I felt ridiculous and foolish, and feeling like that gave me more reason to punish myself; my self-hatred grew as I felt more and more isolated from the world. But here is a fact for me and for everyone else — we are not alone. There are more people in this world who have those habits for the exact same reasons as you do — because you feel like that is exactly what you deserve. You are enough just the way you are and yes, you definitely do deserve to seek help with these behaviors.
No one is going to laugh, and you are not silly for having them. You, reading this article, are magical. We become so familiar with our habit of attacking ourselves that it starts to feel like a permanent part of who we are. Trying to change it may even feel unsafe. Our anger at ourselves might consume us and distract us from being present and engaged with our lives. Our relationships, our connections to our bodies, and our drives toward creative or professional development could get derailed or weighed down by the vice grip of continual self-punishing.
We can lose sight of what we truly want and need. We are at risk for getting horribly off track and making poor choices, trying to escape with drugs or alcohol, developing destructive habits with food, and then feeling even more reason to punish ourselves as we start to regret our behaviors.
First of all, we need to recognize that self-punishment may be so deeply entrenched that no amount of telling ourselves to be nice to ourselves is going to make much difference. In fact, it might cause us to be even more self-punishing when, in our usual self-attacking way, we get mad at ourselves for failing at being nice to ourselves! We also must move beyond a focus on self-esteem.
It may seem logical that if we could just find self-love and acceptance, then we would start being nicer to ourselves. Creating a more positive sense of self is, of course, critically important for improving our health and well-being; self-punishment, however, is far more complex than a lack of self-esteem.
Moving beyond self-punishment becomes possible when we get the help that we need to navigate in a new way when we feel pain. Instead of relying on self-attacks, we practice leaning on others to comfort us and soothe our pain. We begin to internalize this comforting feeling and become increasingly capable of self-soothing. This lie creates more guilt, which you may attempt to resolve with more self-punishment. A pretty unpleasant cycle, to say the least.
Consider your canceled trip to the beach. If you spend the afternoon criticizing yourself for your earlier distraction, you might still struggle to complete your work.
By the end of the day, you feel pretty miserable. You missed out on something you were looking forward to, and you still have tons of work to finish. This pattern will likely leave you feeling drained and burnt out , which can take a much bigger toll on your work than an afternoon at the beach. Not sure if your approach to self-punishment lies more in the motivational self-improvement category or the unhelpful and potentially harmful one? But it may not do much to improve your overall feelings about yourself, especially if you also have feelings of shame and low self-worth.
Thankfully, self-compassion offers a beneficial alternative. Not only does it help you get more comfortable with the idea that mistakes are merely part of being human, but it also helps you learn to love yourself regardless of your perceived flaws. Self-compassion can also help ease even long-held pain and promote self-worth, making it easier to treat yourself with love and kindness. Over time, greater self-regard can improve your faith in your ability to make positive change.
Try to keep in mind that life involves the occasional error, and you deserve a chance to try again and again, and again, if needed to show yourself you can indeed do better.
Reframing your mistakes as opportunities for growth, rather than failures, can also make it easier to practice forgiveness toward yourself.
You can only ever do your best. Next time you feel guilty for getting distracted at work, ask yourself if your lack of focus means you really need a break.
A trip to the beach might seem like a treat, but the exercise , sunshine , and time in nature it involves can also help improve your mood, potentially increasing productivity.
Treating yourself with kindness makes it easier to acknowledge and respect your needs instead of punishing yourself for having them. A long-standing pattern of self-punishment might be tough to overcome alone, particularly when it relates to shame, unworthiness, or difficulty forgiving yourself. Physical punishment can leave mental and physical scars that stick around forever.
This can leave them with damage that will stick with them for decades. Rather than physical punishment, try to talk things out with them and explain how you feel. Tell them that you are upset with their actions. If the mistake they made makes you want to hurt them physically, wait a while until you see them again. Because then, you will be the one who has to suffer from consequences.
There are many different causes of self-punishment. For one, someone who suffered from toxic levels of strict parenting may feel the urge to punish themselves later on in life.
This is because all they knew was negative consequences growing up. For other people, they may have severe anxiety levels or are depressed, so they turn to self-punishment as a coping mechanism.
Consequences are important, but self-punishment is an unhealthy behavior that must be unlearned. Through therapy and hard work on yourself, you can unlearn these toxic behaviors. People mentally and physically attack themselves for many reasons. If they have experienced harsh punishments before as a child, this is a common reason people turn to attacking themselves in adulthood.
Many other people suffer from mental illnesses that make them feel like they need to attack themselves. This could be negative self-talk, or it could be physical harm to themselves.
All in all, attacking yourself comes down to your mental health and how you feel about yourself. For someone with a high self-esteem, attacking themselves in unquestionable and sounds impossible. However, for someone with a low self-esteem and poor mental health, attacking themselves may sound like a considerable option.
Overeating is a very common way people punish themselves. Food can make you feel better, but then once you eat too much, it can cause pain. For people who feel the urge to self-punish, this pain can be the goal.
The reason behind this is the same for self-punishment. A person wants to eliminate their feelings of guilt, so they turn to punishing themselves, hoping to relieve their feelings. There is also guilt eating, which is where someone eats because they feel guilty about something. This is another common form of coping with guilt.
Forgiving yourself is very important for moving on from a situation. You may struggle with accepting that you did something wrong. No matter what you did, working on forgiving yourself is an important step to learning.
So, taking the road down self-forgiveness will be one of the best ways to learn and heal. To forgive your past self, try to understand why you did it. Was it an accident? Was it because you were confused? Then, try to apologize for what you did. Telling yourself sorry for suffering from pain is vital. Then, focus on how you can learn from your mistake.
When you focus on the learning portion of making mistakes, you will have minimal time to feel guilt. No one on this Earth is perfect, and neither are you.
Although you may feel significant pressure to be perfect, let go of this pressure. Whenever you make a mistake, realize that mistakes will always be made, no matter how hard you try. Rather than holding on to regret, apologize, right your wrongs, and move one. Use the painfulness that comes with regret to motivate yourself to not make the same mistake again. If you still have difficulties, consider reaching out to a therapist for help. Some people believe that suffering is a tool for self-betterment or may think that suffering is an inherent part of their religion.
However, these beliefs can lead to a cycle of negative thinking and poor self-image, both of which contribute to mental disorders and overall unhappiness. Instead of believing that suffering should be part of your experience, seek to rectify the things that make you feel guilty, so you can lead a life where you encounter more happiness than suffering.
Guilt plays a major role in suffering. In fact, some people feel so much guilt that they believe they're worthy of feeling bad and suffering. When you believe this, you instigate negative feelings that keep you down and put you in mental and physical harm. Regardless of what may have happened in the past or how you may feel about yourself, no one deserves to suffer.
Help is available while you work through these feelings and recover your worthiness. As stated previously, self-punishment doesn't only take physical forms like self-injury; it can also present itself in mental forms if someone believes they're supposed to suffer.
Whether this belief comes from guilt or a desire for self-improvement, some people implement this mantra into their daily lives and look for ways to suffer on a regular basis.
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