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From my garden
When I asked "what do you need?" earlier this spring, a number of you said, "I feel guilty about lots of things. Please say more about guilt."
Always happy to talk about guilt because guilt is a useless waste of time. There, I said it.
Here's what I mean:
Guilt is a false emotion. It's something you throw up in front of a situation or a real feeling to give yourself credit for "taking action." And yet, the guilt persists in a way that is unpleasant and unhelpful to you.
A couple of examples:
- Let's say you have a relative in a nursing home, and you feel guilty because you never visited. Your guilt doesn't help you feel better, and it also doesn't inspire you to visit.
- Or you feel guilty when you play golf with your friends instead of cleaning your garage. Your guilt gets in the way of fun with your friends, and the garage still doesn't get cleaned.
So what's happening and what do you do about your guilt? I tell clients to look for what is more real. Let's go back to our examples and unpack what might be more real in each situation.
- You are sad that you don't have a relationship with that relative that makes you want to visit them. Or you are grieving the person you loved and are having a hard time seeing them so diminished. Or you're pissed that you are the only one caring for this relative when other family members won't step in. Instead of feeling guilty, give yourself permission to experience your real feelings - sadness, grief, or anger and then do something about those feelings instead of steeping in guilt.
- You may feel like you don't deserve to have fun when there is work to do. Or you may not feel like you deserve to enjoy yourself at all. Work on those more real things rather than ruining a beautiful day out with friends feeling guilty.
Does this make sense? The bottom line is to go for what's more real and feel or deal with that. Then the guilt will lift and leave you free to make clearer decisions about what you want.
As always, reach out with your questions and stories. I love to hear from you.!
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