January 5, 2022 • 18 mins
If you're anything like me, you're more compassionate, empathetic, forgiving and kind to other people, but not to yourself. You're your own worst critic and may have found yourself ruminating on, feeling guilty and shameful about the way you may have handled different situations, whether you said or did something you didn't mean. You didn't take a pause to determine what you can and can't control. You were impulsive in your response, and you continue to make the same mistakes.
In this episode, I unpack the different ways you can work through these emotions and ultimately forgiving yourself, to evolve and free yourself to move forward and live a more healthy, positive life. You don't have to sit in it, you are capable of forgiving yourself, practicing methods to help you move beyond yourself. You may not be able to control circumstances or people around you, but you have more control than you think and one area of control you have is how you move forward, how you learn from the mistakes you may have made and how you continue to grow one day at a time.
You got this!
Please make sure you follow this podcast, share with a friend who may heed to hear it! I appreciate you and am grateful you're listening and hope my perspectives are helping you get through what you're going through.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:09):
Hey, everyone, and welcome tothe rise with the light podcast.
My name is Susan Fink and thisis my weekly podcast dedicated
to supporting families raisingchildren with special needs. I'm
on a mission to provide hope andpositivity through sharing my
personal insights, stories,mindset perspectives, and ways
to navigate through thisjourney. Let's get started.
(00:45):
Hi, there, and thank you so muchfor joining me today, I wanted
to just take a moment to thankyou for listening, you have no
idea how much it means to seethat people are listening that
hopefully, the content, theinformation I'm providing is
helping you and just to talkabout my own perspective is
helping you and that you're ableto connect with that and
(01:05):
hopefully feel better, or havesome guidance and have some
ideas on how you can get throughwhat you're going through. So I
just want to really, thank youso much for listening. And if
these episodes are helping you,please make sure that you follow
this podcast wherever you'relistening, and even share it. So
if you know someone who may begoing through something similar
that you're going through, orthat's part of a topic that I'm
(01:27):
covering, please make sure thatyou share with other people. My
mission is to help as manypeople as I can. And I cannot do
that without you. So thank you,again, so much for listening,
and sharing and commenting, andfollowing and all of those
things. So again, thank you somuch. So I want to just go ahead
and get right into this topicthat is all about forgiving
(01:47):
yourself. If you're anythinglike me, you may have a hard
time with letting go. And that'ssomething that I have been
working on for a really longtime of letting go of control,
letting go of the past, lettinggo of what I think about in the
future, letting go of past hurtsand things that have affected
(02:08):
me. But one of the things that Ihave a difficult time doing is
letting go and forgiving myselfletting go of the things that
maybe I said or that I did thatI regret, maybe that I didn't
take a moment to pause and Ididn't take a moment and think
about what I was doing. And Ijust have this level of guilt
(02:29):
about those things. Does thisresonate with you? Do you feel
that maybe you've done or saidthings that you just feel bad
about and you haven't been ableto let it go and you haven't
been able to forgive yourself.
And sometimes that's holding youdown from moving forward.
So I've talked a lot aboutforgiving others, I actually
(02:49):
have done a lot of work andforgiving other people that have
been in my life and letting themgo or letting go of the things
that maybe they had done to me.
But for some reason, I have areally hard time with letting go
and forgiving myself, I amextremely hard on myself, I have
very high expectations ofmyself. And that oftentimes
(03:11):
leads to feeling guilty aboutthings, especially in different
situations related to my son. Soif you have a special needs
child and autistic child, maybethis will resonate with you.
Because in the beginningespecially, I really had no idea
what was going on. It was beforethe diagnosis, there were things
(03:33):
that were happening. And Ireally didn't know why he was
having all of these challenges.
I didn't know why he would havejust these meltdowns and
physical outbursts and that hewould physically hurt me because
he just couldn't communicate. Iunderstand now what's going on.
As I was learning more, as I wasunderstanding more over time, I
(03:55):
definitely understood wherethese things were stemming from
but in those moments, there weredefinitely times where I just
lost it, you know, maybe Ididn't handle things in the best
way. And I'm not really ashamedto say that that I mean, I'm
definitely feel and still harborsome guilt about maybe the way I
(04:17):
responded to a situation ormaybe I just raised my voice or
I just, you know, I just didn'tknow how to handle it. But I've
had to forgive myself to be ableto move forward, I have to
understand why and reflect onthose things. So we all have our
moments, right? We all have ourmoments whether you have a
(04:38):
special needs child or not. Imean in any given situation. You
have a choice and how yourespond to things you have a
choice and how you react in whatyou say and what you do. Those
are your choices. That is whatyou have control over. I always
go back to that serenity prayer.
You know what, and you havecontrol over you know what you
don't have control over. And thebiggest thing that you can do is
(05:01):
to understand the differencebetween that and realize that
what you have control over ishow you respond to different
situations. So you have a lotmore control than what you
think. So in differentsituations, maybe you've said
something you didn't mean, maybeyou reacted in a certain way
that you didn't mean, but youdidn't take that moment to pause
(05:23):
and to think about what you weregoing to say or think about how
you're responding. And maybeyou're just completely stressed,
you have so much built up thatit just comes out. And it comes
out in a negative way, rightsometimes. So if you're anything
like me, a lot of those momentscan create guilt, and feelings
(05:44):
of shame, and difficulty lettingthem go and difficulty forgiving
yourself. So how do you go aboutdoing that? Have you ever
thought about how you actuallyforgive yourself, maybe you
thought about how you forgiveother people, but you haven't
necessarily looked inward, tofigure out how you forgive
(06:05):
yourself and let go. So there'sa number of things that you have
to have for yourself in order todo that. So in order to forgive
yourself, you have to haveempathy, compassion, kindness,
and understanding for yourself.
Those are not always easy thingsto have for other people, let
alone yourself. And if you arelike me, having kindness and
(06:27):
understanding of yourself is areally big hurdle. But in order
to forgive yourself, in order toactually feel better, in order
to let go, and not be negativelyimpacted by some of these things
that are holding you down, andholding you back, you do have to
have kindness for yourself, youhave to have compassion, you
have to have understanding andpatience. You have to be
(06:51):
empathetic to yourself, andrealize that you're not perfect,
no one is perfect. We all makemistakes. That's something that
I actually teach my son, I teachhim all about making mistakes.
And one thing I say to him aboutmaking mistakes is that that is
the way that we learn, we learnby making mistakes.
So it's okay to make mistakes.
But one of the ways in which youcan really actually forgive
(07:14):
yourself is by admitting thatyou messed up by admitting that
you made a mistake by admittingthat maybe you didn't handle a
situation, that in the best wayin the most positive way,
admitting that maybe you've letyour anger or your temper or
your stress and anxiety takeover that that wasn't really you
that that was something elsethat was taking over. So
(07:37):
admitting it, admitting it isthe first step. It doesn't
always come easy, but at leastthen you recognize and you're
aware of what you have done. Andyou start the process of
healing, and you start theprocess of forgiving yourself,
after you've become aware of it.
After you've admitted it. Thenext thing is to learn from it,
(07:59):
identify, what did you do? Whatdid you say? And identify ways
in which you could have handledit differently.
So if we make mistakes, weactually don't grow and actually
don't progress forward. unlesswe've learned something from it,
right? It's like, you keepmaking the same mistake over and
over again, you're not learninganything, you're not growing. So
(08:22):
if you've identified and youadmit that you messed up that
you made a mistake, it'ssomething that you need to
forgive yourself on. identifyways in which you could have
handled things differently.
Learn from it. Ask yourself somecritical questions. relive the
experience, relive thesituation, maybe write it down,
write down what you did, how itmade you feel, how it made other
(08:42):
people feel, and then identifyways that you can do things
differently. How could youapproach a situation? How could
you handle the situationdifferently? Another way to move
past some of these things thatyou might need to forgive
yourself on is to actuallyidentify who may you may have
heard and apologize to thatperson. So I've actually had to
do that to my son. So using myson as an example of different
(09:04):
situations with him that I havereally just not able to control
how I'm feeling and control myemotions. I've had to walk away
in different situations so thatI can calm down. And if there's
something that I did say, orsomething that I did, I actually
identify that within myself, Irealized that things I could
(09:29):
have done differently. And Iapologize to him. I actually
apologize to my son for whateverit was that I did or said that
may have upset him or may havemade the situation worse. So
apologize. That's where we haveto set aside our ego and realize
that in order to forgiveourselves, we really need to dig
(09:50):
deep into what we did what wesaid how to do things
differently. And then apologizeTo the other person. And that
helps us to relieve that guilt,that shame and whatever is
holding you back fromprogressing forward, and letting
that go and ultimately forgivingyourself. Now, I don't know if
(10:12):
this is something that you do.
But when I am having a difficulttime letting things go, and
especially with something thatI've done that may have hurt
someone else, something I saidor did something that I'm not
able to forgive myself on Iruminate, I ruminate over and
over about it, I think about itover and over again. And it's
(10:33):
basically just playing the tape,rewinding it playing the tape,
rewinding it playing that taperewinding, and I'm not able to
just let it go. And so I getstuck in the cycle. And so one
way to break that cycle is toactually redirect it. So if
you're stuck in this ruminatingcycle, try to stop it by doing
(10:53):
something else. So maybe goingfor a walk, maybe writing it
down, getting it out in ajournal, talking to a friend,
playing music, doing a hobbygoing for a hike going for a
run, do something else that canbreak that cycle that can stop
the tape from playing over andover on repeat. So that's going
(11:14):
to help you to move forwardthat's going to help you to let
it go and that you don't getstuck in this trap. And I have
been in this trap. So many timesI've been in a situation where I
just ruminate, I think about itover and over again. And it just
makes me feel worse. So ifyou're unable to actually break
the cycle and stop the tapeplaying over and over on repeat
(11:37):
by doing something physical bygoing for a walk or something,
like I just said, you can alsostop it by saying something
positive about yourself. So ifyou're stuck and feeling bad, or
feeling guilty about somethingyou may have said or done, and
you need to forgive yourself,instead of saying something
negative about what you did,turn it around and say something
positive, have some compassionfor yourself. This is where that
(12:00):
compassion and empathy foryourself comes in realizing that
you are not perfect, everybodymakes mistakes. This is
something that you can getthrough. But don't beat yourself
up about it. Don't continue downa negative thought process. Flip
the script, if you listen tothat episode, flip the script
from negative to positivethinking, flip the script, say
(12:21):
something positive aboutyourself. Even if you said I
admit that I was wrong. Or Iadmit what I did. I did not like
how I responded to whatever thissituation was. You apologize to
that person or people that maybeyou've hurt, you think about
other things that you could havedone differently. Maybe the
positive thing that you say toyourself is that I'm learning.
(12:44):
I'm taking it one day at a time,I'm learning how to get through
these different situations, andI'm learning and growing. And
that's something positive, youcan say to yourself to forgive
yourself that it's okay. Thatyou will continue to grow that
you will continue to learn thatyou will continue to be better
every single day and just takeit one day at a time. You know,
(13:04):
being kind to yourself isultimately the best way to
forgive yourself being patientand kind and understanding and
compassionate and empathetic toyourself. I find it so much
easier to do those things and tobe that way to other people. And
I don't know if you feel thesame way. But I really feel like
(13:25):
I am so much more kind to othersthat I have so much more
compassion to others that I'm somuch more empathetic to other
people and not to myself. Andthat kind of drives me a bit
crazy because I'm like I shouldbe my own best friend, right?
That's what everybody says, beyour own best friend. I'm not my
own best friend. I am my ownworst critic. And I'm really
(13:45):
hard on myself. And I know thisabout myself, I have really high
expectations. Like I mentioned,I am very, very hard on myself.
And one thing that I've had tochange in order to forgive
myself in order to alleviate anyguilt or shame or anything that
I'm going through, as it relatesto my own actions that I do have
control over. Right, I havecontrol over how I respond to
(14:07):
things. Those are things that Ican change. I'm empowered by
making those changes. I'mempowered by learning and
growing, and taking the mistakesthat I've made and making shifts
in my life. But it's not alwaysan easy journey, right? I mean,
it's difficult to often lookinternally, it's difficult to be
empathetic to yourself. We allknow everybody makes mistakes.
(14:31):
But when it comes to ourselves,we expect ourselves to not make
any mistakes. So I think a bigpart of this is really lowering
our expectations of ourselves,leveling them out, realizing
that we will always makemistakes, but it's a matter of
how do we come back from that?
Do we learn do we grow? How dowe forgive ourselves and move
(14:53):
forward? How do we stopharboring on things that we may
have done or said and how do wepress forward? And forgive
ourselves. So these are some ofthe things that you can do. So
these are some of the thingsthat have helped me with how I
have had to move forward. Andespecially as it relates to my
journey with my son, and being amother of an autistic child that
(15:13):
does have challenges. And thosechallenges change all the time.
So I've got to be prepared, inhow I handle different
situations with him, I have tolearn from the mistakes that
I've made. And I have to admit,when I'm wrong, I have to
(15:34):
apologize if necessary. And Ihave to just be kind to myself.
The more that I practice this,much, like so many other things
that I talk about, it's apractice, the more that I
practice, the more that I becomeaware of how I am handling
different situations of how I amthinking of how I'm responding
(15:57):
of the choices that I'm making,the more I become aware, the
more that I practice, the easierit gets. And I actually feel a
lot better, I'm actually able toforgive myself and let things
go. So does this resonate withyou? I really hope it does. I
really hope that maybe I'm notthe only one who has a hard time
(16:19):
forgiving myself. Maybe I'm notthe only one that holds on to
things that maybe I said or havedone, I hold on to them a little
longer than I should. But I'mhoping that this episode has
helped you that you can forgiveyourself, you can move forward,
you can let these things go,that may be holding you down,
that may be keeping you frompressing forward. And that may
(16:41):
feel heavy for you. You canactually push through them, you
can forgive yourself just likeyou forgive other people, just
like you are empathetic andcompassionate to other people,
you can be the same way toyourself. And I highly encourage
you to do that. Because you willlive a much more fulfilling
life, you will learn and growand be able to be the best
(17:04):
person every single day, themore that you work at it. So
that's it for this episode. Ifyou can relate to this, please,
like I said earlier, follow thispodcast so that you don't miss
another episode and share thispodcast. Maybe you know someone
who needs to hear this messagetoday. And please share this
podcast with them. So I want youto remember that you are never
(17:25):
alone in your journey. Stayconnected, reach out there are
solutions out there to help youand there are other people who
you can relate to, and who canrelate to you too, that can help
you along your journey. So Inever want anyone who's
listening to ever feel likethey're alone. And if you need
to reach out you can also DM meat Susan Fink dot rise. And my
(17:46):
mission is to help as manypeople as I can and I cannot do
that without you. So thank you.
Thank you. Thank you so much forlistening and thank you for your
support and sharing this podcastto help others and until next
time, I appreciate I empathizeand I'm here for you. And we can
do this
Hey, everyone, and welcome tothe rise with the light podcast.
My name is Susan Fink and thisis my weekly podcast dedicated
to supporting families raisingchildren with special needs. I'm
on a mission to provide hope andpositivity through sharing my
personal insights, stories,mindset perspectives, and ways
to navigate through thisjourney. Let's get started.
(00:45):
Hi, there, and thank you so muchfor joining me today, I wanted
to just take a moment to thankyou for listening, you have no
idea how much it means to seethat people are listening that
hopefully, the content, theinformation I'm providing is
helping you and just to talkabout my own perspective is
helping you and that you're ableto connect with that and
(01:05):
hopefully feel better, or havesome guidance and have some
ideas on how you can get throughwhat you're going through. So I
just want to really, thank youso much for listening. And if
these episodes are helping you,please make sure that you follow
this podcast wherever you'relistening, and even share it. So
if you know someone who may begoing through something similar
that you're going through, orthat's part of a topic that I'm
(01:27):
covering, please make sure thatyou share with other people. My
mission is to help as manypeople as I can. And I cannot do
that without you. So thank you,again, so much for listening,
and sharing and commenting, andfollowing and all of those
things. So again, thank you somuch. So I want to just go ahead
and get right into this topicthat is all about forgiving
(01:47):
yourself. If you're anythinglike me, you may have a hard
time with letting go. And that'ssomething that I have been
working on for a really longtime of letting go of control,
letting go of the past, lettinggo of what I think about in the
future, letting go of past hurtsand things that have affected
(02:08):
me. But one of the things that Ihave a difficult time doing is
letting go and forgiving myselfletting go of the things that
maybe I said or that I did thatI regret, maybe that I didn't
take a moment to pause and Ididn't take a moment and think
about what I was doing. And Ijust have this level of guilt
(02:29):
about those things. Does thisresonate with you? Do you feel
that maybe you've done or saidthings that you just feel bad
about and you haven't been ableto let it go and you haven't
been able to forgive yourself.
And sometimes that's holding youdown from moving forward.
So I've talked a lot aboutforgiving others, I actually
(02:49):
have done a lot of work andforgiving other people that have
been in my life and letting themgo or letting go of the things
that maybe they had done to me.
But for some reason, I have areally hard time with letting go
and forgiving myself, I amextremely hard on myself, I have
very high expectations ofmyself. And that oftentimes
(03:11):
leads to feeling guilty aboutthings, especially in different
situations related to my son. Soif you have a special needs
child and autistic child, maybethis will resonate with you.
Because in the beginningespecially, I really had no idea
what was going on. It was beforethe diagnosis, there were things
(03:33):
that were happening. And Ireally didn't know why he was
having all of these challenges.
I didn't know why he would havejust these meltdowns and
physical outbursts and that hewould physically hurt me because
he just couldn't communicate. Iunderstand now what's going on.
As I was learning more, as I wasunderstanding more over time, I
(03:55):
definitely understood wherethese things were stemming from
but in those moments, there weredefinitely times where I just
lost it, you know, maybe Ididn't handle things in the best
way. And I'm not really ashamedto say that that I mean, I'm
definitely feel and still harborsome guilt about maybe the way I
(04:17):
responded to a situation ormaybe I just raised my voice or
I just, you know, I just didn'tknow how to handle it. But I've
had to forgive myself to be ableto move forward, I have to
understand why and reflect onthose things. So we all have our
moments, right? We all have ourmoments whether you have a
(04:38):
special needs child or not. Imean in any given situation. You
have a choice and how yourespond to things you have a
choice and how you react in whatyou say and what you do. Those
are your choices. That is whatyou have control over. I always
go back to that serenity prayer.
You know what, and you havecontrol over you know what you
don't have control over. And thebiggest thing that you can do is
(05:01):
to understand the differencebetween that and realize that
what you have control over ishow you respond to different
situations. So you have a lotmore control than what you
think. So in differentsituations, maybe you've said
something you didn't mean, maybeyou reacted in a certain way
that you didn't mean, but youdidn't take that moment to pause
(05:23):
and to think about what you weregoing to say or think about how
you're responding. And maybeyou're just completely stressed,
you have so much built up thatit just comes out. And it comes
out in a negative way, rightsometimes. So if you're anything
like me, a lot of those momentscan create guilt, and feelings
(05:44):
of shame, and difficulty lettingthem go and difficulty forgiving
yourself. So how do you go aboutdoing that? Have you ever
thought about how you actuallyforgive yourself, maybe you
thought about how you forgiveother people, but you haven't
necessarily looked inward, tofigure out how you forgive
(06:05):
yourself and let go. So there'sa number of things that you have
to have for yourself in order todo that. So in order to forgive
yourself, you have to haveempathy, compassion, kindness,
and understanding for yourself.
Those are not always easy thingsto have for other people, let
alone yourself. And if you arelike me, having kindness and
(06:27):
understanding of yourself is areally big hurdle. But in order
to forgive yourself, in order toactually feel better, in order
to let go, and not be negativelyimpacted by some of these things
that are holding you down, andholding you back, you do have to
have kindness for yourself, youhave to have compassion, you
have to have understanding andpatience. You have to be
(06:51):
empathetic to yourself, andrealize that you're not perfect,
no one is perfect. We all makemistakes. That's something that
I actually teach my son, I teachhim all about making mistakes.
And one thing I say to him aboutmaking mistakes is that that is
the way that we learn, we learnby making mistakes.
So it's okay to make mistakes.
But one of the ways in which youcan really actually forgive
(07:14):
yourself is by admitting thatyou messed up by admitting that
you made a mistake by admittingthat maybe you didn't handle a
situation, that in the best wayin the most positive way,
admitting that maybe you've letyour anger or your temper or
your stress and anxiety takeover that that wasn't really you
that that was something elsethat was taking over. So
(07:37):
admitting it, admitting it isthe first step. It doesn't
always come easy, but at leastthen you recognize and you're
aware of what you have done. Andyou start the process of
healing, and you start theprocess of forgiving yourself,
after you've become aware of it.
After you've admitted it. Thenext thing is to learn from it,
(07:59):
identify, what did you do? Whatdid you say? And identify ways
in which you could have handledit differently.
So if we make mistakes, weactually don't grow and actually
don't progress forward. unlesswe've learned something from it,
right? It's like, you keepmaking the same mistake over and
over again, you're not learninganything, you're not growing. So
(08:22):
if you've identified and youadmit that you messed up that
you made a mistake, it'ssomething that you need to
forgive yourself on. identifyways in which you could have
handled things differently.
Learn from it. Ask yourself somecritical questions. relive the
experience, relive thesituation, maybe write it down,
write down what you did, how itmade you feel, how it made other
(08:42):
people feel, and then identifyways that you can do things
differently. How could youapproach a situation? How could
you handle the situationdifferently? Another way to move
past some of these things thatyou might need to forgive
yourself on is to actuallyidentify who may you may have
heard and apologize to thatperson. So I've actually had to
do that to my son. So using myson as an example of different
(09:04):
situations with him that I havereally just not able to control
how I'm feeling and control myemotions. I've had to walk away
in different situations so thatI can calm down. And if there's
something that I did say, orsomething that I did, I actually
identify that within myself, Irealized that things I could
(09:29):
have done differently. And Iapologize to him. I actually
apologize to my son for whateverit was that I did or said that
may have upset him or may havemade the situation worse. So
apologize. That's where we haveto set aside our ego and realize
that in order to forgiveourselves, we really need to dig
(09:50):
deep into what we did what wesaid how to do things
differently. And then apologizeTo the other person. And that
helps us to relieve that guilt,that shame and whatever is
holding you back fromprogressing forward, and letting
that go and ultimately forgivingyourself. Now, I don't know if
(10:12):
this is something that you do.
But when I am having a difficulttime letting things go, and
especially with something thatI've done that may have hurt
someone else, something I saidor did something that I'm not
able to forgive myself on Iruminate, I ruminate over and
over about it, I think about itover and over again. And it's
(10:33):
basically just playing the tape,rewinding it playing the tape,
rewinding it playing that taperewinding, and I'm not able to
just let it go. And so I getstuck in the cycle. And so one
way to break that cycle is toactually redirect it. So if
you're stuck in this ruminatingcycle, try to stop it by doing
(10:53):
something else. So maybe goingfor a walk, maybe writing it
down, getting it out in ajournal, talking to a friend,
playing music, doing a hobbygoing for a hike going for a
run, do something else that canbreak that cycle that can stop
the tape from playing over andover on repeat. So that's going
(11:14):
to help you to move forwardthat's going to help you to let
it go and that you don't getstuck in this trap. And I have
been in this trap. So many timesI've been in a situation where I
just ruminate, I think about itover and over again. And it just
makes me feel worse. So ifyou're unable to actually break
the cycle and stop the tapeplaying over and over on repeat
(11:37):
by doing something physical bygoing for a walk or something,
like I just said, you can alsostop it by saying something
positive about yourself. So ifyou're stuck and feeling bad, or
feeling guilty about somethingyou may have said or done, and
you need to forgive yourself,instead of saying something
negative about what you did,turn it around and say something
positive, have some compassionfor yourself. This is where that
(12:00):
compassion and empathy foryourself comes in realizing that
you are not perfect, everybodymakes mistakes. This is
something that you can getthrough. But don't beat yourself
up about it. Don't continue downa negative thought process. Flip
the script, if you listen tothat episode, flip the script
from negative to positivethinking, flip the script, say
(12:21):
something positive aboutyourself. Even if you said I
admit that I was wrong. Or Iadmit what I did. I did not like
how I responded to whatever thissituation was. You apologize to
that person or people that maybeyou've hurt, you think about
other things that you could havedone differently. Maybe the
positive thing that you say toyourself is that I'm learning.
(12:44):
I'm taking it one day at a time,I'm learning how to get through
these different situations, andI'm learning and growing. And
that's something positive, youcan say to yourself to forgive
yourself that it's okay. Thatyou will continue to grow that
you will continue to learn thatyou will continue to be better
every single day and just takeit one day at a time. You know,
(13:04):
being kind to yourself isultimately the best way to
forgive yourself being patientand kind and understanding and
compassionate and empathetic toyourself. I find it so much
easier to do those things and tobe that way to other people. And
I don't know if you feel thesame way. But I really feel like
(13:25):
I am so much more kind to othersthat I have so much more
compassion to others that I'm somuch more empathetic to other
people and not to myself. Andthat kind of drives me a bit
crazy because I'm like I shouldbe my own best friend, right?
That's what everybody says, beyour own best friend. I'm not my
own best friend. I am my ownworst critic. And I'm really
(13:45):
hard on myself. And I know thisabout myself, I have really high
expectations. Like I mentioned,I am very, very hard on myself.
And one thing that I've had tochange in order to forgive
myself in order to alleviate anyguilt or shame or anything that
I'm going through, as it relatesto my own actions that I do have
control over. Right, I havecontrol over how I respond to
(14:07):
things. Those are things that Ican change. I'm empowered by
making those changes. I'mempowered by learning and
growing, and taking the mistakesthat I've made and making shifts
in my life. But it's not alwaysan easy journey, right? I mean,
it's difficult to often lookinternally, it's difficult to be
empathetic to yourself. We allknow everybody makes mistakes.
(14:31):
But when it comes to ourselves,we expect ourselves to not make
any mistakes. So I think a bigpart of this is really lowering
our expectations of ourselves,leveling them out, realizing
that we will always makemistakes, but it's a matter of
how do we come back from that?
Do we learn do we grow? How dowe forgive ourselves and move
(14:53):
forward? How do we stopharboring on things that we may
have done or said and how do wepress forward? And forgive
ourselves. So these are some ofthe things that you can do. So
these are some of the thingsthat have helped me with how I
have had to move forward. Andespecially as it relates to my
journey with my son, and being amother of an autistic child that
(15:13):
does have challenges. And thosechallenges change all the time.
So I've got to be prepared, inhow I handle different
situations with him, I have tolearn from the mistakes that
I've made. And I have to admit,when I'm wrong, I have to
(15:34):
apologize if necessary. And Ihave to just be kind to myself.
The more that I practice this,much, like so many other things
that I talk about, it's apractice, the more that I
practice, the more that I becomeaware of how I am handling
different situations of how I amthinking of how I'm responding
(15:57):
of the choices that I'm making,the more I become aware, the
more that I practice, the easierit gets. And I actually feel a
lot better, I'm actually able toforgive myself and let things
go. So does this resonate withyou? I really hope it does. I
really hope that maybe I'm notthe only one who has a hard time
(16:19):
forgiving myself. Maybe I'm notthe only one that holds on to
things that maybe I said or havedone, I hold on to them a little
longer than I should. But I'mhoping that this episode has
helped you that you can forgiveyourself, you can move forward,
you can let these things go,that may be holding you down,
that may be keeping you frompressing forward. And that may
(16:41):
feel heavy for you. You canactually push through them, you
can forgive yourself just likeyou forgive other people, just
like you are empathetic andcompassionate to other people,
you can be the same way toyourself. And I highly encourage
you to do that. Because you willlive a much more fulfilling
life, you will learn and growand be able to be the best
(17:04):
person every single day, themore that you work at it. So
that's it for this episode. Ifyou can relate to this, please,
like I said earlier, follow thispodcast so that you don't miss
another episode and share thispodcast. Maybe you know someone
who needs to hear this messagetoday. And please share this
podcast with them. So I want youto remember that you are never
(17:25):
alone in your journey. Stayconnected, reach out there are
solutions out there to help youand there are other people who
you can relate to, and who canrelate to you too, that can help
you along your journey. So Inever want anyone who's
listening to ever feel likethey're alone. And if you need
to reach out you can also DM meat Susan Fink dot rise. And my
(17:46):
mission is to help as manypeople as I can and I cannot do
that without you. So thank you.
Thank you. Thank you so much forlistening and thank you for your
support and sharing this podcastto help others and until next
time, I appreciate I empathizeand I'm here for you. And we can
do this
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