Great Minds: Hamish and Kyle - On regrets and how to forgive yourself

In this web series, psychotherapist Kyle MacDonald and Nutters Club co-host Hamish Williams look at mental health and how to navigate some of the more challenging parts of modern life. Today they talk about forgiveness.

I don't subscribe to the idea of "no regrets". Although there's been plenty of highs during my life to date, there has certainly also been a few lows and sometimes they were a direct result of my own actions. When I think back on them they tend to elicit a few feelings that are less than positive but I like to think that I learned from them. In short, I've forgiven myself.

That wasn't always the case though, and the path to being able to make peace in my own mind was at times a very challenging one. As it turns out, I'm not alone and it's an aspect of mental health that can be very confronting as it requires us to critique the person we know the most about, ourselves.

"Its all about getting stuck in the feelings of regret," explains psychotherapist Kyle MacDonald. "Being able to move through these feelings is the path to letting them diminish over time."

Kyle MacDonald and Hamish Williams discuss how to move through stuck feelings of regret.

But if you simply leave your regrets alone will forgiveness come with time? Don't count on it. It's perfectly normal to want to leave mistakes in the past and perhaps even not talk about it for a while. Healing, however, only occurs when you engage, and to simply remain quiet and ignore the issue that needs resolving has a fairly predictable outcome.

"Secrets keep you sick" states MacDonald. "Being able to find a way to talk about these things out loud is the way to help get those feelings unstuck and stop feeling bad about it."

I also find it helpful to get a fresh perspective from someone outside my own mind. Listening to your own thoughts is like having the same song on repeat; it doesn't change and only seems to get worse the more you listen to it.

Forgiving ourselves is one aspect but forgiving others can be a whole other challenge. Someone at some point will unfortunately treat you badly. Feeling anger or even hate for that happening is not uncommon. Finding an ability to forgive people, however, isn't a case of endorsing the behaviour that caused us hurt.

"You don't have to forgive anybody" says MacDonald. But he goes on to explain to me that when we hold on to negative emotions we are only doing ourselves harm.

"No one expects you to be friends with people who've done you wrong, unless you want to. Forgiveness is on your terms but find a way to move away from the negative emotions."

This comes through creating understanding for ourselves. This might come from being able to think why the person might have treated you that way but recognise that they likely have their own issues going on. It's important to recognise that no matter the level of the relationship, their issues are not yours.

Achieving forgiveness is about moving forward by turning pain and hurt into bad memories. Life, at the end of the day, is a collection of memories so hold tight to the good ones and let go of the not so good.