I’ve heard it, you’ve heard it, we’ve all heard it. The second most cliché advice out there behind “Just love yourself”, is “You have to forgive yourself.” And yeah, that sounds great in theory, but just about everyone who’s ever received this little snippet of wisdom has immediately countered with the question: “How?!?”
What, exactly, is forgiveness, and how does one forgive oneself? I mean, in practice? Why do we have such a hard time accepting forgiveness, especially from ourselves? Since I haven’t spoken about this subject in quite a while, I thought it was about high time I broke down the mechanics of self-forgiveness. If there’s something you’ve been beating up on yourself over, today’s video is definitely for you.
Transcript
Hello, my happy shiny puppies. This is Melody Fletcher and I teach the Technology of Reality, and The Law of Attraction, to highly intellectual overthinkers, just like you, in a way that actually makes some friggin’ sense.
And today, I want to talk to you about Self Forgiveness, or Forgiving Yourself. I’ve had a lot of emails lately about this topic, so that tells me that it is the right timing to revisit this topic.
Feeling bad is just an excuse
So, what is forgiving yourself actually? What is the act of forgiveness? This might sound a little bit shocking, but when you understand energy and how it actually works, this explanation is going to make a lot more sense. What forgiveness actually is; is no longer using something the person did, said, or whatever, as an excuse to feel bad. That’s it! So, when we can’t forgive someone else, or we want to forgive someone else, we’re feeling badly about something that they did in the past. We’re feeling badly, and we’re using whatever they did, or said, as an excuse to continue to feel badly. We might be feeling blame, or anger, or guilt, or judgment, or whatever. Well we’re feeling that, and we’re using that as an excuse until we, kind of let them go. And so, when we’re forgiving somebody else, we’re really letting ourselves off the hook by letting that go and saying, “I choose to feel better, even though this thing has happened; I choose to feel better anyway.” That’s what real forgiveness actually is. So, when you’re forgiving somebody else, you’re actually doing it for you, not for them. And, when you’re forgiving yourself, of course, you’re doing it for yourself as well. But the structure of it, the mechanics of it, are the same. You’re using something that you did, as an excuse to feel bad.
And often, the bad feeling that you’re experiencing isn’t, necessarily, so much because you did that thing. You’re, sort of, heaping insult to injury. But there’s something else going on underneath that caused the entire event, and that you’re’ holding onto. When you don’t step into self-forgiveness, when you’re not letting that go, you’re actually holding onto the initial pain that caused the entire event. And so now you’re not shifting out of it. So essentially, when somebody else forgives you, they’re giving you permission to feel better, because you’re using this excuse to not feel good. And, when they come along, they might say, “You know what? It’s ok.” And, if you actually feel better, then you use that as an excuse to feel better. They’re giving you permission to feel better.
Give yourself permission to feel better
So, self-forgiveness is really about giving yourself permission, which is the only person who ever can, really, truly give you permission. You can use permission from somebody else to give yourself permission, but you’re still giving yourself permission. So, what we want to look at then is: How do you give yourself permission to feel better, when you’ve done something really, really bad?
So, we need to differentiate between guilt and shame. When you feel guilty about something, you feel like you’ve done something bad. When you feel shame about something, or ashamed of something, you feel like you are bad. They are slightly different when you go after them. Shame is worse than guilt, basically. It’s more encompassing.
Something always happens for a reason
So, one of the things you want to understand is that nothing happens randomly, nothing just happens. Everything happens for a reason. And, I don’t mean that in the tried, “Everything happens for some mystical reason, because there’s fairies out there, and they’re pulling the strings. And, we just can’t understand it.” No, we can friggin’ understand it! That’s my whole job here, is helping you understand it. It happens for a reason and we can find that reason.
So, you didn’t say something hurtful to someone. You didn’t have an outbreak, you didn’t make that mistake because you’re a bad person, or because it just happened, or because you’re stupid, or because you’re broken, or because you’re evil, or because you have an anger problem that you can’t seem to address by squashing it. If that is you, please, please go and watch my video on anger releases. So, those aren’t the reasons why they happen; those are the reasons that we want to jump to. “I just did this because I’m weak, and I’m stupid, and I have no willpower, and I’m a horrible person.” All of these different justifications, none of them are the truth. When you hit upon the truth, it sets you free. So, if something that you’ve come up with doesn’t set you free, it’s not your truth. What you want to assume is, you want to kind of look at yourself through the eyes of compassion. Compassion is acceptance without judgment.
Why getting triggered can make us feel bad
So, suspend your judgment for one minute. Suspend your judgment, because if you’re blaming yourself, if you’re not forgiving yourself, there’s a lot of judgment. So, suspend your judgment just for a minute, pretend that you’re looking at someone else; someone that you love, someone that you really, really, really love a lot. Who could not do anything so wrong, that you would never love them anymore. Pretend that you’re looking at them. Run it through that filter and give yourself the benefit of the doubt that maybe, just maybe, you had a really valid reason for reacting the way that you did. Now, maybe that reason would no longer seem valid to you today; that is possible, but at the time it was valid. Now, that reason may not have been conscious, that is, probably, pretty much guaranteed to be true; but it doesn’t mean that you didn’t have a reason.
So, what happens is that we get triggered by something. Now, we often get triggered by things, that are unknown to us. We get triggered by people, and they don’t even know that they triggered us, because to them it’s not a trigger. Somebody says something, somebody does something, some circumstance has unfolded (again, not by accident), to trigger you, and in that trigger, now you have started to feel bad. What’s happening in that moment is, actually, the thing that you’re wanting to take a look at. There’s a part of you that is holding onto an old belief, a limiting belief, something that is not serving you anymore. But, a part of you believes that this is going to cause you great pain, if you were to look at it. Maybe it’s a vulnerable part of you, and other people are definitely going to attack you, whatever. But there’s a belief in there that says, “Don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t; don’t go there!” And so, you develop defensive mechanisms. Defensive mechanisms come up, and go, “Hey! No.” And, they’re usually the ones that bust out and say something. It is a defensive mode. It might look offensive, as if you’re going on the offense. You’re trying to push people away, but really, it is a defensive thing. You’re defending yourself, even if the other person, and even if you yourself, don’t even know what you’re defending yourself from. Even if it’s absolutely not logical, these things never are. It’s like there’s a wounded animal inside you that has just been threatened and just lashed out, because it was scared and threatened. Just like a wounded animal would.
Does that make the wounded animal bad? No! Can we understand if we were to see the wound? You see a cat, or a dog, with a wounded paw, and there’s blood, and you’re like, “Oh God, that’s got to be painful.” And you try to go near them, and like, no, no, no, no; no. They bark, or they hiss, or whatever. Would you not understand that; would you not be able to have compassion for that wounded animal? Or, would you go, “Well, if you don’t want my help.” Probably not, most of us wouldn’t do that. We would be like, “It’s ok. Its ok, I’m going to wait until you trust me. We’re going to do this together; I’m going to help you.” You would have compassion and empathy for that wounded animal. So, you want to bring that same compassion and empathy to yourself. So, you understand that there’s a wounded part of you that lashed out, out of fear and pain. And, that wounded part of you, can cause you to do all kinds of things. It can cause you to do things like, even stealing, or things that you even consciously know are not good things. It isn’t just about putting your fist through a wall, or saying something mean to someone that you love, it can cause you to take bad actions, where you’re thinking, “Why am I doing this?”
Actions are a stage 5 manifestation
This is also what happens when you find yourself, despite what you really want to do, despite your best efforts, at 3 o’clock in the morning, you open up the refrigerator and you’re eating your cheesecake that was supposed to be for a party tomorrow, or whatever. And you end up scarfing it down, because you just can’t seem to help yourself. And the thing is, you can’t help yourself. Because actions are a manifestation, and they’re a stage 5 manifestation. Which means they come at the end of a progression of manifestation. And, if you don’t know what I’m talking about, I’ll put a link in the description about The Progression of Manifestation and what that is; how manifestations actually become physical. But for now, actions, your actions included, are a stage 5 manifestation; they come at the end of this cycle. So, you get some energy going, and it starts to progress, and it starts to grow. At the end of that, once there’s already a lot of momentum going, it causes you to take action. So, when you’re just trying to suppress the action, “I should shut up; I shouldn’t do that.” It doesn’t work; it doesn’t work. You have to start earlier in the progression. Again, trying to change your reality through action, is a little bit like trying to get healthy by putting vitamins in your poop. It’s too late, you need to start earlier.
So, what you actually want to look at is, what got triggered. That original pain; you want to look for that original pain. You want to sit with that idea, you want to dissect it. You don’t just want to push all that away and go, “Well, that was bad, I was wrong. I’m a bad person, I did a bad thing, and I should just feel guilty for the rest of my life.” Actually, look at what really happened. What were you really feeling? Give yourself the benefit of the doubt. Why did you react that way? What were you really reacting to? Because when you find that, you forgive yourself. It’s just like seeing the wounded animal. The wounded animal is barking, hissing, lashing out, and then you realize, “Oh! Their paw’s broken.” Would you still feel badly about that? Or would you go, “Oh! That’s totally understandable. I would have done the same thing.” That’s what happens. You start to understand why you did what you did, and then you can learn from that. And you can release that, so that you don’t have the same defensive reaction again.
Self-forgiveness is not carte blanche to hurt other people
I know, whenever I talk about this topic of self-forgiveness, and letting ourselves off the hook, there’s always going to be a few people out there who say, “Well, that’s just like giving everyone carte blanche, to do whatever they want. There’s going to people out there who clearly want to hurt others.” (That’s actually not true; nobody really wants to hurt others. Yeah)? “But people who want to hurt others, who are going to go out and use this as an excuse, as a carte blanche to go, well, I don’t actually have to feel bad about anything. I can just pretend that I was triggered by something, and I never have to take responsibly for hurting anyone ever again.”
First of all, anybody who would think like that, would probably not make it to this blog. Those kinds of people, don’t tend to attract this kind of information to them. But also, very few people actually think like that. We have this conception that there’s people out there who are just crazy, and who think like that. But very few people actually think like that. Some people pretend to think like that, but don’t actually think like that. And very few people in the world, outside of sociopaths and psychopaths, actually really get pleasure from harming others. They might feel a little bit more empowered by getting control over others, but that’s not quite the same as being a total sadist.
Actually, most people when they hurt others, do it because they don’t think that there’s any other way to get what they want to get. It does happen that you bump up against that a little bit, and you have a choice to make. And often, you make the only choice you feel like you can. It’s the less powerless choice. And then, you want to judge yourself in hindsight. Because in hindsight you see more choices that you could have made, but you didn’t know that at the time.
Bottom Line
So, don’t look at yourself through the eyes of the hindsight goggles. You want to look at what you actually felt at the time. But again, this isn’t a carte blanche, because most people don’t actually want to hurt others. But also, it’s not a carte blanche because I’m not talking about just harming others and going, “Well, I must have been triggered.” I’m talking about using it as an opportunity, to actually take a look at what was really going on and shifting out of that. Because, as you do that, you’re going to have these experiences less, and less, and less, and less; because you’re actually learning from them. You’re actually shifting the underlying energy. You’re healing the wounded part of yourself that needs these defensive mechanisms. And then the defensive mechanisms can go away, they can just fall away.
This is actually ultimate responsibility, rather than shirking responsibility. When you find that underlying reason, when you find the reason why you did what you did, you will be able to step into forgiveness. Forgiveness isn’t actually an emotion, it is the LACK of the beating up on yourself. It is the lack of using something as an excuse to beat up on yourself; to feel badly about yourself, to feel guilty, and to feel ashamed.
So, I hope that this video was useful for you, and that you learned something. Why not tell me, below in the comments, what you thought about it, and what kind of aha moments did you get from this. Have you forgiven yourself for something in the past? Or do you need to forgive yourself for something now? And, maybe try doing what I just said, and see how far you get, and let us know in the comments.
These videos are often inspired by me seeing questions in comments, and via emails and the contact form on the blog. So, if you have a question you’d like me to answer in a video, like this, go ahead and let me know. I read all of the comments, even if I can’t respond to them all, myself. I read every single one, because I want to know how you guys are doing; and that is my crack!!
Alright, until next week, sending you, big, smooshy, smooshy, smooshy, happy shiny puppy hugs. And thank you, for bringing your light to the world.
“When you hit upon the truth, it sets you free”
I wrote it down to always refer to it when I need it. What a strong, full of meaning, sentence. Thank You Melody.
Hi, Mel.
I’m kinda confused about something.
I had a situation where I took (well, stole) some old parts that I uninstalled out of a machine during modernization process. Some time after, a thought kicked me, that stealing stuff is a form of action paired with lack. But I don’t really feel any lack in the department of cheap electronics. I took it with a mindset of ‘I’ll use it for something at least, it won’t be laying around rusting’, I never felt bad about it, and no one even cared at work.
So now I kinda feel guilty… of not having that shame… Cuz I did something bad… I think? Yeah, seems so.
I guess I answered my own questions writing this, and know what to do. Does it even make any sense?
Thanks for the video Melody! Perfect timing for me seeing this, as always, and I just wanted to say that I really enjoyed your energy in this video. You seemed extra calm and confident and it was a great way to start my morning 😀
I read this once – its been so helpful to my understanding of things and this blog just adds to it :
Guilt is when you DID something you feel was wrong and YOU know it.
Shame is when feel you ARE something wrong and THEY know it.
x
Hi Melody
I was taken in by a phone call from scammers who managed to convince me they were trying to sort out a security problem with my internet account. I used security information for my bank account and they have taken all my money including all my savins. The bank will not refund my money due to my negligence. I watched your video in a spirit of wanting to forgive myself for doing something that with hindsight I do not understand why I did it. This seemed to come out of the blue though am aware it must be related to some aspect of self sabotage in my energy as have colluded with others to my own detriment. Your video helped me to realize that I am ashamed of myself rather than guilty and am attempting to get in touch with what was going on for me when it happened. It has certainly inspired me to a greater focus on shifting my energy in a more positive direction. Thank you
wow! i find it interesting how often the combo of the blog and the coaching call seem to bring something together.
I have had this real blast of ‘cocooning’ into my life – so much so its like i have been pulled away from all family, old friends and it almost feels as if i dont know who next is going to be be whisked away or why. If i try to step back in the direction of those people or ‘force’ myself too because (belief coming) ‘ there must be something wrong with me if I need to cut off like that and its not normal behaviour ‘ – then its like trying to step towards a repelling magnet and the ‘unwanted’ body feelings and sensations scream very loudly. But can I really need to cocoon from so many people at once ???
So the idea from the coaching call that cocooning can happen as a kind of essential on the growth path is interesting to me – that it can be a good and needed thing.
How this ties in with the blog is that whilst this cocooning has been going on for me for the last few years it has as a consequence brought up huge shame in me because i dont know how to explain my behaviour to others who dont feel this way. It means when i am in the company of those I am not cocooned from but who arent necessarily on my ‘path’ I find that I just can’t explain why i am not intouch with family or friends in a muggle friendly way – it brings up a deep shame in me as some part of me must feel I am deeply wrong in this even though it ‘feels’ better to step away and feels very uncomfy to step close. As i write this I realise I can’t feel totally better by stepping away as by doing so it brings up the shame pain. I guess I am attracting others who are reflecting this ‘shame’ and ‘judgement’ in relation to my cocooning need and so I end up then wanting to coccon from them too just because as I can’t explain or justify my other cocooning. haha! Does this mean I am ‘sub-cocooning’ ( cocooning caused as the result of initial cocooning ? – help I mean is this all the ame origin). Anyone else in cocoonland ?
So first step , from blog insight, is to forgive myself and understand that for some reason the cocooning is the most comfortable space i can get to right now due to some hidden thing I maybe can’t see yet.
Then it bringss up a question which would be useful to hear about in a blog or to be pointed to if one already exists ;
“Is there (for want of a better expression) good cocooning and bad cocooning or rather high vibration cocooning that is an essential part of the self growth path and low vibration cocooning which is not good and is the self curling in on itself, avoiding growth and doing the best it can just to try and survive and is avoiding and hiding from the world just to be able to cope with the amount of emotion and feeling that arises otherwise. Then there could be like a third type which is a total fear driven hiding from the world terror type cocooning. I mean is there a difference between these 3 or do they serve the same purpose but just at different levels of the scale ? Can we say one type of cocooning is love driven and are others fear driven. If so can we turn from one type to the other ‘mid-cocoon?’. How do we explain cocooning to muggles or others who just think we are being anti-social or even rude by not ‘conforming’ to social expectations and ‘duties to others’.”
I would find this very valuable to hear a blog or views on this.
Big hugs and thanks
xxxx
Oops maybe that was a bit long! 🙂
xx
( Melody, I’m a songwriter who two years back manifested a talk with you ! ) And I like the commentary that explains that our strong actions are the FINALE’. (It sounds like me when I suggest to my understandably irritated pre-school teacher wife. I find myself trying to find out WHY the 2-year olds are pushing chairs out of place, etc.. Do they just have so much energy and need to DO something– or do they need to be engaged in more singing/movement ? I’m balancing my compassion for my wife with my compassion for these small kids ( who I’ve never actually seen in action.)
And so, from you, Melody, I’m getting that it’s key to examine what is causing the lava to wickedly churn inside BEFORE the outburst occurred/occurs.
I’m hearing we need to take some time to analyze what we were feeling BEFORE. In time we will soothe our trigger……
Thanks for the perspective, for the ample articulation– and for the free snippets of wisdom. (This should, incidentally, advertise how counseling could be a blast).
Wow, I really love this perspective on forgiveness. It brings a lot of clarity to the process of how to actually forgive, too. I read some research that showed that most of the time, people don’t have an active moment of “forgiving”–instead, they just realize at some point that somewhere along the way they forgave the person for the bad action. There was no one moment that really stood out as forgiveness. I think Melody’s perspective really fits with that research–for those people being studied, they just stopped beating themselves up about the event, and when they realized they weren’t using that event as a reason to feel bad anymore, they realized they had “forgiven.” Choosing consciously in the moment to investigate what the trigger was is an even more enlightened way to go about things (and would help prevent manifesting the same trigger-response situation again), but it helps to know that even if you don’t do this soul-seeking, forgiveness for that particular event can still happen.
This post was really helpful for me! I think it is helping me to forgive myself for something awful I did in the past.
I wanted to give an update, now that it has been about a month. I really think I have forgiven myself for the bad action that I took, and I credit this post for that. I didn’t want to say so right away, since it’s always possible it’s just a “feel-good” rush that happens and then rapidly dwindles away. But after a month, I still feel a degree of peace I hadn’t thought possible regarding the bad action I took. I still know it was the wrong thing, and I certainly wouldn’t do it again, but I have a level of understanding and peace about what happened where I don’t have to keep using it as an excuse to feel bad and punish myself over and over. I can see how, given the horrible thoughts I was thinking day after day, and the horrible feelings I was having day after day, that particular bad action was a likely result. Now that I see I have other options, and I don’t think those thoughts over and over, I never have to behave that way again, and I don’t have to keep punishing myself for having done it in the past. To me, this is really big. So thank you, Melody, for this post. It has changed my life for the better in a profound way.
It makes complete sense! Now that you’ve put it like that…..
ironically … often what I struggle to forgive myself for is ‘failing’ , or the inability to deal with the underlying wounds/ reasons for whatever happened that needed forgiveness, even if I can forgive myself for that thing itself! Hmmm…. how do I crack that vicious circle?!
This one really hurt. I know what I did (chasing my love away because of unsecurity) and I know why I did it (old feelings of insecurity from my childhood, an absent father and so on) but I still miss him and I blame myself for destroying our relationship. Of course he triggered me in some ways, I can see that and I understand that I manifested that as well, but what can I do about this other pain? I wish I knew then what I know now. And now it’s too late, at least with this guy.
And I know all about he might not be the right one for me, there will be another if I just focus on feeling good…..But it hurts anyway.
Sorry for this depressing answer, I’m usually in a good mood but this video made my tears flow 😉 Hugs
I did have an aha moment watching this . I realised many of the questions that I did ask you in the comments on your past videos were inclined towards forgiveness- aka not beating up on yourself aka letting go of that control freakishness. The interpretation of phrases – letting yourself off the hook and giving yourself permission to feel better feels clear now so does the difference between guilt and shame . In my past 3 years of not clearing my exams I did realise by watching this that I have shifted from shame to guilt . I haven’t released much but yes, I have released a few . This video also made me remember the grandma and child filter that you had talked about in your video of how to love yourself which can be used to look at yourself through compassion in order to truly identify what it is that you reacted to I.e. the underlying belief in order to shift it. I wanted to ask, is it really necessary that you need to have an opinion on any topic that you come across through on the internet ? Lately I realised that I would
Find myself unnecessarily judging and forming an opinion on a topic that frankly is not relevant to me ( energetically
It would be or else it wouldn’t have come) and then when that opinion is not kind of a good one , hunting it down to find the real good feelings truth . It sure does seem adventurous but it does happen at the cost of giving up on my set goals making me feel guilty later on for having taken that path .
“trying to change your reality through action, is a little bit like trying to get healthy by putting vitamins in your poop.” HAHAHAHAHA I can’t stop laughing <3 Thank you Melody.
Thank you for this video. I feel like I have forgiven myself. I think I am just tired of myself to be honest. It seems like one belief after another keep popping up and it’s hard to deal with. I finally let go of a person, who was never good for me to begin with, but I took that opportunity to see where I got triggered at, so that I can move on from those types of people. It worked for the most part. I got a lot taken care of. However, just today, I finally had to block his phone numbers, email, everything just to keep myself from doing any other emotional reactive things. It was a stage 5 reaction. I didn’t see it coming. I was fine for a few days, an then today, was like a punch in the face. I forgive myself, really, I realize I am growing and releasing what no longer serves me. I see that. However, I still don’t have the truth about yet. I know when I don’t feel heard by a person, I get triggered and begin to use anything type of tactic to get emotion out of them, to get them to hear me, to respond in a manner that I need them too. I see that. It really sucks, because it’s mental torment. I’d like to let that go, because I don’t want to attract a$$clowns anymore or emotionally unavailable men. That’s for sure. I am open and willing to listen to anyone who may have any advice. Thank you. Thank you Melody for all the videos and wisdom and know-how you share with us. I appreciate it. Always good.
That sounds just like me. I keep doing the same mistake over and over again, and I’m really tired of it. It’s not easy to look at every failured relationship and feel grateful for the lesson, when all you feel is sadness that it failed, again. I mean, I know everything about law of attraction but why do I keep forgetting all about it as soon as I meet somebody? And then I start blaming myself that I didn’t practice everything I already know. And then again, I know I only attract what I vibrate… I can’t seem to get out of this vicious circle. I could also use some advice 😉
Hi, I can related to the feeling of being triggered by not feeling heard and someone reacts to something you say becuase it appears as if they didnt hear what you meant to say – then wanting to express over and over until you feel like the person has ‘got it and that you have been understood and not misunderstood’. This is so hard to walk away from feeling unheard and the needs to scratch the ‘putting them right so I am not misjudged/ misheard/ falsey accused’ itch and the ‘loyalty of ‘owing it’ to ones ‘truth’ to make it clear what I was trying to say and feel the relief of being heard’ itch. The pain of what feels like ‘injustice’ haha … when actually clearly something is going on that the other can’t match us to hear us or we can’t express it to match or we are attracting ‘unheard’ or challenges to ‘feeling right’ or whatever. Sometimes forgiveness doesnt feel satisying enough when we want to beat the cr*p out of something. Then again maybe I didnt find proper forgiveness yet …… or I would be accepting all these things too. Forgiveness maybe IS the allowing of the feelings rather than the not having them or the reactions. Oh dear I am confusing myself as I write haha!
Thank you for your replies Katarina and Ann. I think I figured it out yesterday. I know that when someone isn’t able to give me what I am needing in a moment even when I make it clear. Yes, I got caught up in that cycle before. I realized, though for me, why I do that was because I am placing my value on whether or not they hear me. If I already knew my value, then I wouldn’t accept anything less than someone maturely listening to me. I also addressed that limiting belief yesterday as well. Thank you all!
Thanks Melody! This came to me in perfect time.
The “Giving yourself permission to feel better” angle is clarifying for me, thank you!
I was just looking at old posts about “the void” because I’m noticing that I’m really hanging out in a place where I often feel “I’m not doing enough, I should be WORKING ON MY PROBLEMS!” but I don’t feel much if any motivation to do that, but I also feel guilty about not doing anything. So I get stuck in a space of weird limbo feelings.
Reading this most made me think that I could just give myself permission to feel okay about it, and do something that feels (relatively) better, like watching a comedy, or listening to music. But then I get a tense “but that probably isn’t okay” feeling. Emotions are so weird!