: By seeing that who we used to be is different from who we are now. If we have learnt, and maybe we've got 20-20 hindsight now, then we've actually increased our understanding. So we have to view the person we used to be as not the same person as who we are now.
Using the reflection of cause and effect and the Four Noble Truths is very important in these types of situations. To see "Ah, this is Dukkha. This came about because of this, that's the cause of Dukkha. How can I prevent Dukkha? What is the way out of it?" Using the Four Noble Truths helps to de-personalize the situation. This is very helpful, and I've used this very often in my life. Using the Four Noble Truths, applying it to our life, observing our past actions so that we can increase our Wisdom, and bring up the Effort to Prevent - which is part of Right Effort of the Noble Eightfold Path - to prevent further Dukkha. This is the compassionate intention, to look into Dukkha, investigate into the cause of it, and understand how it came about, and then learn how to use the Noble Eightfold Path to prevent it from arising in the future.
If there were no way out of Dukkha it would be very difficult. But because we have the potential to learn, to increase our Wisdom, we have the potential to lessen our suffering. So through Compassion for ourselves we look into these things. If we can bring up more Compassion for ourselves, then we are less likely to fall into aversion. We see the person we were, the views that we had, the hindrances we had, and the results of that in ourselves at that time. We see that our understanding is greater now, that we're a different person. We then bring up a resolution to try to avoid it in the future. That is showing compassion for who we're going to become, and who we are now.
We can't change the past. The person we are now is reaping the results of our ignorance or unawareness in the past. So we see that actions have results. Then we really have Compassion to ourselves when we try to prevent suffering from coming to the person we are going to become. So the investigating part of Moral Shame is very important. When it gets into guilt and self-aversion, and limiting our potential, it is going too far. So we have to learn forgiveness, Learning how to forgive the person we used to be. In order to do that we have to see the change in our understanding. And as I said, if we've got 20-20 hindsight now, then we've increased our understanding. Then if we investigate with the Four Noble Truths we increase it even more. We use the Noble Eightfold Path, examine the Noble Eightfold Path, and see how we can prevent Dukkha arising in the future. Then we're using the Dhamma to aid us and find a way out of suffering.
If we freeze ourselves and don't believe in the possibility of change, and think that we're just the same as we were yesterday, we are not seeing how things change, how things flow, and how different we can be from moment-to-moment. Focusing on the change, and even contemplating this impermanence is very hopeful. So that we don't freeze ourselves into a solid, static self-image. That's the way the problem comes, freezing ourselves into a solid, static idea that, "I am this. I was that, and I will become that," without actually realizing that everything is changing, and that we are more like a flowing river.
The Mississippi River, it's right there on the map in the United States. If you go up to the Mississippi River and look at the water in the middle of the river, is it the same water going by? You see it is constantly changing, but the idea, the concept "Mississippi River" remains the same. So we are more like that. So if we freeze ourselves into this solid static idea of ourselves, we're missing the reality of the moment that everything is changing