We need to simply see what we've done, which may not be super fantastic, as something we've done. Or see that we've been someone we wouldn't like to think about as having been.
Whoever said that we have to be the right person and do the right thing all the time? We are but human and we are bound to slip up, best intentions notwithstanding. But if we do slip up, then there are a million sticks to beat us with - either other people will beat us because we have not conformed to their idea of right or we have been so psyched to believe what is right by our elders that we beat ourselves up if we deviate even a tiny bit.
We forget that we have our own lights to guide us along - to live by and act by. Of course we are going to fall, make mistakes. But we would have made our own mistakes and had our own falls. And we would find the leeway and mental energy to fix it by our own self. Not wait for someone to set us on the right path and berate us into nothingness...
Looking at the concept of 'right'...
The question begs: What is this 'right'? Who decided that this is 'right' for me? Who decided this was the right thing to do or right way to be and that was the wrong thing or the wrong way to be? What gave certain people the right to decide what is 'right' for me.
While growing up, we are so often told by our parents and elders - This is not the right thing to do...That is not the right way to behave....This is not the right dress....What will society say...and so on.
Wanting to always do the 'right' thing, be the 'right' person is actually very crippling because you would be living your life according to someone else's idea of how life should be lived and how you should be. That someone else can be a beloved parent, or someone you look up to, someone who has always been a fixture in your life.......or it could even be this non-existent-man-made thing called society...but the fact still remains that you are trapped in someone else's idea of 'right' person, 'right' way of living, 'right' conduct.....
Some of us actually look to others to tell us the right thing to do or what is expected of us as being right. We've given up our faculty to decide or to see things through our own eyes. We've bartered away our ability to think and understand. We've given away our inborn gift of understanding. We've pushed our intelligence to the back of our mind instead of using it to find out what we are all about so that we can decide for ourselves what is right for us or not. And all this for what? For something as ephemeral as the feeling of being loved or feeling secure or feeling a part of society.
Well, we are then just sailing along on someone else's ship, probably as a stowaway.
It's taken me these long years to understand this....and I am most definitely trying my hardest to get out of all these things that have crippled me all these years. I have to do and be what is right for me.....what feels right in every cell of my being.....what gives me a sense of peace and serenity... It is probably one of the most difficult tasks I've ever undertaken...but I mean to work on it...
Walt Whitman puts it beautifully: Re-examine all that you have been told...dismiss that which insults your soul.