About The Feeling Of Guilt And Why Is It Needed?

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

How often do you feel guilty about something?

Why do some people constantly feel guilty, while others, with complete self-confidence, do something that others do not even like is condemned or blamed, and do not suffer from a sense of guilt?

Do you belong to the first or to the second?

There are many good techniques for letting go of guilt. And the technique that I apply in principle to all feelings and emotions is the ability to understand why they are inside me.

Guilt is a sense of the potential difference between what I think and how I really want to act. It happens in people who do not have agreement with themselves inside. To figure it out, let me tell you a story about Maria Ivanovna.

Maria Ivanovna is a 45-year-old woman who wants to improve her health. She reads books on proper nutrition and basically figured out what is good for her and what is not. She knows for sure that sugar is a harmful product, and it is not desirable for her to eat potatoes. But she loves sweets so much. And when she eats cakes or uses sugar, her conscience torments her. In other words, she feels guilty. This is the potential difference between what a person thinks and what a person does.

But with Maria Ivanovna, a fairly clear and easy case. She just needs to either stop worrying about sugar and decide that it is important for her to eat sweets and find an alternative for herself. But this is rather a solution to the question, and I will write about this even later in this article.

And Vasily Petrovich is also tormented by a sense of guilt, he is 32 years old and he feels that he has not achieved in life what he dreamed of at 22. And he condemns himself for it. Also, Vasily Petrovich is a generally good person and therefore he is not used to immediately talking about what does not suit him, to defend his positions and express his thoughts aloud. Therefore, when he comes home to his wife and children, he flashes like a match and shouts at home, expressing his dissatisfaction at the slightest pretext. But then he himself very much condemns himself and feels a sense of guilt. Of course, then he apologizes to everyone for his behavior. But after a while this terrible story repeats itself with him.

As we can see, in the second example, the situation is already more complicated, because the difference between how a person thinks and how he does is present in many areas of life. And a person has a whole worldview, fears, misunderstandings, which in general lead to choices that are at odds with what the person really wants. And it's not so easy to figure it out. But all this potential difference, of course, will, at the level of feelings, express a sense of guilt, a feeling of unworthy and a lack of understanding of what to do about it.

Of course, I can give many more examples, but I think even from these two examples it is clear how the feeling of guilt works and what it is for. And it is needed to indicate that you are living in disagreement with your choices, on the way to the integrity of yourself.

Also, we feel guilty for our carelessness, awkwardness when we make mistakes. There are a number of cases where a person, after a while, realizes that he did the wrong thing, and then he also feels guilty.

In any case, the feeling of guilt can be used for your own good and treat it like your own friend.

In the first case, when it is already accumulated, a chronic feeling of guilt must be noticed. This is the first step. Then sit down and write out situations when it comes to you. Usually people do not want to feel it and then it accumulates. And, on the contrary, you need to start to notice it and use it for your own good. If you write down all the situations where you feel guilty, then you can begin to deal with your contradictions, which guilt is trying to point you to. Of course, it is very difficult to do it alone for the first time. But in any case, you need to start.

In the second case, the feeling of guilt is situational and helps to overestimate the wrong approaches. Those. if possible, do everything possible to eliminate the error and draw conclusions next time. When a person does this within himself, then the feeling of guilt quickly weakens.

Feelings of guilt are negative habits of thinking and doing things other than what you think.

And there is no quick solution or getting rid of guilt, so that for real. Because if this feeling is chronic, or you have become accustomed to it, or do not notice it at all, then this indicates a number of wrong actions, lifestyle and world outlook.

In order to get out of guilt and restore your self-confidence, it is important not only to learn to forgive yourself, but to learn to understand yourself.

Let's return to Maria Ivanovna and Vasily Petrovich. Maria Ivanovna needs to not just stop eating sweets, canceling sugar by willpower. She needs to hear the needs of her body and her other needs, for which she eats sugar. And if she pays attention to them, then she will stop feeling guilty and understand that her body needs what is in sugar. And he will find this for himself in sufficient quantities, perhaps in fruits or in freshly squeezed juice, or in some other way. Then she will eat right and stop suppressing her needs.

To easily notice feelings of guilt and accept them as an ally, you just need to begin to understand your needs.

Vasily Petrovich will cease to be so aggressive if he directs his attention to self-realization and realizes that his life is not over, even if he did not achieve anything by the age of 32, as he dreamed. In his case, it is important to deal with responsibility and continue to engage in self-education, to look for a way to achieve their goals. The energy that he directs in this way will no longer accumulate and pour out into discontent. He also needs to learn to set his boundaries and express his opinion. Of course, in his case, it would be better to turn to a professional psychologist.

The feeling of guilt that people experience is the same, but the situations that lead to it are different. And it is very difficult to start unraveling them, like walking through a maze without a map.

But there are general rules that I wanted to share in this article.