Releasing Guilt

Dwelling in guilt is like living your life with an anchor tied to your ankles, dragging you down.
Learning to accept the things that we perceive as wrong can be a difficult task for many of us. Often we have been brought up to admit that it is normal to feel guilty about our actions and that by doing so, we will make everything seem alright within ourselves. Even though we might think that we have a reason to make up for the choices we have made, it is much more essential for us to learn how to deal with them healthily and positively, such as through forgiveness and understanding.

When we can look back at our past and assess what has happened, we realise that there are many dimensions to our actions. While feeling guilty might assuage our feelings at first, it is only a short-term solution. It is all too ironic that being hard on ourselves is the easy way out. If we genuinely can gaze upon our lives through the lens of compassion, however, we will be able to see that there is much more to what we do and have done than we realise. Perhaps we were trying to protect ourselves or others and did the best we could at the time, or maybe we thought we had no other recourse and chose a solution in the heat of the moment. Once we can understand that dwelling in our negative feelings will only make us feel worse, we will come to recognise that it is only through forgiving ourselves that we can transform our feelings and truly heal any resentment we have about our past.

Giving ourselves permission to feel at peace with our past actions is one of the most positive steps we can take toward living a life free from regrets, disappointments, and guilt. The more we are able to remind ourselves that the true path to a peaceful mind and heart is through acceptance of every part of our lives and actions, the more harmony and inner joy we will experience in all aspects of our lives.