Self management: forgiving a poor decision

The other day I did a classic self-management fail. My neck was niggling slightly, and I knew I was probably aggravating it a bit with how I was lying, but the rest of me was comfortable, and...well...it wasn't that big a deal.

Only: It WAS a big deal. By evening I had horrendous head and neck pain - to a throwing up level. So I had to activate all my coping strategies - lying flat on my back, with heat packs, and gently massaging my neck when I could, and doing absolutely nothing in the dark for hours - while unable to sleep. It was, quite frankly, a horrible experience, and although the acute pain faded by the early hours of the morning, I'll be fragile in that area for a few days yet.

In a way, this was self inflicted. Not deliberately, but by getting complacent with my posture management. My symptoms had reduced, so posture management strategies had gently slid down my priority list without me noticing,

I made a poor decision and completely failed at self management. And now I had to deal with the consequences.

When we're in the consequences stage, the default reaction is often self-blame, guilt, and beating ourselves up for being so stupid. This approach has big drawbacks including:

a) increasing stress - which can worsen fatigue, pain, muscle tension etc.

b) worsening mental health

c) making it harder to recover

d) it demotivates us for the next steps (I'm such a failure! What's the point of even trying?)

However, the reality is that this is a common part of human experience - we do things, and when the consequences hit, we can see, with hindsite, that we should have known - or did know, and should have remembered/taken it seriously.

So I've been working hard on a gentler response.

a) To accept: yes, I messed up.

b) To acknowledge: That messing up was totally understandable, and part of being human. - and forgive myself for it.

c) From that gentle acceptance of my mistake - to make some practical decisions on what to change in the future. Not out of self-hatred, but out of recognising that I can do better - and that is a hopeful thing.

And so: onwards and upwards.

And lying in that position to look at my phone is banned for the forseeable future.