LeanAndBop said:
I am feeling a lot of shame and regret about my past at the moment. How can I redeem myself? I will explore this further. Does a period of my life define who I am? Or is it merely part of my experience as a human being, to make mistakes, to fail to live up to my values?
Man, I feel you. For years and years I've had so much shame about my PMO habit and have thought that it was the "real" me. I thought that if anyone ever actually found out about it, they would be weirded out and stop liking me. I thought that I could never really have the things I really wanted, like a healthy relationship with a woman, because no woman would ever be interested in me if she found out about my PMO.
I still have a long way to go to get over this shame, but it's better now than it's been. I have told a few people in my life about my addiction, and they've always been supportive and helpful, and they've almost respected me more for wanting to change and for trusting them with this part of my life. Of course, if you do tell someone, you should be careful to tell the right person, someone you can trust.
But here's the point: PMO is not you. Whatever happened in the past is in the past. You can't change it, but you can learn from it and grow from it. PMO is a thing you've done in the past to deal with difficulty in life, but you are way more than one bad habit. Regret is good when it prevents you from messing up again, but it isn't helpful when it just makes you feel bad and prevents from you moving on.
I'm a religious person, and my addiction means that there's a very obvious way that I'm not living up to my beliefs and values. It makes me feel like a hypocrite a lot of the time. But one of my beliefs is that people can change and that where we're going is way more important than where we've been.
Sorry to write so much, but you can do this! We can leave this garbage behind and work towards a full and happy life. So keep going!
