How the Steep Cost of Shame Pushed Me to Embrace Self-Love

Shame exists in people who cannot see themselves as good people and I'd guess most of us are either still stuck in it or has experienced episodes of shame at some point. I have been stuck in shame my whole life; I always felt like I was a bad person and that I deserved to never be free. But recently, my eyes have been opened in a way they have never been before. I recently witnessed my deep-seated shame dramatically end a relationship. By being unable to forgive myself for a prior more minor mistake, I projected the unforgiveness onto a person who had already let go of the matter. Obviously, he didn't directly tell me I was forgiven or else that prolonged uncertainty would not have caused me so much distress.
Until recently, I thought I had to stay locked in a prison cell made of shame and guilt in order to properly show remorse, to show that I'm sorry. But in the end, that prison I thought I deserved actually ignited another moment of self-destruction. A part of me wanted to say, "See?!? I told you I was unlovable." But after dealing with the steep cost of shame driven self-destruction, I learned that shame could not make me a better person. It actually made me toxic. This incident taught me that you cannot become a good person until you learn to see yourself that way.