Guilt
Do you remember when your English teacher or professor would ask you what definition you assign to a word? Let’s say that word is guilt. How would you describe it? What is guilt to you? I can answer my own question to make you not feel so ‘doing it by yourself.’ So, guilt to me would be... a feeling of selfreflection and realizing you shouldn’t have done/said/or felt a certain way during an exchange with yourself or another person, which then possibly leads to self-loathing, negative self-talk, anxiety, depression and other metal health issues. It seems that guilt and remorse go hand in hand.
According to Psych Central guilt “is feeling self-conscious and experiencing a sense of distress about your potential responsibility for a negative outcome.”
Guilt can come in many types and forms, some being: Deontological - guilt that comes from breaking your own, or someone else’s morals or values; Altruistic - the empathetic guilt that forms from causing harm to someone else; Existential - not living up to your own set expectations and life purpose; Nonrelated: - survivor’s guilt; etc.
Feeling guilty is not a funny matter but the jokes about them can make people with a morbid sense of humor laugh and chuckle. For instance, Catholic guilt. It’s another form and most of you might know first hand or have heard of it. I know I have heard of this in comedy shows. It brings a harsh and ingrained form of feeling guilty spiritually into the spotlight to possibly get a chuckle but in my eyes it shows that alleviating some of the guilt with laughter can be a form of coping with it. Does it make it right? Who is to say? Don’t worry, the comedian might just feel guilty after they joke about it in the deontological form.
How is one supposed to cope with the guilt they have, if they have it? Well first, let’s attack it for what it is, an emotion. We all know about emotions. They sometimes feel like a whirlwind and they are everywhere. In Paul Eckman’s work, he terms it to be very difficult to distinguish from sadness and therefore it falls into his category of six basic forms of emotions. So, what do we do when too many emotions come up?
Take time. Take time for yourself and don’t push out those feelings. Find a place where you can explore those emotions with a trusted friend, or by yourself. Use journaling to help understand why you feel guilty and mentally explore deeper as what is further behind those feelings of guilt. Examine the motivation and once you find out, go and make amends with that someone or yourself. Ask for forgiveness, even from yourself. Sometimes it’s easier to forgive others before yourself. After doing all of that fun work, let it go and move on. Learn from it, practice gratitude for all the good in your life and remember compassion.
I always say if you want something to change you have to do it, no one else can or will do it for you.
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