How To Recover When You’ve Messed Up

Life isn’t perfect. People aren’t perfect. From time to time, even the most careful of persons can find themselves in trouble, having made mistakes or demonstrated massive errors in judgment. And while the actions you carried out can indeed be impactful and, in some cases, devastating and life-altering, how you move forward and what you do in the aftermath can be just as important as the incident that triggered the situation. Remember, every mistake is an opportunity for growth and learning.

If you’ve messed up your life and you want to get help to get things back on track, you need to stop and fully assess the situation and any consequences you might be facing and see where you go from here. Because things are never completely hopeless, nor are they often too big to overcome where nothing can be done.

If this hits the nail on the head and you need guidance on what should happen now, read on.

This is a contributed post.

TAKE RESPONSIBILITY

You need to own what you have done, why you did it, and how it happened. There’s no point in burying your head in the sand, especially if you need to navigate life in its aftermath. 

Stand tall, hold your hands up, and take responsibility for your actions and what they caused to happen.

Before you start working on righting your wrongs, you need to be able to acknowledge what you did for others who might be involved and for your own mental health. It might not be easy to admit you were at fault and that you played a part in getting to where you are now, but doing so is crucial if you want to move forward. Three little words can be helpful here: “It’s my fault.” That’s all you need to do.

APOLOGISE

Sorry is the hardest word to say, yet it’s so simple. Sorry implies you are at fault, and if you have moved through the above point, then this is a vital step you need to take. Whether you’re saying sorry to yourself for messing up your life, throwing away a significant opportunity, or you’re saying sorry to others for the impact your actions or decisions had on them, you need to pluck up the courage to say sorry.

Choke back the fear, regret, and shame you might be feeling and make an apology. Even if it’s rejected, the fact that you offered a sincere apology acknowledging your wrongs is still the right thing to do.

GET HELP

Help might be required by confiding in someone you trust to assist you in what happens next or to keep you from repeating the same mistakes. It can be in the form of mental health help and undergoing therapy or talking to a doctor, or it can be getting expert legal advice.

Professional legal support will help you to navigate more complex issues you might be facing, such as being arrested for drug-related offences, traffic offences, or anything else. But regardless of what consequences are awaiting you, getting help is vital to assist you in making amends and the changes you need to improve your life and turn things around.

MAKE AMENDS

Not everything is reversible; not everything can be fixed. Depending on what brought you here, you might be unable to make immediate amends to rectify the situation or improve it. Other people don’t have to accept your offers or your willingness to make amends in any way.

However, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t at least try to make plans to make amends in the future, whether you work towards not allowing this to happen again, work on paying back someone you owe money to, or help others to the same place so you can reach out to those you impacted or others to break the cycle for the future.

FORGIVE YOURSELF

Forgiveness is infinitely easier said than done. However, it is vital if you want to move forward and cut the strings that bind you to a troublesome past. Wallowing in self-pity, ruminating on your mistakes, and allowing them to overshadow the future means that you are dooming yourself to repeat the same actions over and over.

Forgiving yourself won’t be easy; effective forgiveness is a process. However, it’s something worth working through. The reality is that if you can’t forgive another person, you can push them out of your mind and ignore them for a while. However, when it comes to yourself, you have to live in your own head every day, and not forgiving yourself can be detrimental to moving forward.

LEARN FROM THE EXPERIENCE

Everything can be used as a learning experience, allowing you to be willing to make changes and understand more about yourself as a person. Take a step back and analyse everything you do, every action you take, every decision that propelled you forward, and the interactions you had or didn’t have with others that led to the point that brought everything to a head.

Addressing each step, why you reacted that way, what makes you choose one option over another, etc., gives you more insight into how you think and react in certain situations. The more you understand yourself, the more you can change your responses to avoid being in this situation again, and the easier it will be to make sustainable changes for the better.

Think of it this way: mistakes happen for a reason, and things can’t get better if you don’t know how they can go wrong. Analysing your mistakes and your response is a path to a deeper understanding of yourself and your capabilities.

Making mistakes is part of life, even for the most careful people. While the errors you make can range from minor to life-altering for you or others, there is always a way to learn, grow, and get things back on track. Accepting it happened, accepting your part in the process, and learning how to move forward and avoid repeating the same behaviour can help you get your life back under control.

Olivia x