't.

.

.

The thing is,

Is that I can tell that this is going to continue on if I don't look at this and start to heal it and mend it.

So what's that going to take?

I think a lot of it is my awareness.

So if I'm getting awareness that there is a deep unrest within myself that is encouraging me at every moment and underwriting every single thing that I do as not good enough,

You should have been better.

How have you not gotten all of this done already?

So we can shorthand that to perfectionism.

But perfectionism,

I used to be proud of that.

I used to think,

Oh,

I try so hard.

I'm going places.

Yeah.

I remember when someone said that,

That didn't know me,

I thought,

Oh,

Good.

They even know that I'm doing this thing.

And that's why I want to look at perfectionism differently with all of the subcategories underneath it,

In all the ways that in every moment,

However I chopped that zucchini,

Or depending on what time I'm leaving to leave somewhere,

There is these whispers of unworthiness that are telling me,

This isn't right.

You're not right.

And it's really painful and I don't wanna,

So that's what will lead me into distractions,

Whatever it may be.

Survivor has 40 seasons and I'm concerned for my wellbeing at this point because doing this deep inner work is uncomfortable and it's really hard for me to do this.

But I know that if I don't start looking at this and get familiar and start forgiving myself like all the friends that I think really deserve forgiveness,

If I don't look towards myself like that,

It's not going,

What will happen is I'm gonna be 40,

50,

60,

And whether it be fill in the blank,

I'm still gonna be saying,

I'm not good enough.

I haven't done enough.

If I continue to hate myself,

I'm gonna be better.

Or once I do this thing then.

And that's the thing.

I am constantly doing that.

Well guess what?

Immediately,

The next thing not enough is in.

I've never stopped to rest.

It's never been enough.

And I am tired,

Tender,

And sad.

And I don't even recognize it that I am here calling out,

Begging for myself to say,

It's okay.

You're doing enough.

You are enough.

Yeah.

That's,

I'm gonna stop right there because we desperately need some tools.

And by we,

I mean,

I desperately need some tools.

Yes.

This,

I wanna share a memory that's come up recently.

I started this career as a writer about six or seven years ago.

And when I moved to Oakland,

I got a job writing a column.

One of my jobs as a freelance writer was for two local publications,

Print publications,

Oakland Magazine and East Bay Times.

And I,

Or the East Bay Monthly.

And I didn't share it with anyone.

It's this really cool accomplishment.

Like,

Oh,

I get to have this like column in a magazine with pretty pictures,

Like photos.

Yeah,

They're legit.

And I'm like,

It's not good enough.

Once I publish in this,

Then I'll start sharing things.

The bigger,

Better one.

Just one step up.

It's so interesting.

And now I look back and I have these stacks of these magazines.

I was just cleaning out my room and I'm like,

Oh,

Annie,

How sad that you didn't,

Like,

Maybe three articles that I shared with people.

And when I did it,

Like took every ounce of courage and I'm like,

Oh my God,

This is so embarrassing.

I can't believe I'm doing this.

And like,

This is the thing that we're talking about,

Right?

Like not good enough,

Not good enough.

Later it will be later.

It'll be okay.

Yeah.

When I do better,

It'll be all right.

I love myself when I'm better.

Yeah.

And then I'll let people see me when I've reached this.

Yeah.

And we're missing out on that whole heart space of lovingness for self.

Yeah.

It's really sad.

It's sad because I need love now.

Yeah,

You do.

I need it right now.

I love you,

Lindsey Pony.

Thank you.

You're so wonderful.

I love you,

Lindsey Pony.

I know,

But I gotta love me to receive.

Yeah.

Oh,

Yeah.

So let's get into tools.

I would love to hear Annie.

Yes.

What tools would you like to talk about?

So I have two meditation-based tools and they are ones that I'm working with actively.

So it's work in progress.

The first one is a forgiveness meditation that was taught to me by a very lovely and wise person.

And it is a forgiveness mantra that I shared before,

But now I'm centering it back towards myself.

Can I forgive myself for the ways that I behave that I think aren't okay?

Can I forgive myself for being so hard on myself?

What can I forgive myself for?

So I'm gonna repeat each line of the mantra twice.

I'll read it through it and then share really briefly on it and then read through it again.

So I'll just say one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

So one,

I forgive myself for any harm I have done myself and you can tag on via this behavior by my sense of entitlement,

By my self-indulgence,

By my whatever.

Two,

I forgive myself for being so angry,

Upset,

Scared about this for so long.

Three,

I forgive myself for any harm I've done to others as a result of this behavior.

And four,

I give myself permission to forgive me.

So what I'll do is I have this really nice kind of music,

Meditation music that I'll play on Insight Timer and I'll just repeat those lines in my head as a meditation.

Just kind of this like mental balm that I'm just kind of like washing my brain in these ideas.

And another way that I practice this is just writing these sentences over and over.

And for me,

That's a way that I express myself is through writing,

Handwriting.

So maybe it would be painting or maybe you sing or maybe you walk and talk to yourself,

Like whatever it is.

Maybe you record your voice on your little voice recorder on your phone and play it on a loop to yourself.

But just this kind of like repetition of these phrases through my brain and my body semantically.

So I'll just read them again.

One,

I forgive myself for any harm I've done myself via this behavior.

Two,

I forgive myself for being so angry or upset or scared about this for so long.

Three,

I forgive myself for any harm I've done to others as a result of this behavior.

Four,

I give myself permission to forgive me.

And then the other tool is one that we talk about all the time on this podcast,

But it's the rain meditation by Tara Brock.

And really specifically,

If you Google this phrase,

The trance of unworthiness,

She has these Dharma talks about the idea of the trance of unworthiness and then leads people through a rain meditation,

Which is recognize,

Accept,

Investigate and nurture.

And so it's just really confronting the fact that I have this deep judgment of myself around a certain topic,

Acknowledging it's there,

Making space for it and nurturing it.

And I had a real resistance to the rain meditation for a while because I felt like it really would go against my whole goal of hating myself into being better.

But I'm starting to see that it's not just a way where I could just get stuck in indulging myself in my own feelings or that it would be some kind of spiritual,

Like me doing me under the guise of a spiritual tool.

But instead it's actually like the lubrication that I need to maybe let some of this forgiveness in.

And then I'm not doing these things right now.

So can I forgive that and trust myself that I won't?

Or if it's something that I'm still stuck doing,

This forgiveness is the first key.

And then the love comes of like,

Oh,

I am lovable,

Even though I'm human.

So those are my two tools.

What about you,

Lindsay?

Thank you so much.

And I was wondering if you would be interested or open to,

I was feeling really compelled that I either I or you,

Of course,

Whoever wants to could do the forgiveness of self meditation on Insight Timer as our first live interactive one like that.

And or we could also do we could do both of those.

And we could also have one.

So you would go to Insight Timer and under the Pretty Spiritual podcast,

You see all of our podcasts that we have.

But there's also a guided meditation fun where we do that self forgiveness.

Let's do it.

Yeah,

I love that idea.

Really good idea.

Great.

Okay.

Stay tuned,

Guys.

We're going to start adding more meditations on Insight Timer and doing some lives.

Yeah,

On Insight Timer,

One of the greatest apps of the whole entire world.

Check it out.

We love it.

Oh,

My gosh,

It saved me.

I use it all the time.

Every day.

One of the ways that I help myself is by asking is,

Is what I am doing usually,

Is it acceptable?

Because I have these expectations as I've learned about myself.

It's not good enough.

What I'm doing isn't good enough.

It's not right.

That's the set point,

And I've come to realize that.

I will find myself,

My body tight,

Clenched up,

And it will give me the body cue that,

Oh,

Something's going on here.

I can do my shorthand of,

Okay,

So there's probably critical criticism happening here of self and self-hatred.

Is what I am doing,

Is it acceptable?

So in my job,

The job that I'm doing,

Is it acceptable?

Okay,

So I'm not perfect.

I'm like,

I didn't do it perfectly.

What are my expectations in this situation?

Have I done,

Is it honestly enough?

Because once I see what my expectations are,

Well,

I've got to fix and solve this whole entire thing for this whole entire company right now,

Is my mentality.

I have to make sure that these children are so well taken care of that there's never any pain in their life.

That is how I am approaching my life.

Very relaxing.

So the simple phrasing of looking at what I have done and is it acceptable?

Can I find myself and this moment acceptable exactly the way that they are,

In every way?

And that will help me kind of ratchet it down a little bit and give me a little bit of perspective.

So that's real time in the moment application of forgiveness of self.

Tara Brock,

Who we love so much,

Of course,

When something like that is going on,

She just puts her hand on her heart and she says,

Forgiven,

Forgiven.

And I love,

I just love having that moment of like,

Oh,

Okay,

I see that you really want to be so perfect and do everything so right,

Because maybe in some way you believe that this will make you lovable and worthy in this life.

Forgiven,

Forgiven.

You know,

I've really started talking to myself in this really heartfelt way to kind of bring more of a integrated relationship of all of the parts of me that are kind of swirling around.

And then for the next tool is listening.

So really listening to myself,

Listening to the way I talk to myself about myself.

And the best time to practice this is when meditating.

So hear me out.

You know,

So you're meditating,

You're doing a simple breath meditation,

And all you are to do is just focus and breathe in and breathe out and breathe in and breathe out.

And you've taken one breath in and you've gone somewhere else.

And then I go,

Oh my God,

How are you not just breathing in and breathing?

Oh,

Right.

Oh,

So that's how,

Okay,

Can I come back to my breath breathing in?

So these little moments in meditation,

Really getting to listen to ourselves and how we talk to ourselves about ourselves are really rich moments to see perhaps what is going on all throughout the day.

And to maybe find ways of just softening and maybe being a little bit more gentle or just honestly for the first five,

Eight,

10 years in my life.

And it's taken me this long to see what the type of reaction I have to myself and how to bring in a pause to be able to be more gentle with self.

And that's the pathway that I need for me.

So again,

It'll be very personal.

It's a very personal journey for you to go on and check in with and ask yourself,

Where does my heart,

Where does it need some tender loving forgiveness?

Where are the ways that I'm holding back love and acceptance of myself?

So where are they?

Let us know.

We would really love to hear from you.

Where are some areas that you would like to practice self forgiveness?

I have a last thought and it's at the core,

All of this effort,

I believe in energy of moving through self forgiveness to foster self love is my spiritual guide in the area of self love says,

Annie,

You are unique and precious creation.

And when you love yourself,

You are open to guidance and clarity about the divine direction of your life and that you can give your gifts freely to the world.

But when I'm so embattled with myself,

I'm actually not being of service to the world and the people around me.

I mean,

I can't,

I am,

You know,

But it's,

I'm,

I'm closing off that divine direction.

So actually the thing that I think is selfish,

Right?

Just tending to myself,

Healing myself,

Forgiving myself,

Filling myself with love is actually the greatest gift that I can give.

It's true.

Yeah.

And it's just nice.

So we'll say this to all of you.

Each and every one of you is a unique and precious creation.

You truly are.

And I hope you can let that sit on your heart today and really feel it for yourself.

Thanks so much.

And I love yourself.

Love yourselves.

Bye.

And for your soul.

Reviews

This conversational approach to meditation felt really resonant with a self coming to know and love the parts of myself that I do not like and wish would just go away. Realizing that I was stuffing down these emotions, regarding them as monsters that needed to be caged and hidden away, turned into decades of depriving myself of the permission to live, creating my own self-imposed prison. I am learning that liberation and love are possible when I invite these emotions for tea and get to know them and love them for being part of me and allowing them to be recognized, accepted, listened to (investigate sounds so police-state), and nurtured. Then I can be grateful for their presence, helping me to learn the language of my body and my emotions to hear and listen to what they are trying to tell me. That begins to feel like self-forgiveness and self-love.

Amazing self reflection and beginning. I realize all of the anger and hate I project onto others is really self hate, self anger...and I cry about it because I am so sad about my own self hatred.

That was fun and powerful ♡ cut through some of the heaviness that comes with this healing and reminded me to let my spirit out more 😊 ~ Kolleen, Santa Cruz, CA

Beyond relatable - was able to release some sadness and anger with tears and laughter, thank you

Insights into the nature of self hate, trying to be better in order to be loved and the four step tool/meditation in this talk I find newly revelatory and deeply helpful.

Thank you. I have been working on self forgiveness for a while. My biggest takeaway is that it’s difficult to be of service in this life if my time is spent on self criticism. I will always be a work in progress. And I am doing my best.

Thank you. I have been working on self forgiveness for a while. My biggest takeaway is that it’s difficult to be of service in this life if my time is spent on self criticism. I will always be a work in progress. And I am doing my best.

This was amazing! Thank you for this. You two are very much loved ♥️ I am grateful to have been able to listen to this podcast.

Self love.... it sounds so simple but oh so hard especially when the negative self talk comes into play. At least I go recognize that now and try to self correct as quickly as I can.

Lindsay and Annie I love that you offer pure heartfelt emotion and can share it with us here on Insight Timer so beautifully! You’ve helped me to look at forgiving myself for whatever in a whole different way and for that I thank you! Much love. Beverly 💜🙏🏻