Repenting isn’t groveling. It’s turning the car around once you realize you missed the exit.

Grovelling and turning around are different activities, and the first one can go on indefinitely without changing anything. Lengthy self-punishment feels appropriate, which is exactly its appeal; it looks like taking something seriously while leaving your direction untouched. The actual move is practical and short. You realise you have gone past the exit, you come off at the next one, and you go back the other way.

Skip the week of feeling terrible this week and do the U-turn instead. Name what you are turning from, then change the specific behaviour today rather than after a suitable period of misery.