Self Forgiveness Quotes to Motivate You to Let it Go
Making mistakes is inevitable. It is a part of life that everyone can expect. The great thing about mistakes is they give you the opportunity to learn, grow, and become a better human being. Instead of beating yourself up when you make a mistake, find inner peace by forgiving yourself. Reading and reflecting on self forgiveness quotes will help you find peace as you struggle with the negative feelings that come along with making mistakes.
Forgiving yourself takes time and true intention, but it’s possible. You do not want to carry the guilt of your past errors with you for the rest of your life. Making a conscious decision to release the feelings of guilt associated with your wrongdoings is a huge step in the right direction on your self-love journey.
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What is self forgiveness?
Self forgiveness is letting go of the pain and negative emotions felt when you do something wrong. This includes resentment, anger and any other feelings of despair. When you forgive yourself, you accept that you have messed up, apologize to anyone you may have hurt in the process and begin the healing process.
Forgiving yourself includes separating yourself from the wrong actions and understanding that one moment in life does not define who you are.
Why is forgiving myself important?
Research by Stanford Medicine states that self-forgiveness improves our overall well-being. The negative emotions caused by unforgiveness directly impact your productivity and can also affect your relationships and your ability to perform day-to-day tasks. Not forgiving yourself for mistakes can even have a negative impact on your mental health.
Here are some other reasons you should forgive yourself:
- You forgive other people, so why not forgive yourself?
- To prove to yourself that you’re strong enough to overcome your mishaps.
- To give yourself the peace of mind that you deserve.
- To allow yourself to live your best life.
- To free yourself of the guilt and pain associated with making mistakes.
- To allow yourself to have a more positive attitude.
- To improve your relationship with yourself and others.
- To embrace the concept of self-love.
- To experience the great moment of liberation felt when you finally forgive yourself and move past your mistakes.
Is self-forgiveness hard?
Moving on after you’ve messed up can be hard. Somehow, we convince ourselves that we aren’t deserving of a fresh start. But, we are.
We replay our downfalls over and over in our minds and allow negative thoughts to overshadow all of the good things that we’ve done in life. Oftentimes, we’re still beating ourselves up for an error that we’ve made when other people have long forgotten about it. Self-forgiveness is a long process, but it’s necessary if you truly want to live your best life.
At the end of the day, we’ve all messed up. But we are all worthy of forgiveness. It’s hard, but it’s not impossible.
How can I forgive myself?
Making a huge mistake can be a painful experience. But, the best day of your life is when you decide to forgive yourself and move forward from a mistake you have made. A big act of self love is having the courage to admit that you did something wrong, forgive yourself, and take the valuable lessons that you’ve learned from your mistake and use them to be a better person.
The first step in forgiving yourself is admitting your mistake. A true mark of maturity is taking full ownership of the mistake that you’ve made. You can’t move forward until you have first accepted that you were wrong.
In addition to admitting that you did something wrong, WebMD also suggests you make an effort to repair any damage your mistake may have caused.
Forgiving yourself is a journey that will likely take a long time. There are several self-forgiveness exercises you can try along the way to help you get to a place where you can truly accept your mistake, forgive yourself, and move forward productively.
The 4 Rs of Self-Forgiveness
There are some important things to consider when thinking about forgiveness. It’s not just as simple as saying “I’m sorry” or “I forgive you.” Most often, a mistake leads to a negative situation that may even cause some real difficulty for one or more parties involved.
I like to refer to the 4Rs of Self-Forgiveness as a way to remember how to move past any mistakes you have made.
- Responsibility: Accept what has happened and show yourself compassion.
- Remorse: Use guilt and remorse as a gateway to positive behavior change.
- Restoration: Make amends with whomever you’re forgiving, even if it’s yourself.
- Renewal: Learn from the experience and grow as a person.
Responsibility
The first R of self-forgiveness is responsibility. To me, it’s the simplest part of forgiveness. I’d also argue that it’s the most important part of forgiveness. Without taking responsibility for the mistake that you have made, it’s going to be very difficult to move past it.
We have to face the fact that everyone in the world will do something wrong at some point, even if you are a really good person. Take ownership of your mistake. A major pitfall of self-forgiveness is skipping the very important step of taking responsibility for the thing that you’ve done wrong.
Remorse
Remorse and guilt have a place in the forgiveness process. The primary role of remorse is to bring awareness to the situation. It’s natural to have feelings of guilt when you make a mistake. Truly forgiving yourself means moving past the feelings of remorse that creep in from time to time.
Restoration
Making amends with the person that you’re forgiving is important in the act of forgiveness. It’s difficult to move on and find peace if you’re still holding onto bitterness and resentment towards a person. This includes you, too. If you are holding onto anger at yourself because of a mistake, try to let it go.
Renewal
When you experience true learning and growth from the mistakes that you’ve made, that’s when you know that you have truly experienced forgiveness. The power of forgiveness is that it can give you a sense of renewal like none other. Forgiving yourself gives you a fresh start and can be one of the best gifts of self-love that you could ever give yourself.
Quotes about self-forgiveness
Here are some of the best quotes to inspire you to forgive yourself and move forward after you’ve messed up:
Forgive yourself for all of the unkind, unloving, unsupportive things you have thought about yourself. Forgive yourself for the things you have done to yourself, that support the things you believe about yourself that are not true. Forgive yourself for being so hard on yourself. -Iyanla Vanzant
Forgiving yourself is easier said than done. Leaving your past mistakes behind can be hard. These inspirational quotes about self-forgiveness can help you if you are having a difficult time:
Forgiveness says you are given another chance to make a new beginning. -Desmond Tutu
Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it. -Mark Twain
Forgiveness is giving up the hope that the past could have been any different, it’s accepting the past for what it was, and using this moment and this time to help yourself move forward. -Oprah Winfrey
It’s one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself, to forgive. Forgive everybody. -Maya Angelou
Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense. -Ralph Waldo Emerson
I am who I am today because of the choices I made yesterday. -Eleanor Roosevelt
I’d rather regret the things I have done than the things that I haven’t. -Lucille Ball
I am a patient man—always willing to forgive on the Christian terms of repentance; and also to give ample time for repentance. -Abraham Lincoln
For all of the ways I have hurt or harmed myself, knowingly or unknowingly, I offer forgiveness. -Sharon Salzberg
Having asked God for forgiveness, accept release, then truly forgive yourself and turn your back definitely on the matter.” — Norman Vincent Peale
Through training there is knowledge. You can produce compassion, love, forgiveness. you can change yourself. – Dalai Lama
Forgiveness is a gift to yourself. It frees you from the past, past experiences, and past relationships. It allows you to live in the present time. When you forgive yourself and forgive others, you are indeed free. There is a tremendous sense of freedom that comes with forgiveness. -Louise Hay
I forgive myself, and then I move on. You can sit there forever, lamenting about how bad you’ve been, feeling guilty until you die, and not one tiny slice of that guilt will do anything to change a single thing in the past. -Wayne Dyer
If someone has made a mistake you should forgive and forget. If you have made a mistake, you should ask for forgiveness and move on. Don’t get stuck; feel free! -Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Embrace and love all of yourself—past, present, and future. Forgive yourself quickly and as often as necessary. Encourage yourself. Tell yourself good things about yourself. -Melody Beattie
Forgiveness is man’s deepest need and highest achievement. – Horace Bushnell
Silently repeat to yourself: I forgive myself for any ways in which I knowingly or unknowingly caused hurt or harm to any living being or creature. I forgive all who have ever hurt or harmed me. Everything between us is now cleared up. -Michael Beckwith
Forgive yourself for your faults and your mistakes and move on. – Les Brown
Forgiveness is the most powerful thing you can do for yourself on the spiritual path. If you can’t learn to forgive, you can forget about getting to higher levels of awareness. Affirm: I forgive everyone, including myself. -Unknown
I think one of the most important things is starting off the day forgiving others and forgiving yourself. You learn from your mistakes, but I don’t think you have to drag them back into today. – Joel Osteen
You can sit there forever, lamenting about how bad you’ve been, feeling guilty until you die, and not one tiny slice of that guilt will do anything to change a single thing in the past. Forgive yourself, then move on! -Wayne Dyer
Self-forgiveness is a daily practice of the humble, strong, and mentally sane. It is an intentional preservation of inner-peace and a reflection of a healthy self-concept. -Shannon Tanner
Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you. -Ephesians 4:31-32
If you do not practice empathy and forgiveness for your actions, it will be impossible to practice empathy with others. -Laura Raskin
How unhappy is he who cannot forgive himself. – Publilius Syrus
I have learned that the person I have to ask for forgiveness from the most is: myself. You must love yourself. You have to forgive yourself every day; whenever you remember a shortcoming, a flaw, you have to tell yourself, “That’s just fine.” You have to forgive yourself so much until you don’t see those things anymore. Because that’s what love is like. – C. JoyBell C
You cannot travel back in time to fix your mistakes, but you can learn from them and forgive yourself for not knowing better. -Leon Brown
Once you forgive yourself, the self-rejection in your mind is over. Self-acceptance begins, and the self-love will grow so strong that you will finally accept yourself just the way you are. That’s the beginning of the free human. Forgiveness is the key. -Don Miguel Ruiz
We all make mistakes, don’t we? But if you can’t forgive yourself, you’ll always be an exile in your own life. -Curtis Sittenfield
Forgive yourself and forgive others around you. -Raven Simone
Forgive yourself for not being at peace. The moment you completely accept your non-peace, your non-peace becomes transmuted into peace. Anything you accept fully will get you there, will take you into peace. This is the miracle of surrender. -Eckhart Tolle Quotes
These can also be seen as self-love quotes because forgiving yourself is one of the best ways to improve your sense of self-worth. When you take steps to accept the fact that you will make mistakes in life, you are on your way to becoming a better you. Moving on when you mess up can be difficult, but it’s the right thing to do. You cannot let mistakes define you. You are so much bigger and better than one moment in time.
