For tough days

Some days are tough days.  Those are the days when you feel like you can't do anything right, like you've made one mistake too many, or like life is dishing out more than you can handle.  It's easy, on days like those, to slip into the "shame mindset."  When that happens, your lose your ability to separate what you do and what happens to you, from who you are.  When I'm in the "shame mindset," I often have the following thoughts:

"I am bad at life." 
"What's wrong with me?"
"Is G-d disappointed in me?"

There are others, but those are the Big Three.  They nearly always pop up when I am feeling vulnerable to shame, and they are unhelpful 100% of the time.

Recently I came across a quote that, I think, challenges Shame quite effectively.  I found it on www.chabad.org, and it's based on the talks and letters of Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson (specifically, Torat Menachem 5742 vol. 3, and 5747 vol. 4):

"Two ways you could write your life:

'I am so small, and I make such stupid messes that even if the Creator of this magnificent universe had some plan for me, by now He must have given up.  So I do, too.'

Or:

'I am so small, and I make such stupid messes, yet nevertheless the Creator of this magnificent universe will not let go of His belief in me.  So neither will I.' "

For me, making the shift from the first viewpoint to the second is the key to my emotional well-being.    I am human, and I do make mistakes.  I do sometimes get overwhelmed by life, and I occasionally handle things with less grace than I would have liked.  I sometimes have thoughts I wish I didn't have, or I say things I wish I hadn't said.  All of that is real...and normal.  But the important thing, I think, is to remember that G-d sees beyond my day-to-day missteps and focuses on my true self, my inner being, which contains a spark of the Divine--and He won't give up on that.

I once emailed a special teacher of mine at a time when I was mentally "spinning" about whether or not I should view challenges or obstacles that pop up in my life as G-d's way of punishing me for "bad" things I may have done.  ("I mean, I know the world doesn't work that way, but what if it does?!")  Her response was exactly what I needed in that moment, and I have carried it with me since:

"No one knows how Hashem runs the world, and the most important thing we can do when we don't know what to do is to ask ourselves, "What do I imagine Hashem wants from me right now?'"

The journey is long, and there will be mistakes, large and small, made along the way.  There will be hardships, some of which we will understand, and some of which we won't.  The important thing is to not give up on ourselves, and to try our best, in the moment, to do what we think G-d would want us to do.  It's a perspective that keeps us moving forward, rather than stagnating or moving backward.  We can only do the best we can do, and that looks different from moment to moment.  But it's always good enough for Hashem.