Some people find forgiving themselves difficult even though they have sought forgiveness from Allah swt and may have repented.
From this comes many internal battles. What advice would you give to these individuals?
Know that even if your at the bottom of the sea, you can still gather pearls rise back up. There will always be light at the end of the tunnel as long as your heart still beats.
What I have learnt during my life: Things that have not yet occurred or things which you thinks will happen in the future, you don´t need to mourn in advance. If they will happen, they do and then you can mourn them but don´t poison your life with thinking what if this and that will happen... What if they will never happen at all? Then you have lost your days for useless grieving.
"I cannot change what has been happened. But I still can make good plan for the future".
This is the principle that, In Shaa Allah, will help you to forgive yourself. It's hard, of course, to start accustom yourself with this principle. So you should start from little mistake. In example, you spilled sauce on the table because carelessness when eating. Do not think "Why I so careless?". But think "I should be careful since now".
I remember a drunk woman saying to me, I get into lots of fights and beat people up, will God forgive me? I said maybe you are asking the wrong question, next time you are angry and want to beat someone up, search in your heart for a way to forgive them. If you can forgive them, you will come to understand how God can forgive you.
There are people who easily can forgive themselves but hard to forgive the others. There are people who easily can forgive the other but hard to forgive themselves. There are people who hard to forgive themselves and hard to forgive the others. But the worst is, people who never feel guilty.
Guilty feeling is not bad. Even guilty feeling can make us aware to not make the mistake again. But the guilty feeling is also can be counterproductive because it can make us afraid to do something to redeem the mistake that we have done.
Do you believe that Allah will forgive you if you repent?. Do you believe that Allah will give you a chance to redeem your mistake?. If you believe, .... why must you punish yourself?.
Do not punish yourself through always regret and always blame yourself. But take a lesson from the mistake that you have ever done, and change yourself into the better person.
Forging oneself and forgiving others, has to be one of the toughest things we do in life.
I listened to a man of about sixty years tell his story. When he was about ten years old, he lived on a farm, he was waiting for his dad to come home with a lorry load of wood. His dad reversed down the drive, and he ran out to meet him, he hadn’t noticed his baby brother crawling after him. His Father’s lorry killed his baby brother. Clearly it was a horrific accident, a moment’s relapse.
The mother blamed the father and son, it tore the family apart. This man has lived about fifty years with the knowledge that he was partly responsible for the death of his brother.
I guess that no matter how many people tried to reassure him, by saying it was an accident, deep down he has to live with it. Again, only by forgiving other people, will it help us understand that we can also be forgiven.
In the end we are told that we stand before a just, merciful and forgiving God.
In the spirit of praying to a just and merciful God,
For me personally, increasing in istighfar (forgiveness), increasing in acts of worship, and reflecting on Allah ayat often does the trick.
It's similar to medicine, it does the trick so long as you take the right dosage. Sometimes we don't repent enough for our sins or our repentance is not strong enough. So over time the guilt and shame gathers until we feel overwhelmed by it. To prevent/correct this I would recommend the following:
1) Immediate repentance for sins. Do not delay. When you sin, say "astaghfirlullah" repeatedly, and if able pray 2 raka'at seeking forgiveness
2) Continue seeking Istighfar as long as you feel the pain (note: long after the initial pain of sin we should still feel regret and seek His pardon)
3) Continue increasing in worship (salah, dua', dhikr, fasting, giving sadaqah and other deeds of kindness)
4) Reading/reflecting upon Allah's Book as much as possible. The Quran offers a lot of guidance and answers all our questions if we just refer to it more
5) Realize that your sadness is a gift from Allah, a sign of faith, and acts like a magnet that points your compass in the right direction (towards piety)
6) Realize it's part of your nature to sin, and Allah has not created you an Angel, so he will not overburden you with what He has created you with
- Instead, the purpose is to strive against your desires, and that striving is an act of worship of which there is great reward
7) Realize that our mistakes are only a test that can make us much better than before. As we improve we become closure to Him and closer to Jannah
8) Realize that Allah is ar-Rahman, ar-Rahim, al-Ghafur, and al-Wadud and that His Mercy prevails over His wrath
9) Be proactive and think of ways you fell into the sin and ways to prevent them in the future
10) And of the most important is to make constant dua that Allah guides you and forgives you. For our deeds will never enter us into Jannah, but only by His Mercy
Pain and hardships allow you to grow spiritually Alhamdulilah so smile when a so called calamity befalls upon you.
Alhamdulilah Allah swt is the greatest.
Maybe this is a form of dunya punishment to clean your soul from the sin?
I see it more as a blessing. Similar to the nerves in your fingers (nociceptors) that alert you that the stove is hot, and so you remove your finger.
If it weren't for those pain receptors you could easily harm yourself quite critically. This is a disease called Congenital Insensitivity to Pain (CIP).
Sensitivity to sin is similar in that it alerts you to harm, and that harm burdens your heart.
As the Prophet (saws) said:
"wrongdoing is that which wavers in your soul"
"wrongdoing is that which wavers in the soul and causes uneasiness in the breast".
Where a sign of CIP is a lack of sensitivity to physical pain, a sign of a diseased heart is a lack sensitivity upon committing sin.
Both absences of sensitivity require the invocation of a doctor, and the doctors of the heart are the scholars of Islam.
Many words of wisdom has been spoken already by all the above posters! I like the way everyone has their own positive perspective MashaAllah.
But there's a hadith we shoud all remember when we feel this way:
Rasul Allah (sal Allahu alaihi wa sallam) said: "Seek out that which benefits you, seek help only from Allah and never say you can't do it. If any adversity comes to you do not say: 'If I had only acted in such-and-such a way, it would have been such-and-such;' but instead, say: 'Allah has decreed (it) and what He willed, He has done,' for verily, (the word) ‘if’ opens the way for the work of Satan." [Sahih Muslim]
I have lived with the feeling you have described for some years about various events in my life and I wonder if I had acted differently if I could have prevented some things but I realise that everything happens because of Allah's will (as Prophet saw states above) and Allah is in control of everything and part of Iman is to accept fate; both good and bad comes from Allah and take this as a test of Iman and test of Tawwakul Allah; we have to put our trust in Allah. You need to remember that Allah is The Most Forgiving, Most Merciful, Allah is able to forgive you and if He forgives you then whatever happened/whatever mistakes does not mattar...wash it away and forget about it; learn from mistakes and remember we are only human, we will make mistakes and we will sin but Allah is Most Powerful and Most Forgiving.
Last edited by Sakina'141; 12-08-2015 at 11:05 PM.
Rasul Allah (sal Allahu alaihi wa sallam) said: "Seek out that which benefits you, seek help only from Allah and never say you can't do it. If any adversity comes to you do not say: 'If I had only acted in such-and-such a way, it would have been such-and-such;' but instead, say: 'Allah has decreed (it) and what He willed, He has done,' for verily, (the word) ‘if’ opens the way for the work of Satan." [Sahih Muslim]
Maybe this is a form of dunya punishment to clean your soul from the sin?
Dunya punishment does not automatically clean the sin. It's just a warning to make us repent. But if we don't repent after we got this warning, then we still bear this sin.
I see it more as a blessing. Similar to the nerves in your fingers (nociceptors) that alert you that the stove is hot, and so you remove your finger.
If it weren't for those pain receptors you could easily harm yourself quite critically. This is a disease called Congenital Insensitivity to Pain (CIP).
Sensitivity to sin is similar in that it alerts you to harm, and that harm burdens your heart.
As the Prophet (saws) said:
"wrongdoing is that which wavers in your soul"
"wrongdoing is that which wavers in the soul and causes uneasiness in the breast".
Where a sign of CIP is a lack of sensitivity to physical pain, a sign of a diseased heart is a lack sensitivity upon committing sin.
Both absences of sensitivity require the invocation of a doctor, and the doctors of the heart are the scholars of Islam.
Good points and very important reminders for all but I think the OP was talking more about feeling extreme guilt about an event in the past which she has truly repented for but struggling to get over her past mistake or event as she cant forgive herself.
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Forgiving Ones Self
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