Healing (22) Forgiveness and repentance

Repentance is a complex psychological and spiritual task, and history reveals with what difficulty people acheive it. It comes in a total surrender to the Way Things Are, yet there are ten difficult steps to be taken, before repentance can be complete.

• The first step is to realise the nature of  your invented shame.

• The second step is to achieve self acceptance through an honest personal evaluation of  invented shame.
• The third step is to face the truth of one's genuine morally shameful behaviour .
  
• The fourth step is as far as is possible to set things to rights where there has been wrong doing
• The fifth step is to ask for forgiveness from others
• The sixth step is forgive yourself
• The seventh step is to allow yourself to accept totally that you are forgiven
• The eight step is to recognize that every shameful act, both invented and otherwise, has been a personal choice
• The ninth step is to change those choices.
• The tenth step is to recognize that all our actions and our inaction can have negative consequences on ourselves and others.