Sometimes in life we are our own worst critics. Even if we have successfully forgiven people who have hurt us in the past, many of us find it particularly difficult to forgive ourselves. Yet why should this be the case? After all, shouldn’t self-forgiveness be fairly straightforward and easy? Shouldn’t we want to improve our own opinions of ourselves?
And yet in truth, self-forgiveness can be one of the most difficult concepts that most of us will ever have to put into practice on a day-to-day basis. We might even spend the majority of our lives failing to let go of self-directed anger. That kind of anger can consume us both literally and figuratively: Not only will self-directed anger affect our mental health, it may also affect our physical health.
Reckoning With Forgiveness
The reasons why we do not forgive ourselves are myriad: Many of us may not feel as though we deserve forgiveness; we may feel as though our mistakes have been particularly egregious; we may have experienced relationships that have placed the brunt of the blame for problems on our shoulders and only on our shoulders; we may feel as though we deserve to suffer as a means of atoning for our mistakes. In this latter case, in particular, we may feel as though forgiving ourselves would be akin to letting ourselves off the hook.
Why Self-Forgiveness is a Vital Skill
Before we consider the benefits of self-forgiveness, it is worth considering why forgiveness of the self is such an important skill in life.
Firstly, the state of our self-esteem will likely be dependent on our ability to forgive ourselves. If we do not let go of guilt over things we can no longer change, in other words, we may label ourselves as “bad” people who are incapable of redemption. That is a recipe for low self-esteem as well as for serious mental health problems related to anxiety or depression.
Secondly, we have to understand that our capacity for self-forgiveness is oftentimes dependent on our desire for approval from others. There can be little doubt that the desire for approval is a central quality of the human experience. From the time we’re in school to the time we’re building our career, we tend to associate popularity or social approval with high self-esteem. Conversely, we tend to associate rejection from social groups with the notion that we are not living up to the “right” standard of behavior.
Yet we ought to question how valuable this concept of social approval actually is: If people are imposing materialistic qualifications on a friendship with us, we would do well to wonder whether that friendship is worth having.
And you can bet that when other people are judging us harshly, we are more likely to judge ourselves harshly. You’ve probably noticed that your mood can change drastically depending on who you spend time with: Hang out with people who esteem you, and you probably feel better than usual. Hang out with people who put you down or make you the butt of their jokes, and you’ll probably feel very low indeed.
Fair-weather Friends
For example, have you ever been around a crowd of people who only want to associate with you if your social status is “good enough” for their friendship? These kinds of people aren’t really interested in who we actually are as people deep down; they’re interested in what we can do for them or how we reflect on their competence. They’re shallow in the sense that they look to our exterior qualities to judge us; our interior life and values may be of exceedingly little interest to them.
But the problem here is that we tend to think of the rejection of our surface qualities as a rejection of our inner qualities: When we surround ourselves with materialistic people, we begin to evaluate ourselves by their criteria: If we’d only pursued a different career path or held out for a raise, we think in our weaker moments, we might “earn” the respect of a desired in-group. We may even pick a career with the end-goal of seeking approval from those who we regard as “in the know.” (We’ll rarely if ever get unqualified approval from such cliques; however, that is a different topic.)
Mistakes as Burdens
In other words, it is easy to see how our desire for approval from others can cause us to be particularly tough on ourselves. When we’re dependent on receiving approval from other people, our mistakes are no longer “just” moral errors; they’re burdens that cause us to be “unworthy” of our desired peer group or desired life. In these terms, that “D”-grade that we got on a high school math exam wasn’t just an example of poor planning, it’s the thing that kept us from going to a better college and getting a more prestigious career. We may in fact be angry at our past selves for “denying” us the future that we wanted for ourselves.
Which illustrates a truth about the link between self-forgiveness and self-esteem: We often can’t forgive ourselves for our mistakes because deep down we are angry at ourselves for our mistakes. If only we’d listened to the advice of others or worked harder or played the game of office politics! Our lives might be better; we might be “better” people. In this sense, self-forgiveness can start by breaking down this argument and examining its logic.
Why Our Mistakes Make Us Who We Are
Suppose for example that we take a look at what determines self-worth in a human being: Of course, there is no perfect way to judge human beings, but we can get a pretty good idea of what constitutes a person that deserves respect by looking to people that we ourselves admire. These can even include fictional characters from our favorite books or movies.
As flawed as they may be, for example, we tend to admire fictional characters like Luke Skywalker or Elizabeth Bennet or Hermione Granger or Harry Potter or Indiana Jones because these characters make the effort to do the right thing even when faced with easy alternatives. They may not be wealthy or well-connected or from the “right” social group, but these kinds of characters strive to become better people by overcoming inner flaws such as greed, pride, envy, or self-pity.
Risking Disapproval
Indeed, perhaps the thing that we most admire about these characters is that they risk losing the approval of others to do the right thing. Elizabeth Bennet of “Pride and Prejudice” speaks her mind even when it may cause her to be shut out of high society. Harry Potter rejects the snobbery and social status of Draco Malfoy’s peer group at Hogwarts in favor of the kindness of real friends like Hermione and Ron. Indiana Jones thinks priceless archaeological finds should be kept in public museums rather than in the private collections of the wealthy.
It should not surprise us that these kinds of characters tend to live up to the ideals of virtue put forth by Jesus himself. In Luke 12:15, Jesus tells us:
“Take heed, and beware of covetousness: For a man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.”
And for many of us, social approval can become a thing that we covet above everything else. Yet when we emulate our favorite characters and give up that kind of approval-seeking, we’ll soon find that self-forgiveness comes more naturally to our lives.
Finding the Good in Ourselves
Just like Harry Potter or Elizabeth Bennet, maybe we are where we are in life because we’ve made positive decisions too. Who knows, maybe we would be infinitely worse off if we had gained the approval of snobs or other types of shallow social groups. Maybe the approval of our neighbors would come at the expense of pursuing our actual vocation in life or following our real values. And shouldn’t we judge ourselves on our inner characters rather than on our outer social status?
In Romans 2:11, Saint Paul says the following:
“For God does not show favoritism.”
God’s kingdom is not an elite social club or a fancy college or the in-crowd in your local professional circle. God does not care about social status or income or about how many followers we have on social media. As Saint Paul says, God is impartial: He judges us based on our virtues and on our vices. It is the inner life that means something to God because the inner life is a more accurate reflection of who we are as human beings. And perhaps it is this aspect of our personality that we should cultivate.
Here is a prayer to help us better conceptualize self-forgiveness as we move forward in life:
Dear Lord, let us strive to treat ourselves with the kind of impartiality that You treat us with each day. Help us to forgive ourselves just as You forgive us. Let us find the strength to resist seeking approval from others in favor of seeking approval from ourselves and from You.
Above all else, let us strive in forgiving ourselves to forgive others. Help us each day to grow closer to You and to emulate the actions of Your son Jesus Christ. Let us treat ourselves with kindness and understanding so that we might also treat others with kindness and understanding. Amen.