Recently, I joined Dr. Real N. Kunene on Rise to Greater Heights for a short keynote conversation about something I have spent much of my life trying to understand:

Why are so many of us so hard on ourselves?

I started with some very ordinary examples.

You leave a meeting and immediately think about the one thing you wish you had said differently.

Or maybe you didn’t speak up at all, and now you keep replaying the conversation.

Maybe it’s even smaller than that.

Why did I do that extra thing that made me late?

Why did I spend my time that way?

Why did I order that?

And then, of course, there are the bigger regrets.

The decisions that cost you something.

The choices that affected someone you love.

The things your mind keeps returning to with the belief that somehow, if you replay them enough, you’ll finally figure out how you should have done it differently.

I know that place intimately.

I call it regret hell.

When Regret Becomes “Regret Hell”

During the conversation, I described regret hell as repeatedly reliving the would’ve, should’ve, could’ves.

For me, it could feel almost physical—like stabbing myself in the stomach with the same memory over and over again.

And as far as I could see, there was no way out.

I had done decades of counseling, spiritual practice, personal growth, and inner work.

Yet no one had taught me how to reliably stop turning against myself when something went wrong.

From the outside, my life looked successful.

I had written a book. I was speaking on world stages. I had built a beautiful life.

But on the inside, I was crashing from all the ways I constantly turned on myself.

The minute something didn’t go well—or someone was angry or disappointed—I would over-function, become over-responsible, rethink everything, and look for what I had done wrong.

Somewhere in my brain was a belief that sounded like this:

“If I beat myself up enough, I’ll do better next time.”

But as I said in the conversation. It doesn’t help us do better. It just tears us down.

How Does This Pattern Get Started?

Dr. Real’s format gave me only a few minutes, but I wanted to talk about something deeper than simply “stop being self-critical.”

Because for many of us, self-criticism isn’t just a bad habit. It began as protection.

I shared a memory of being about eight years old at our Sunday dinner table.

My wonderful mother would sometimes become almost like a different person as she collapsed into judgment—of herself and of others.

As a child, it felt as if she had abandoned me emotionally.

And what did I do? I abandoned myself. I became small. Apologetic. Accommodating.

I tried to be whoever I thought I needed to be to make everything okay again.

We hear a lot about fight or flight, but there are also the survival responses of freeze and fawn.

For many women especially, fawn can look like trying harder, becoming more agreeable, over-functioning, and taking responsibility for other people’s emotional states.

And the brain can eventually wire this into:

“It’s my fault.”

“If I turn on myself, I can fix this.”

“If I criticize myself enough, maybe nobody else will leave.”

The pattern may once have helped us navigate a difficult situation.

But later, it can follow us straight into our marriages, workplaces, parenting, leadership, and decision-making.

The Realization That Changed Everything: It Wasn’t About Getting Them Back

One of the most powerful shifts in my story came when I realized:

It wasn’t about getting my mother back. Or my husband back. Or my boss back.

It was about getting myself back.

That distinction changes everything.

When we believe our peace depends on someone else becoming less angry, more approving, more loving, or more understanding, we can spend enormous amounts of energy trying to manage their response.

We abandon ourselves in the process.

Self-Solidarity offers another possibility:

Standing with, by, and for yourself. Not only when everything is going well. But no matter what.

The Night an Email Sent Me Into the Bathtub

About 12 years ago, I discovered three steps that helped my move out of regret hell.

Those steps became The Wheel of Self-Forgiveness™.

The process begins by changing the way we understand the moment we regret.

Step One: Find Your Own Innocence

Finding your own innocence does not mean pretending nothing happened.

It doesn’t mean avoiding responsibility.

It means going back and looking honestly at the thinking that was operating at the time.

You didn’t consciously create the survival-driven thinking that shaped your reaction.

You were looking through a particular lens.

You were responding from the information, conditioning, fear, and wiring available to you in that moment.

This can create a profound shift.

Instead of endlessly asking, “Why did I do that?” you can begin asking, “What was happening inside me that made that response make sense at the time?”

That is a very different question.

Step One: Find Your Own Innocence

The first step is about seeing the thinking that was driving the action you now regret.

This does not mean pretending that nothing happened.

It does not mean avoiding responsibility.

It means recognizing that you did not consciously manufacture every thought, belief, fear, and survival response operating in that moment.

You were looking through a particular lens.

Given what you were believing at the time, your response made sense from inside that lens.

That changes the question.

Instead of endlessly asking:

“How could I have done that?”

You can begin asking:

“What was I believing that made this action make sense at the time?”

That is the beginning of finding your own innocence without abandoning accountability.

Step Two: Find the Fear Underneath the Regret

In the conversation, I also talked about something I came to see very clearly:

Fear is often what plunges us into guilt, regret, and self-criticism in the first place.

We may believe we’re only upset about what happened.

But often we’re frightened of what we think the outcome means.

What if they never forgive me?

What if I ruined everything?

What if I chose the wrong path?

What if this proves I’m a terrible parent, partner, leader, or person?

What if I can never fix it?

The second step helps us examine and question that fear rather than automatically letting it run the show.

One of the deepest pieces of this is learning to recognize that we simply cannot know what every event is ultimately meant to accomplish in our lives—or in the lives of the people affected by our choices.

That doesn’t erase consequences.

It brings us back to a right-sized mind.

Step Three: Become the Hero You’ve Been Waiting For

This was one of my favorite parts of the conversation.

I said: Self-love isn’t just drinking your lemon water and meditating for 20 minutes.

Those things can be lovely.

But the kind of self-love I’m talking about gets very specific.

What is it you desperately want someone else to give you?

Approval? Forgiveness? Reassurance? Understanding? Permission? Acceptance? A different response? A different outcome?

Those cravings can give us a window into the places where we have not yet learned to give ourselves what we need.

Step Three is about becoming the hero you’ve been waiting for.

Not in an abstract way.

In concrete ways that actually begin filling the gaps in self-love.

A Regret About Parenting Shifted in About Ten Minutes

I also shared a very recent example during the podcast.

The night before the interview, in my women’s online mastermind, someone came in carrying a huge regret about a decision she had made while raising her children.

This was not a tiny, “Oops, I wish I had said that differently” kind of regret.

It was something she had carried with a great deal of pain.

And in about ten minutes, I watched her begin moving from that huge regret into something very different:

Trusting the path of her child. And trusting her own path as well.

That kind of shift is why I continue to teach this work. Not because the past disappears.

But because our relationship with ourselves in the present can change.

One Surprising Outcome: Less Indecision

Another thing I talked about with Dr. Real was something I didn’t expect when I first discovered these steps.

My indecision began to change.

I eventually realized that I had not only been afraid of making the “wrong” choice.

I was afraid of what I would do to myself afterward if the outcome wasn’t what I wanted.

That changes everything.

If you know you will stand by yourself regardless of the outcome, you no longer need to predict the future perfectly before you make a decision.

That is where self-forgiveness begins becoming self-confidence.

And self-advocacy.

And a much more unconditional kind of self-love.

Self-Solidarity Isn’t Self-Serving

Near the end of the conversation, I talked about why this work matters far beyond simply feeling better about ourselves.

Self-Solidarity isn’t self-serving.

When you learn to stand with, by, and for yourself, you become better able to stand with others without disappearing in the process.

You create more possibilities for win-win solutions.

And perhaps most importantly, we begin changing what the next generation learns.

Children begin life with a natural sense of self-love.

But many of us watch that natural state gradually get trained into self-criticism.

Into perfectionism.

Into shame.

Into turning against themselves when they make mistakes.

When we interrupt that cycle in ourselves, we are doing more than healing one regret.

We are changing what gets passed forward.

Watch the Rise to Greater Heights Conversation

This was a short conversation, but we covered a lot:

• Why we replay conversations and decisions long after they’re over
• How self-criticism can become a survival strategy
• Why “beating yourself up” doesn’t actually help you do better
• The realization that it was me I needed to get back
• How The Wheel of Self-Forgiveness™ was born
• Why self-love is much more specific than conventional self-care
• How self-forgiveness can reduce indecision and build self-trust
• Why Self-Solidarity can help us change what gets passed to the next generation

WATCH MY RISE TO GREATER HEIGHTS CONVERSATION WITH DR. REAL N. KUNENE ON YOUTUBE

Want to Try the Process Yourself?

If something in the conversation feels familiar—and you’d like a practical way to work with a regret or moment of self-criticism—you can also download the free Wheel of Self-Forgiveness™ Cheat Sheet.

Get the free Wheel of Self-Forgiveness™ Cheat Sheet

My forthcoming book and built-in workbook, The Wheel of Self-Forgiveness™, takes you through the process step by step—from the moment you begin turning against yourself all the way back to standing with, by, and for yourself in Self-Solidarity.

Because if you’re the one who abandoned yourself…

you’re also the one who gets to come home.

Frequently Asked Questions About Self-Forgiveness

What is self-forgiveness?

Self-forgiveness is not pretending nothing happened or avoiding responsibility. In The Wheel of Self-Forgiveness™, it begins by understanding the thinking, conditioning, and fear operating when you made the choice you now regret, so you can take responsibility without continuing to attack yourself.

Why do I keep replaying things I regret?

Regret can become tied to fear and survival-driven thinking. Your mind may believe that if it replays the event enough—or criticizes you enough—it can prevent the same thing from happening again. But chronic self-attack often produces more fear, indecision, and second-guessing rather than better choices.

What is self-abandonment?

Self-abandonment is what happens when you turn away from yourself in response to fear, conflict, rejection, disappointment, or regret. It can show up as people-pleasing, over-functioning, over-responsibility, harsh self-criticism, or constantly trying to manage other people’s reactions.

What is Self-Solidarity?

Self-Solidarity™ is standing with, by, and for yourself no matter what—while still taking responsibility for your choices and remaining capable of caring deeply about others.

What is The Wheel of Self-Forgiveness™?

The Wheel of Self-Forgiveness™ is my three-step process for helping people move through regret, guilt, self-criticism, self-doubt, and self-abandonment toward greater self-love, self-confidence, self-advocacy, and Self-Solidarity.