10 tips to stop the habit of beating yourself up

Do you have a habit of beating yourself up for things? Have you got a habit of becoming really mad at yourself for things you did or simply did not do? Do you get yourself down and indulge in negative self-talk every time you notice something you did had some bad consequences? Maybe you are regretting your actions all the time and hating yourself for it?

But you really want to set and end to that and stop feeling bad for everything?

Then here is the answer to your question.

Here are my 10 tips to stop the habit of beating yourself up!

But first, let’s take a closer look what beating yourself up actually means.

How beating yourself up looks like

Beating yourself up can be really obvious, but also very not so obvious and difficult to identify. Let me give you some examples.

Obvious

The obvious kind of beating yourself up is either when you curse out loud at yourself in the moment you do a mistake, or you complain about yourself with your friends or yourself.

Not so obvious

The not-so-obvious kind comes as a general bad feeling or mood that you can’t really explain the origin of.

Do you feel tired a lot?

Then maybe you are internally fighting with yourself because you know what you want to be doing, but you are procrastinating on it for whatever reason. Feeling tired may be a response of your body to give you an excuse for not doing what you want to be doing. And you beat yourself up for procrastinating.

Do you feel unfocused?

Are you beating yourself up for feeling unfocused and do you try to force yourself to be more focused? That doesn’t make it any better, because it won’t change much about your situation.

Look out for these phrases to identify the negative self-talk that comes with beating yourself up:

• “I should (have)…”
• “I really have to…”
• “It’s my (own) fault…”
• “I am not good at this”
• “I am too slow/stupid/fat/thin…”
• …

10 ways to stop beating yourself up

1. Forgive yourself

Totally the first thing you need to do. Practice forgiveness. It is clear that stopping to beat yourself up won’t just happen overnight. It is a habit you need to change. A good way to start now is to forgive yourself for having the habit of being mean to yourself and forgive yourself for every single time it will happen in the future.

And don’t get impatient, because the thing is: this practice won’t bring you anywhere if you beat yourself up for “not progressing fast enough”.

Here is a daily affirmation for you that you can use to learn forgiveness.

“I forgive myself for beating myself up. I treat myself with compassion and forgive myself and my mistakes.”

2. Be kind to yourself

“You are telling me to be kind to myself instead of being mean to myself? No shit, Sherlock!” is what you’re probably thinking right now.

I agree that it may sound obvious, but it is still important to name, because, being kind to yourself does not only mean to not be mean to yourself but to show respect and compassion towards yourself.

It means accepting your own mistakes as a part of yourself and listen and understand to your needs and desires. It means being reasonable with your expectations for yourself and have compassion if you aren’t always at your 100% – because you simply can’t. Nobody can.

3. Ditch the perfectionism

If what you want is to be perfect, you always loose. Why? Because perfectionism is inexistent. I bet you have heard this before: Nobody’s perfect. Cliché, right? But so true. So stop striving for perfection, because that’s the easiest and fastest path to disappointment, which again means being mad at yourself for “failing” at being perfect.

Instead of striving to be perfect, strive to become your best version instead. That’s way better anyways, because perfect is boring.

4. You are not a machine

In other words: accept your flaws, because they make you human. Also, you should and simply cannot be at your 100% all the time. There are times when your performance is better than at other times. There are times you need more breaks than at others. Nothing has gone wrong. It is just the usual up and down of life, and that’s beautiful.

5. Change your perspective

Think again: Why are you beating yourself up again? Who are you trying and failing to impress? Only yourself. Why do you feel like you need to impress yourself? Because you want to be proud of yourself and achieve something.

Well, turn it around. First be proud of yourself, then, from there, with way more self-confidence and belief in yourself, achieve even greater things!

Afterwards, the pride will feel even better, because you did not do what you did for the sake of impressing yourself, but because you could and wanted to.

6. Accept failures as a step on your journey

Learn to celebrate your failures, because they are what makes you grow. Failures are blessings.

The most difficult times in your life are the best learning periods. They are also part of the process, and they serve a greater end goal. Cherish them, instead of being mad.

7. Set achievable daily goals

This is a method to help you feel proud of yourself more. One reason why you beat yourself up may be that you are not being productive or not achieving “enough”. A way to change that is to set small achievable goals every day that you can be sure to accomplish that day. This can be as simple as bringing out the trash or responding to an e-mail. Make sure you write your mini goals down and tick them off one by one.

8. It is all a process

These last times, I sometimes catch myself while beating myself up for not doing Yoga and not having started to teach any classes yet after completing my Yoga Teacher Training. I feel bad and regret it, but I figured out that that’s not how I should react.

So now, instead of feeling bad, I calm myself down by telling myself that this is just life: There are different periods in life during which you have varying priorities. This means; only because you have enjoyed doing something during a specific period of your life, it does not mean that you have to always do it. Your priorities, pleasures and passions will change.

And it is good and just normal that they change. Maybe it will come back someday. In my case, right now, I am simply enjoying fitness more than Yoga, and that’s fine. I am more than sure that my Yoga time will return, or that I will find a good combination of both.

So to not beat yourself up for not doing things you think you “should” be doing… if you don’t do it and don’t want to do it, then maybe it is just not the right time. Trust the process, and trust that life will give you what you need.

9. Trust

Learn to trust yourself. You are fine the way you are, always. No need to be mad at yourself, because you are doing great. You are always doing the best you can and whatever you do or not do is fine. Really.

Read more about this here.

10. Believe in yourself

Believe that even if you’re disappointed in yourself for some reason, you will do better next time. Believe that you are able to, because you are.
Get rid of the “I can’t”. You can do whatever you believe you can. So stop beating yourself up and start believing in yourself. And even when you mess up, celebrate it and take it as motivation to do better next time!

Never. Stop. Believing.

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So, I hope you now know better what to do to stop and what to do instead of beating yourself up. First, forgive yourself for doing it, then start to practice believing and trusting yourself and in the process, be kind to yourself and have compassion. Don’t expect to be perfect, because nobody can ever reach that point. Do YOUR best because that’s the only thing you can and should do.

Change your perspective. First be proud, then work to be even more proud. Accept your mistakes and failures as a part of you, because you are not a machine, and set yourself small, achievable daily goals.

And of course, always LOVE YOURSELF. Check out my posts about self-love here!

Do you have any other ideas or tips? I would be so happy to hear from you in the comments!