I've come to learn that for many (perhaps most) people, we are our own worst critics.

Imagine what you would say to a person who had done what you feel you are guilty of. Would you be as harsh to them as you are being on yourself?

That is almost purely positional.

The vast majority of the time, if you are going to talk to someone about anything that makes you feel bad, their instinct is to try to make you feel good.
The Louie c.k. bit is a perfect example of that - the friend giving horrible advice is actually doing what we'd expect most friends to do, she is showing empathy towards the person right in front of her with whom she's closest with, showing how strong of an ally she is by siding with her, empowering and supporting her, doing what she has to do to.. Be nice. And most people do this. to be nice on the most immediate level, to say nice things that people want to hear. She is probably not consciously lying either - that's not really part of the process.
She was given a description of an underlining conflict with the meaning and consequences of exactly one side of it, so describing it as a story with only one side really is acting on all the information that's available to her - it's simply that her position doesn't put her in a situation where she has any motive to ask herself differently and stop to think about it.
And just like her, with a few exceptions - most of which include odd barriers to empathy like gender or religion or a bias stemming from a previous personal narrative - most people are going to do the exact same thing.
So yes, as a result of that very particular position, other people around you - trying to support you - are usually less harsh critiques then you, because they hear only your side of the story.

Except that if the conflicting perspective is mutual, then there are probably plenty of people not around you who are way worst critiques of you because they are trying to support the other person and telling that person a one sided story in which you are the asshole / crazy bitch / villain in a simple black and white story.
So no, people aren't less harsh critiques then you, it just so happens to be that the people whose criticism you are exposed too is less harsh then your own by virtue of those people's position, which is to be exposed to you back.

That is almost never true for the people you've actually hurt, who unlike you or the people who empathize with you, are not in a position to continue life pretending that their own experience doesn't exist. Under some circumstances they might prefer it stay buried under a rug, but that's not exactly forgiving you either.

In my experience, people who - perhaps as a result of the above dynamic - take it to heart and outright believe that they are their own worst critiques, are usually doing so precisely because that is not true, in order to avoid acknowledging criticism that are worst then their own, by virtue of including the perspectives and emotional consideration of those they hurt. Others take is as an excuse to not have to face up to the consequences of their actions towards others, much like the example of the self flagellation I gave above and the resulting delusion of some sort of karmic balance - "I already hate myself for it, and that is punishment enough, why should I try to do anything to make this better or to figure out why I did it to avoid doing so in the future?"

I have met people who truly are worst critiques of themselves, and they have two distinct characteristics:
1. They never believe that - they tend to assume others are secretly hiding the same criticism they have towards themselves but aren't revealing it.
2. The reason the criticism is worst is not because of viewing the actions as worst, it's because the view themselves as static objects, they don't ask "what's wrong with what I did, the choices I made", they ask "what's wrong with me, with who I am". I think this is a result from a very particular way some people experience choice making, as if they never have any other choice but the one they've made.

To be kind to yourself at other people's expense is pretty much what most horrible actions are made of.

Does it really matter whether the person you've hurt forgives you? If you're attempting to be super objective about quantifying the damage you did, then yes, empathy towards you is irrelevant, but it's equally irrelevant if the victim holds a lifelong furious grudge against you.

We can do our best to make morality objective, but it will never be completely so--maybe you broke the guy's arm, but that kept him away from the vacation where he was going to accidentally fall off a cliff. You helped the old lady across the street, but the short delay in traffic meant that the sports car was speeding around the corner just as the little kid toddled out into the road. Sometimes it's not about getting empathy from others where none is deserved, it's about having empathy for yourself for being a meaningless ape in the vast universe.

Trace, wtf are you talking about? How is being kind to yourself, and forgiving yourself for the mistakes of the past at someone else's expense?

Ffs, nobody is suggesting you go marching up to the family of someone you killed and tell them everything's fine. It's not at anybody else's expense. This is about what goes on in our own heads. It's about our relationship with ourselves.

Look -you want to hold on to guilt and sorrow - take it out at nights and dust it down to feel it all over again? go for it. It will have exactly the same impact on the people you feel you've wronged as if you spent that night sleeping peacefully.

Clearly you are much better and less selfish person than anyone else here.

I am done with this conversation.

It isn't irrelevant because the people been empathetic towards you are subjective, it is wrong because they are not faced with the consequences of your actions that the person you've harmed is - their perspective is biased towards a bubble that excludes them.
That experience of the person you've hurt is part of The shit that actually happened, the consequences are real events - even when they happen on a subjective level within people's skulls - and reaching conclusions on the basis of ignoring or contradicting those is based on ignoring The shit that actually happened, a.k.a. reality.

The person you've effected is unlikely to do that. With the exceptions of extreme cases of abuse, people generally don't exclude their own perspective and experience - they can't pretend it didn't happen. If they forgive you, it's not because of a position that enable them to easily ignore The shit that actually happened.

As far as forgiveness goes...
At the core I think forgiveness is about trust - to hold a grudge is to be on guard, to live expecting that the next time you meet the person your holding a grudge against they are going to give you the same punch your holding a grudge for in the first place. When it's not directed at someone in particular, it usually gets directed in general - at people, at life, at the opposite gender, sometimes at a race or nationality, sometimes it's even towards a more abstract concept, like sexuality or war. A big part of any trauma is the scar it causes and how deeply it can ingrain the fear of it happening again.
To forgive, when it's genuine, it's actually a result of mutual feedback allowing trust to be rebuilt, in which expressing understanding and remorse and trying to repent and make things better to whichever extent you still can - depending on the action - convinced them that you are unlikely to do so again, that they can go to sleep peacefully knowing that the next time they meet you they are not going to get punched again.
I think if you truly accept responsibility for the harm you caused another, you kind of need at least try to fix and heal whichever parts of the harm you can, and this is most often the biggest part of it that you can (If such a part is available to you at all).

I am not sure if I should respond to that - generally I think the responsibility to stay out of a conversation is on the person who doesn't want to be part of it though, so I'll go with that.

No, that is exactly what I meant in regards to people using self-flagellation as a strategy to create an illusion of some sort of karmic balance.

You are just describing the opposite side of the same coin I described - I was saying that the stratagy of forgiving yourself is entirely contingent on never having to actually face up to whoever you've harmed and being able to create a pretend universe in which their experience and consequences don't exist.

It's meaningless because nobody - including yourself - actually exists in that universe. It usually becomes at other people's expense when you then need to go to arms to maintain the illusion that such a universe is real.

Yeah but, no but. Taking it back to the OP - I just stole a scarf.
No regrets (yet) I love it.

Background:
Small market in Otley today, tomorrow is the biggest market of the week.
I sat in the square, reading my library book, eating a pastry.
Whole time I was there, the market had already been disassembled. But there was a lovely woollen scarf still attached to one of the uprights, which aren't taken down overnight on Fri-Sat, obviously because there are stalls on both days.

Read my book.
Looked and looked.
When I was ready to leave I thought "f*ck it" and liberated the scarf. It's soft and warm and as nicely done as one of Limey's (although without the love)
Is even in my Autumn colours - dark pink and dark green.

Do I feel bad?
A little bit.
But the stallholders weren't coming back at that time of day.
Better I had it than some silly drunkener tonight, who would have taken it as a prank and then discarded it.

It's like this thread was created for me.

Yesterday afternoon at 5.30 I received a call from a venue asking where the wedding cake was that was supposed to be delivered. Picture a three tier, white and gold, ruffled, rosed, tall pretty thing meant to feed 130 people for dessert. Malteser, raspberry white choc and lemon flavoured tiers.

Where was I? At a tupperware party.

Where was the cake?

Written in the diary for the wrong date!

Completely my fault. cake had been fully paid for months ago. In the normal course of events I receive calls or messages from at least the bride, and normally the venue too, during the week before just to confirm. For whatever reason, this didn't happen this time, and because I had it written in the wrong date, I of course didn't phone to confirm with them.

My first emotion? Sheer incrudulousness. How could I be so stupid? I just could not even imagine how I could manage to be in a situation so terrible.

In the end, the venue sorted something out. Still don't know what. Haven't spoken to the bride or her respresentative, so the suspense of the impending smack down is driving me nuts. I keep wanting to open the conversation, but then I tell myself that hopefully they had such a wonderful day that they are able to laugh off the series of events leading to this error, so why should I spoil it. Just happily refund the money and try to brush it off and move on.

I feel so awful though. I hope she doesn't go crazy and say bad stuff to me. The worst part is I was really looking forward to doing this cake, and it was to be a statement piece. Something that would generate a lot of business for me because of the size of the wedding etc. Just so unhappy with myself. Can't believe what a douche I am.

Oh sweetheart. I feel your pain.
Breathe. Breathe through it.

If you're like me (and I think you are) this will surface in dreams years later.
But you know what?
I didn't get my flowers on my wedding day. My G-D FLOWERS! T'internet was still in it's infancy in this country, so I went to the nearest town by train to find the best florist. Narrowed it down to three, and chose the one which had the ideas which best matched mine.

On the day?
No flowers.
I'm not writing their name or even the town because it was a horrible series of events which caused it, and I had to accept their apologies. But aside from mentioning it here, it really didn't matter. What do I dream about? My missing flowers? No, I dream about being late for school and not studying for exams.

Be kind to yourself.
You'll worry about this far longer than the bride. She's just had the best day of her life.

Thanks sundae. I still haven't heard anything from the wedding party. I hope they contact me soon.

https://www.bakerdays.com/assets/sit.../large/889.jpg

edit: I was looking for an "I am sorry I ate your cake" cake. Google pics has failed me.

Oh Ali, I know the feeling.

I once completely spaced out a really prestigious photography job. I called and apologized profusely and re-scheduled and then spaced out a second time. Eventually, I did the job but lost what would have been an extremely valuable client and god knows how many recommendations.

Make the cake, take it and two or three kids to the junkyard, find a really smashed up car, smash the cake, sprinkle the kids with ketchup, snap a couple pictures. Piece of cake. ;)

Update. I heard from the bride. She was ok, then I explained the sequence of events that lead up to the event and she thought I was blaming her because I said that one thing that normally happens is the bride rings to confirm delivery times etc, but she didn't do that. Then she got shitty. Left a bad review on my page. Said she'd be in touch again after her honeymoon about compensation. I have given a full refund of money paid. Hopefully she's not going to go insane about the compensation. Pretty sure it'll be hard for her to get blood out of this stone anyway.

At least you've got some lead time to make yourself a few cakes with contraband in them should you wind up in debtor's prison.

Haha...yeah.

Seriously though, if she's lucky, she can make a claim through my business insurance. I still haven't checked if that sort of thing is covered, but I suspect so.