Who we are becoming

What a comfort it is to my heart to read this today.  I am pretty sure that every one of us has something in our past we are ashamed of.  We have all made mistakes.  We have all chosen the wrong path.  We have all lived in this crazy mixed up world.
Why is it so hard to forgive ourselves for our past mistakes?  Even after we repent, our hearts and minds keep turning back the page and wallowing in the "who we once were", past.  It is like we see the atonement as something that applies to everyone else except ourselves.  Like we are exempt from the grace that is promised to us.  And the Lord's hands that reach out to comfort us. 
With all the things going on in the world today, I find it even more necessary to forgive myself for my past mistakes.   It becomes even more necessary to live in the present than in the past.  It becomes more meaningful.  I have a difficult time in letting go of what has happened.  Not so much the things that others have done to me, but the things that I have done to myself or to others.  I find it hard to forgive the child, the youth or even the adult for the mistakes of the past, even when I have truly repented of them and not repeated them. 
I am unsure of what makes it nearly impossible for me to accept the Lord's atonement in my own behalf.  It is like there is a voice in my head telling me that I will never be good enough for His love.  I have noticed that it is much easier to forgive others and passionately defend their right to repent, than it is to forgive myself.  The adult in me expects the five year old child that I was to have known better. 
I have learned that depression is living too much of our lives in the past.  It robs us of the present with it's whispers of "should have", "could have", and "would have".  My present is so mixed up in the past that I find it hard to put it all aside.  I am sure that the Savior who suffered so much for my sins, is sad when I can't find it within myself, to extend the law of mercy to even such as I. 
My goal for this week is to be a little kinder to myself.  To appreciate the present moments.  To love myself a little more and protect myself a little less.  To allow myself to learn from my mistakes instead of condemning me for them. 
It is a comfort for me to know and understand that the Lord forgives and forgets.  He doesn't hold the past against me.  He wants me to grow and become who I am supposed to be.  May we all strive just a little bit harder to be a little bit kinder to ourselves.  We are always worth His Love.