Hi Lucy.
It might help to simply accept / come to terms with what you have done and learnt, including all the unpleasant "mistakes", then look for the wisdom and growth you have acquired from having made those "errors". And compare that wisdom to the ignorance or lack of realisation that you had prior to the mistakes you made. Then be thankful for the wisdom and growth so that it settles in nicely. This way we learn to extract the lesson from our experiences, grow from errors, and even be thankful for wisdom gained from them. Even though we might not be pleased about how we gained that wisdom, we have minimised its negative side and maximised its positives. I find this works for me reasonably well. Of course we will always carry a certain amount of regret, even shame, but realising the wisdom gained makes the load a lot lighter and lessens the pain. Personally, I see shame as like growing pains in the soul. Although it hurts, I am glad its there because it makes my progress more visible to me. Someone once told me, "Life is a realisation process."
Bardo,
Personally, I endeavour to see everything from multiple sides - inside/outside, above and below, and all around it, including all its uses and misuses, and its errors of uses.
Compassion:
Years ago when I was going out of body a lot and attending a training course I was given all the relevant definitions to learn and study. The definition I was given for compassion is that "Compassion is the desire to help others, for other's sake". I was taught that in a correct definition lies everything needed to be known about the subject. That's why I was given so many specific definitions to memorise and meditate upon and interconnect them with each other, like jigsaw pieces. Can you see the potential for error within the above definition of compassion?
Bare in mind that there there are two things, what we did and why we did it, and the why for which we did it, is what we really did. Also bare in mind the law of consequence (what some like to call karma) is not fooled; it has no problem differentiating between generosity and self interest, and it comes about accordingly.
Breath:
The potential for misuse of breath is massive and myriad. Breath is the handle by which we control and manipulate energy. Energy is everything, does everything, and can do anything. Within the total body (physical and astral bodies, and soul) are numerous energies, all doing their respective job. Everyone of these energies can be tapped into by our awareness of it, can be directed by will, shaped by thought, and controlled, manipulated, magnified, accelerated, intensified, etc, by the breath. Breath magnifies thought, intensifies will, and manipulates energy. Try willing and thinking yourself to "relax", and see how long it takes to relax and how relaxed you get. Then try centering yourself in the commander's seat in the head and combining the commandment to "relax" with the breath, and send the commandment out upon your breath to every cell of your body and mind. Compare not using breath with using it. You will see that breath magnifies will, thought and energy, and is the handle by which energy is controlled.
That exercise is a relatively harmless one; it has a wide margin of safety and error. There are many other exercises which carry real risk. For energy has its rightful channels and places to be, and its rightful pressures and intensities. Energies have their compatibilities and incompatibilities, their beneficial and detrimental reactions to each other. Once we start messing about with energy, thought and breath, we can make some very grave errors. I mean insanities of the worst kind, and mental, emotional and physical illnesses, from mild disruptions to severe damage to any and all our bodies, to the very foundational layer upon which all our mental and astral bodies are built, so that we may take many lifetimes of suffering to repair the damage. Think what happens to a motor car when the head gasket breaks and water (the energy of the cooling system) gets into the engine. The car overheats and the engine seizes up and is often destroyed. Or worse, when petrol (the liquid fire energy of the fuel lines) leaks onto the manifold. The car burns. Or the many problems that occur when the electrical system suffers short circuits, arcs and other malfunctions. The human mechanism and its energies are far more complex and potentially dangerous than the simple system of a motor car. There are energies, fires, waters, airs of every sort, all flowing here and there in their respective channels. In their wrong mix and wrong place they range from troublesome to deadly. There are separation "webs" and "membranes", designed to ensure our safety by keeping energies in their right mix and place, and these membranes are easily weakened and ruptured. And probably one of the worst and most common dangers are low level "incorrect" or partially correct energies that are of sufficiently low intensity to be managed and worked through successfully, but when amplified by bringing the breath into contact with them they become explosive, like turning kerosene into rocket fuel. The possibilities for harm are endless. It it takes exact precision and a lot of knowledge to correctly use the breath upon the energies of the human mechanism. There are millions of ways to do it wrong and cause disaster, and only one way to do it right - which is part of why I don't teach much of what I learnt on the subject. If left alone, without direct interference, and if we simply live a good and helpful life, cultivate a strong and kind character, and exercise virtues, then the human energies have their own self-correcting mechanism. For those who wish to accelerate their selves a little and intensify/magnify their efforts, then keep it broad and basic by adding breath to relaxation exercises, to prayer for others, to love and forgiveness to others, and practice being conscious of the breath will help. But precision occult work is best left alone unless we know the risks.
My out of body instructor once told me, "When we combine will and thought and breath we have a potent mix, with all manner of potential." And I have learnt, seen and experienced how true that sentence is.
Sorry if I come across hard, but I had a hard occult teacher and so I can be a bit hard myself. I am learning how to be a little bit soft and fluffy
but not too much.
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