An easy way to forgive yourself for past mistakes is to focus on gratitude. Ask yourself what you have to be grateful for. The problem? It’s far easier to look at what we don’t have rather than what we do have.
Our minds have been almost pre-programmed by society to emulate the haves rather than the have-nots.
But, we have far more than we understand. The problem is that we only compare what we have in our lives using the status quo of our past and the people around us. If we’ve always had clean running water, why would be grateful for that? But, you and I know just how little of the world has clean running water.
But it’s not just about clean running water. It’s about everything around us. We’re surrounded by things that we have to be grateful for. We can be grateful for the fact that we’re six feet above ground, because we could certainly cease to exist or die at any moment. But in this moment, we’re alive. Why not be grateful for it?
We can be grateful for our reason and our intellect, the ability to read and write, speak a language, see or hear, and a million other things. Once you start identifying the things you have to be grateful for, and focus on that rather than what you don’t have, the mind moves from a state of lack to a state of abundance.
Write out all the things you have to be grateful for, no matter how small. It’s an easy way to move past some of the mistakes that we have trouble forgiving ourselves for.
