Dr. Monzer Kahf, a prominent economist and counselor, states: “A real person would always live oscillating between hope for better and fear of doing wrong. This is the true faith deep in the heart as the Prophet, peace be on him, told a man who came to him with a kind of similar feeling.
Carrying it too much in either direction is wrong and true, it becomes from Satan. What do we then do?
Three things, take them as pledges between you and God for all the future to come:
1) repentance with Istighfar and commitment to avoid such a bad actions in the future;
2) doing good thing especially giving to charity and focusing on mentioning and remembering the good things about other persons (brush bad thing aside). The Qur’an promises that as long as one avoids major wrongs, God shall forgive minor things. God also told us that good deeds do away, erase, wipe out or remove bad actions; and
3) Whenever, any past action negatively affected a specific person financially or libel-wise, we must have the courage to apologize and compensate if there is compensation financially or in reputation.”