Guilt's Pleasure and its Mayhem on Wellness

We are all susceptible to guilt. I remember, with astonishment, being a brand new mother and the feelings of guilt that panged me when my newborn threw up, or was gassy, or in any way unhappy.  I remember how shocking it was to feel this, not being used to that feeling, in that unfamiliar situation.  It was new and a somewhat ridiculous response, but there it was.

Depending on your cultural background, guilt can be a daily occurrence that riddles us with negativity, releasing stress hormones which significantly impact our health and wellness. Working with clients and my own self observations of guilt-visits indicates it is an indoctrination that has led to it becoming a fully ingrained habit.  A habit that is sapping our life force.  A habit established, probably, generations before us.

Something rings false when I feel that inclination to obliterate a feeling (usually negative) .  What is guilt good for?  Maybe it is the first bell rung asking for conscience to surface.  Maybe it is a precursor to remorse (I have my doubts on that one).  Mosquitoes serve a purpose (delectable food for birds and bats); so must guilt, I guess.

There is a difference between guilt and remorse.   Remorse is an actual feeling-meeting of "I can never do this again" and the sadness you did whatever you did to such an extent, your gut knows it can never happen again.  Remorse is a deep feeling that actually leads to behavior change.  Guilt is merely feeling bad, masks as having depth, with wringing of hands and "mea culpa", but the behavior associated to the action will usually be seen again and again.

There is some band-aid pleasure with guilt.  A superficial, "I feel bad-- that should do it, move on" kind of reaction.  We have guilt about accidents out of our control, tragedies somebody in us thinks we could have prevented even if they are an ocean and continent away, with people we often never met.  Guilt infiltrates what and how we eat, the way we spend money, our leisure time and relationships.  It undermines us, stresses us, brings bagfuls of negativity to our daily lives.  Yet, we minimize it, turn away and discount the hold it has on us.  There is some pleasure in the angst that is hard to let go of, some payback.

How to deal with guilt?  Guilt, like other mostly automatic negativity, doesn't appreciate the light.  Once an awareness and standing before it is possible, it atrophies quite naturally, slipping into the shadows whence it came.  So the work with guilt is bringing an awareness to it.  One might recognize it by the feeling in one's chest, the considerable tightening in a jaw or lower back.  One doesn't need to understand or analyze it.  But, we are required to be with it, breathe with it.  Find the silence in oneself while the manifestation of guilt begins to free fall.


Guilt and Worry.  Both so easy to discount, while being so wearing.  Is it because most of me hasn't been insistent enough on having a modicum of joy, hence allows for these large bouts of guilt/worry doses to transpire?  Or is it that most of me has confused a life worth living as having a lot of pain, sorrow, negativity; is it that introspection is mixed up with self-infliction?  Or maybe it truly is a life-long and generational indoctrination; a part of me, like a limb or an organ.  Yeah, it bothers me sometimes, but what are you going to do?

Guilt disables our sense of living without regret.  It ensures the cascade of stress hormones, taxing our bodies and our being.  A sense of well being and peace is the antidote to guilt.  But like what cutting oneself is for some people, the momentary pain of guilt is for others.  It feels sorta good.  Until that feeling is acknowledged, guilt will always be a distraction, a smoke screen we secretly (unconsciously?) cultivate, effectively keeping at bay the life worth living.