How To Stop Being So Hard On Yourself

Don't be hard on s

Everyone gets rejected, says the wrong things and experiences failure. When it happens to you, there is no reason to be so hard on yourself. 

You don’t have to be your own worst enemy. Beating up on yourself doesn’t get you anywhere. No matter what, you will always be a person of value! 

Instead, choose to change; create a new habit. Learn to treat yourself with compassion, forgiveness and grace. Choose to be gentle on yourself. 

Read on and discover how to lighten up and think well of yourself no matter what happens. 

Look for the 'blesson'. Look for the lesson. What went wrong? How can you do things differently next time? Choose to grow forward and learn from painful situations. When you do, your lesson becomes a blessing … or a 'blesson'. 

Make life a positive process. Believe in your worthiness and brilliance. Take small steps and go at your own pace. Forget about time, be patient and have faith. 

Change your approach.  Become aware of your self-talk and think before you speak to yourself. Quiet your inner critic with kind words and loving affirmations, sprinkled with understanding and compassion. 

Sit in stillness. Ask for guidance. Listen to your intuition. When you can remain calm, without judgment, you are ready to carry on. 

Don’t sweat the small stuff.  Beware of the temptation to make mountains out of molehills. Our egos like to make horror movies out of our errors. Ask yourself, “Will this matter six months or a year from now? Lighten up and go with the flow. 

Do the opposite. Reward yourself for trying. Spend time being creative. Do something interesting. Spend your energy focused on the important, wonderful and beautiful things in life. 

Get off the pity pot. Everybody has problems. Nobody wants to listen to you complain about yours. If you need to feel sorry for yourself, put a limit on it. Give yourself 24 hours to be miserable; then get up and try again. Count your blessings, not your troubles. 

Create a loving mantra. I am beautiful, kind and enough. Say it to yourself when you are down or when you feel rejected and defeated. Repeat it when you catch yourself falling back into self-criticism. Repeat it when you can’t sleep at night. Practice it every time you have to wait in line. 

Get excited about your future. Learn to expect the best. Remain positive. Refuse to give up. I'm on your side and I have all the faith in the world in you.

Please leave your thoughts below.

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Comments on this entry are closed.

  • Elle April 29, 2013, 11:19 am

    So, so true Tess. We seem to be hard wired for wanting approval and if we would only ask ourselves the right question, which in this case might be…”can I approve of myself, right now, in this moment.” And then, of course, answer yes!

    Love Elle
    xoxo

  • Cathy Taughinbaugh April 29, 2013, 2:39 pm

    Hi Tess,

    Great suggestions here on how to think well of ourselves through thick and thin. “Make life a positive process” is certainly something to remember. As we go along, we will make mistakes and make wrong decisions, but so does everyone else. We can think less about being so hard on ourselves and more about giving ourselves a pat on the back. Take care!

  • Victor Schueller April 29, 2013, 3:13 pm

    Tess,

    I love the “get off the pity pot!” I like the idea of giving yourself 24 hours, and then after that, to move on. That’s a great recommendation. Thanks for these wonderful tips! 🙂

    • Tess May 1, 2013, 11:47 am

      Victor,
      I think it’s important that we give ourselves a bit of time to feel sorry for ourselves. Limit is the key;)

  • Harriet Cabelly April 30, 2013, 3:50 pm

    Love this, especially the ‘blesson’. Growth through mistakes, disappointments, pain becomes transformative.

    • Tess May 1, 2013, 11:46 am

      Hi Harriet,
      I really liked that as well! Thanks for stopping by. I appreciate you.

  • Shana May 1, 2013, 8:36 pm

    “Look for the Blesson” – LOVE IT. Great article.

  • Vanessa May 2, 2013, 6:18 am

    Great post, Tess. Beating up on ourselves is not helpful & just keeps us stuck in a bad groove… but sometimes it’s very hard to get out of it! We hear a lot about forgiving people, but often the most important forgiveness is for ourselves…. forgiveness and unconditional love.

  • Brian May 3, 2013, 4:29 pm

    Hey Tess,

    Good points you raise. It is a bit of a balance. We need to be hard on ourselves for the purposes of disipline, but we need to be able to forgive ourselves so we get over it and are able to move on instead of beating ourselves up over small and insignificant failures.

  • Galen Pearl May 3, 2013, 6:14 pm

    Like others, I love the idea of a blesson. What a great word. And great tips about how to incorporate everything that happens into our growth and learning.

  • Susanj May 4, 2013, 3:14 pm

    I love the idea of blesson too. Life can indeed be a blessing. Focusing on gratitude and joy have totally changed my life.

  • Halina Goldstein May 5, 2013, 5:12 am

    Along the way, I’ve noticed that most people don’t even realize when they are hard on themselves. Including widows, who often times blame themselves for the death of their loved one.

    It looks like most of us need to learn to recognize when we are being hard on ourselves. We need to learn to stop and ask ourselves: “Why am I in pain right now? Could it be because I’m being hard on myself? What can I do instead?” — and then pick one of your suggestions…

    Thank you Tess for your kind spirit

    Halina

    PS: I too love the blesson word! 🙂

  • Carolyn Hughes May 6, 2013, 2:46 am

    I love the message in the post. How I wish I had read this years ago! It took me a long time to learn to be kind to myself and to stop feeling that I was never good enough. The best thing about stopping being so hard on myself was that it also helped me to lower my expectations of others and I was kinder to them too. So glad of the reminder Elle to take a self-check today!

  • Andrea May 6, 2013, 11:37 am

    I love the post. Like many others I tend to be pretty hard on myself. As you say – will in matter in a year or even 6 months.
    My issue is that there are an awful lot of people who do the opposite. They’ll never stand up to be counted. Everything is someone elses fault – not their own. Sometimes you have to be hard on yourself – just don’t build that molehill into your very own mountain.

  • Anne-Sophie May 8, 2013, 11:44 am

    Such a wonderful post, Tess and so uplifting. I needed this today. Thank you!

  • Eva May 9, 2013, 8:51 am

    Thank you for the very timely post, how not to be so hard on yourself. It really hit home for me personally. I have to re-read it again to absorb some more. Again, thank you.

  • Sebastian Aiden Daniels May 16, 2013, 9:52 am

    Thank you for believing in me! My favorite and most important one for me was the don’t sweat the small stuff. My mind tends to blow things way out of proportion when in reality they aren’t a big deal. It hinders me and sets me back from moving forward. I am slowly moving forward on being able to sit still and just go with the flow, but it takes time and many mistakes. Thanks for the post.

  • Travis May 16, 2013, 10:48 am

    Great article…right to the point. In life most people just dwell on your first step…”What went wrong” and stop there. They can’t stop thinking about what went wrong…if only they decided to move on they probably could have done great things. Many of the most successful people in history would agree w/ your list…Michael Jordan, Walt Disney, Oprah, ect.

    Thanks for the post.

  • bhavin July 16, 2013, 10:37 pm

    truely inspirational…thanx for posting it…feeling blessed..

  • Less than perfect August 9, 2013, 10:47 am

    I just saw this, and I apologize for being blunt, but I have to say something. I don’t always screw up in a big way, but when I do, I just ream myself out. I don’t know why, but I feel like I should. And I feel like I need to be hard on myself for screwing up because if no one else is, where would I be? I can’t screw up like this again. I don’t have enough cars to keep crashing. I don’t have enough money to keep fixing them. Tell me why I shouldn’t be hard on myself for something like this. Tell me why I shouldn’t be angry with myself for screwing up like this. Because I don’t know why I shouldn’t or why I am.

  • Tess August 9, 2013, 11:00 am

    Konrad,
    It’s only out of love that we change. Love yourself enough to want to get on the right path. Love yourself for wanting a better life. Be gentle. My guess is there is some kind of pain you keep reliving that wasn’t your fault. You’re punishing yourself even if you’re not aware of it. Stop! It’s not working. Love yourself enough to take responsibility and change. Get help. https://theboldlife.com/courage-coaching-for-a-bold-and-brillian-life/

  • Cynthia November 29, 2013, 5:48 pm

    All your tips are definately life changing.I wouldn’t ask for more, you are such a blessing.

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