Have Your Forgiven Yourself?

I’m a copywriter by trade, and an entrepreneur. And over the course of building my business over the past couple of years, I’ve learned just how critical mindset work is to success. 

One of the things I do is find spaces where I can surround myself with successful people who are moving forward in their businesses. So about 3 months ago, I joined a high-level mastermind/mentorship group for copywriters.

One of the benefits of being in this group is that I have access to a really brilliant mindset coach. And one of the things she talks about is forgiveness.

That’s a little rough for me. As a former Christian, I don’t like the word forgiveness. The concept of forgiveness was wielded against me as a weapon and a manipulative tool many times when I was all-in on that religion. So I’ve had to reframe that word in order to be able to use it as a tool of growth and healing. Let’s just say… it’s a process.

Last week the mindset coach held a “forgiveness session” all about forgiving yourself.

She started the session by getting us to calm and center ourselves. And she encouraged us to be open-minded about what would come up. We all have things to forgive ourselves for, but we may be surprised by what comes up first.

As she was saying this, a thought slammed full-speed into my head in all CAPS.

I AM SO ANGRY AT MYSELF FOR SPENDING MY WHOLE LIFE DOING THINGS THE ‘RIGHT’ WAY ACCORDING TO OTHER PEOPLE INSTEAD OF LISTENING TO MY OWN INNER VOICE. I’VE WASTED MY WHOLE LIFE.

Growing up, I was determined to do things “right”. I knew from a fairly young age that one of my most dreaded emotions was regret. I did not want to get to the end — or even the middle — of my life and wish I’d done things differently.

And being deeply indoctrinated into Christianity from the time I was a young child, I figured the way to do things “right” was to follow the bible and do what my parents and religious leaders told me to do. 

And since I needed to feel like I was excelling at this to be a “good” person, I was pretty extra about it. (If you’re an enneagram person, you may have guessed that I’m a 1. And you’d be right).

I went to church and youth group the whole time I was growing up. I tried really hard to follow the rules. When romantic feelings for another girl would bubble to the surface, I’d shove them back down as fast as I could and Christian harder. I didn’t cuss. I didn’t have sex. I didn’t drink. I didn’t do drugs. I tried to be a good girl.

Yes, I had a “rebellious” phase in college. But honestly, it was pretty tame.

Then when I went to grad school, I decided that the baptist-ish brand of religion I’d grown up with wasn’t hard-core enough. So I joined a church that I now realize was a cult. I know a lot of people are calling Christianity a cult. But this church was extra. They strove to be the best just like I did.

This unfortunate choice put me on the path to living my most inauthentic life. So… that’s what I did. If you’re reading this, it’s likely you did too — whether because of religion, comphet, or some other factor. If we don’t discover our queerness until later in life, we were likely hiding it from ourselves for one reason or another.

But then on January 22, 2021 — Holy Shit, I’m a Lesbian Day — I was finally ready to accept the truth about myself.

Since then my life has been a whirlwind of self-discovery and religious deconstruction. And I’m proud of the work I’ve done. It hasn’t been easy — at all. 

But until I showed up at that forgiving yourself workshop, I really hadn’t realized how mad I still was at myself. I knew I had done the best I could. I even wrote a blog post about it. But, as my mindset coach says, these things happen in layers. So, apparently I had another layer of self-forgiveness to peel off.

We went through some questions and a great exercise in the workshop. And I feel like it really helped. The last step was to listen to your inner voice until you heard a power phrase. And I found mine.

I’ve set myself free.

So now when I start to feel like I need to justify myself or explain my beliefs or just try to be “good” enough, I’m using my new power statement to remind myself of how far I’ve come.