YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

From my journal...

When I have regret, to really accept the regret so I can try to move on, I should mourn it vividly, really "go to the scary place". I should vividly taste what has be (realistically) lost because of my choices and my actions.

Then, feel the forgiveness for the small child inside of me that is burdened by these 4 things:

1) depression

2) anxiety

3) an ego protecting my grandiosity, my unrealistic identity, my all-or-nothing thinking

4) my in-born sweetness under attack from bitterness and self-entitlement, turning my sweetness into meanness

These 4 things are the immense challenges for the small child, and because of those challenges the small child could hardly behave otherwise. So forgive the small child.

It took the work from age 25 to now at age 44 to try to overcome these 4 challenges, and I only started at age 25 because I had a mental breakdown. And at age 44 I am still working as hard as I can.

Keep doing the work Moe.

I think because we learned these things so early, the anxiety, the repression, the bitterness and rage about constantly living on the edge, it can take a lifetime to change. I sometimes consider it my life's work, I don't know if it will ever be completed, but since I decided to better myself and my life, I've found a purpose, I never had before. Before it was purely about survival, but survival is no longer enough for me. Since I've gotten a taste, I want to live, not just survive.

Great to read your post, Manuel!! Your posts are all so deep and thought-provoking, so I like them. For me, it's not just regret, but everything. Even if it's a small thing, if it bothers me, that's a barometer for me to dig in and deal with the emotions, even if I know I'm probably going insane

I wish I could just brush it off like normal people do, but for me, I can't truly move on until I've got to the bottom of it and dealt with it. It's definitely not the "fast, productive ways of dealing with problems" like those self-developmental authors preach. I know I'm making my life much harder and less effective by dwelling on it until I can finally let it go, but I never want to live a life where I had to stuff everything down and act like life was perfect.

You are doing some great work digging inside!

Keep up the hard work! Sometimes we are the hardest on ourselves and forgiveness is not an easy thing to do. Hope the healing process continues and that you can someday find inner peace