One of the most important aspects of a spiritual path is forgiveness. Without forgiving those who have harmed us, we cannot experience freedom. So many of us work diligently to find forgiveness in our hearts for these who have wronged us throughout our lives. However, as important as forgiving others is, it is also equally important to forgive ourselves. We hold so much guilt and even shame about things we’ve done in our past, mistakes we have made. We tell ourselves stories about what a bad person we are. Those stories keep us stuck just as much has anger at others. In the same way that we learn to forgive others, remembering that they did not intend to hurt us but rather they were acting out of their own fear, confusion, ignorance, anger, ego, etc. In the same way, we must recognize that we, too, made the mistakes we made out of our own fear, confusion, pain, ignorance. We did not intend to cause harm to another.

So today, allow yourself to forgive yourself for one big mistake you made in your life! You deserve to be forgiven. You deserve to be free!