Heal from a Choice You Regret
Everyone's going to make choices that harm themselves or others. But that's no reason to avoid owning your choice and repairing the harm you've done. Whether you intentionally or unintentionally hurt someone, the harm is real for them and you have the power to help make it better!
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The process below is one way to repair harm and find peace using virtues like Accept Agency, Create Solutions, and Process Emotions.
Let's Get to It! | Here's What to Do:
1 - Process Emotions
2 - Journal about the Choice's Effects
3 - Make Things Better
4 - Record What You Learned
Process all shame, guilt, and other unhelpful emotions you have about the choice so that you can see it as a decision with consequences, not something with emotional weight.
You can process emotions by writing down everything you're feeling about the choice. Get it all out! Then, destroy the paper. Or you can process the feelings using one of the application ideas for Process Emotions.
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The emotions might come back immediately or later. That's OK. Just process them again. If you keep at it and do the next steps, you'll gradually find peace.
Write down all the ways your choice has affected and will affect yourself and others. More emotions might come up. Process them. It's OK.
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Be totally honest about every single way you've caused harm. Your ego wants to avoid pain by pretending you caused less harm than you did. This pretending puts you at odds with the truth which can leave you feeling heavy and trapped.
As you're totally honest about the impact of your choice and process any emotions that come up, you'll experience relief. The truth with set you free.
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Every misstep can be a lesson learned. Include in your journaling ways that you've learned and grown from making and owning your choice.
Look over everything you wrote in step 2. Then write down everything you can do to make things better and how you can apply the lessons you've learned.
Now, get up and do all the things you wrote down! Make things better to the best of your ability.
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An important part of making things better is apologizing to everyone you've affected, including yourself. Your apology will be most effective as you:
> Frankly state what you did without do anything to make yourself look less responsible than you are.
> Acknowledge how your choice hurt the other person.
> Don't try to blame the other person at all at all.
> Ask to understand better how your action affected them and ask them what they would like you to do to make things better.
> Be OK with the possibility that they may not accept your apology.
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You can always forgive yourself. If you're having trouble doing so, repeat the first step (emotion processing) until you're able to let go of all shame and guilt.
Record what you learned by going through this process. Consider what you learned about yourself and other people; and what you learned about virtues such as Accepting Agency, Creating Solutions, and Processing Emotions. Write how you'll apply what you learned in the future.
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You might share what you learned with someone else.
Fluency Comes with Practice
You don't need to do the entire process described above every single time you make a choice you regret in order to repair harm and find peace.
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This process is just one way to do it and it may be a bit much at times, especially for minor missteps.
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Just as an athlete might practice in a more structured way but then play with fluency during a game, structured processes like this can help you discover and master principles that you can eventually apply instinctually and fluently as you make various choices.
A Few Thoughts on Spirituality
If you have spiritual beliefs or ceremonies that help you heal from mistakes, we encourage you to integrate those into the process on this page. As you do so, we invite you to be open minded about the following possibilities:
> God knows that rules don't have feelings. People have feelings.
> God doesn't want you to make a rule happy by jumping through hoops.
> God wants you to accept accountability for how your choices affect yourself and others and then do what you can to make it better.
> God can help you reach a state where you have intellectually learned from your regretful decision but emotionally it is as if you made a more desirable choice.