One of the undoubted leaders among all possible problems- this is a feeling of guilt. That same feeling of guilt that exhausts, debilitates, haunts you with thoughts of imperfection and, at the same time, inhibits any internal development. A baseless feeling of guilt is one of the most insidious and ugly problems, which always hides under a plausible plumage and never leads to anything good.
You need to know the enemy by sight. And although everyone can only deal with their “guilt” themselves, these few facts about the feeling of guilt are quite generally significant.
Have you noticed how varied the things they blame themselves for are? different people? The feeling of guilt does not disdain any reason, no matter how insignificant it may be.
I haven't called my parents once all day...
I didn't vacuum over the weekend...
I haven’t finished reading the old book, but I’ve already started a new one...
Agree, these are not entirely equivalent “offences”. And certainly none of them are worth stressing yourself out about and ruining your mood.
The feeling of guilt is always born where little can be changed. We do or decide something, and then we walk around and struggle, because something in the subconscious screams: this is impossible!
We often don’t like to listen to our subconscious. It screams and screams to itself, what good can it tell us? But since it is impossible to completely drown out these screams, a feeling of guilt appears. It envelops you with inaction, the absence of any conscious shifts from the painful point. Over time, it fades, but is not resolved, does not dissipate, but settles into complexes and diseases.
People who are constantly tormented by feelings of guilt often also suffer from personal illnesses that have developed due to constant self-accusation. A person who feels guilty is always in a state of stress, which means that his nerves are hard. What kind of diseases are not born from excess nervous tension! And the root of all evil is the same feeling of guilt. Do we need it?
Any action a priori includes some consequences. And the feeling of guilt appears in those cases when we vaguely suspect that the consequences may turn out to be frankly “unsavory.” You will have to bear responsibility for them, and no one wants to bear responsibility for some nasty thing. There is absolutely no desire to then wring your hands and think (or hear from others): “I knew I shouldn’t have done that!” Guilt vaguely warns us of something, of some extremely unpleasant responsibility. The most productive thing will be, again, to pull this warning out of the subconscious into the area where you can work with the information, draw conclusions - and act.
Feelings of guilt are always easier when you are a child. You did something wrong, you were caught and punished. That’s it, you’ve served your sentence, you don’t have to torment yourself (and do more harm). We would happily continue to live according to this kind of scheme. But, alas, the older we become, the fewer people who can “forgive” us of our sins. Here we are both our own judges and executioners. And the most unpleasant thing is that no matter how severely we punish ourselves, the feeling of guilt will never be enough. Because punishment from oneself is never regarded as sufficient.
It is very difficult not to shift your feelings of guilt onto anyone. Is it true. I just want to say: it’s all the fault of childhood/difficult adolescence/an overwhelming adult life/first husband/et cetera.
In fact, no one is to blame. It just happened that way. Accepting the situation as it is, realizing it as a given, seeing it from the outside and moving on is a healthy reaction to realizing your problems. By shifting the blame to others, we do not solve the problem, but get away from it. Of course, this will not help cope with either the feeling of guilt or its consequences.
Typically, feelings of guilt rarely arise without the direct or indirect participation of interested “third parties” in the situation. It will always turn out that we actually feel guilty not in front of ourselves, but in front of someone. And we are afraid of an unflattering assessment not of ourselves, but of someone else. The feeling of guilt deprives us of freedom, the very freedom that is a necessary condition for the formation of a successful personality. Therefore, before you blame yourself, you should realize: is it possible to change something? And if not, then leave this ethereal activity of self-flagellation. It will not make it any easier for you or the person you feel guilty about.
Guilt occurs where need, patterns, and fear of consequences collide. If I didn’t wash the dishes after dinner, it’s most likely not because I’m bad and lazy, but because I had other urgent matters or didn’t have the strength. But I have a pattern of “you need to wash the dishes right away,” and, in addition, I realize that I will still have to wash them later, when it will be more difficult to wash, and Hygiene will be driven into the far corner by such a spectacle.
Patterns are something instilled in childhood. They work immediately, instantly, and it can be very difficult to understand that it is better, for example, to put off the dishes for later than, with persistence worthy of better use, scrub the plates in a half-dead state, growling at those around you, and fall asleep exhausted. No one will feel better from performing the ritual. Feelings of guilt do not lead to a reasonable resolution of the situation; it only aggravates the already tense state of the psyche. Following patterns is often even dangerous: you can miscalculate your strengths and get into unpleasant consequences. Much more unpleasant than your guilt could imagine.
In my opinion, the most dangerous thing for a Christian is to mistake guilt for humble repentance. There are a huge number of little things in the Christian tradition that can confirm this misconception. For example, confession is very much like a conversation between a playful child and a wise adult who can forgive. It’s enough to tell - and that’s it, you don’t have to worry about your conscience any further, a wise adult has forgiven everything. And if you are particularly guilty, they will impose penance, “put you in a corner.” But confession and repentance are by no means only about the forgiveness of the Father granted to children who have committed mischief. And even more so, repentance is not about coming, complaining and, considering oneself forgiven, going on to do indecent things. Many books have been written about what repentance is. And it’s unlikely to be about children’s complexes, the owner of which is too lazy to work on himself.
A person is designed in such a way that when something forms on the body that threatens health and life, it begins to hurt. If you cut yourself, it starts to bleed, you need to urgently disinfect it and bandage it. If you hurt yourself, a bruise has formed and needs to be treated. Any pain is a warning about the danger that threatens us.
It’s the same with mental pain. When a feeling of guilt arises, our soul begins to ache irresistibly. And the guilt for something that hasn’t even been done is so painful that we often abandon our initiatives and plans, just so as not to be “tormented by our conscience.”
But such actions are just an injection of painkillers. This is a dose of morphine to forget about your needs, forget about the necessary and not try to analyze, understand, solve problems. Treatment is much longer and more difficult than injecting a drug. But this is a betrayal of yourself. This is an attempt to turn away from yourself as you are. In the end, it's a lie to yourself. And this leads to anything, but not to a full, happy life.
Based on materials from: www.matrony.ru
Everyone knows the feeling of this unpleasant and pressure-producing state, therefore the psychology of guilt has been well studied by psychologists. It should be noted that this is a very painful sensation, it is constantly depressing and causes a lot of inconvenience. At the same time, the feeling of guilt is distinguished not only by negative functions. It is thanks to this feeling that we distinguish such opposites as good and evil and empathize with others. It happens that for some reason we did not fulfill our promise, and at the same time let the person down. In this case, feelings of guilt cannot be avoided. In addition, there is a reason for other unwanted emotions, tension, anxiety, self-flagellation and awkwardness appear.
Psychologists are confident that feelings of guilt should be considered a sign of a person’s mental health. By experiencing this feeling, a person is able to become a better person. He is aware of the negativity that is a consequence of his action, he is aware of the fact that he has betrayed his own moral values. Feelings of guilt force us to apologize to other people and offer our help.
Thanks to the psychology of guilt, we become more attentive to others and show sensitivity. Therefore, relationships with colleagues and relatives improve significantly, communication becomes more humane.
This feeling depends entirely on the characteristics of the character. If you are demanding of yourself and always meet high standards and goals, then you will experience a more frequent feeling of guilt. It is like a pointer or sign that leads in the right direction, preventing you from deviating. The feeling of guilt, although extremely unpleasant, is useful for personal development.
According to psychology researchers, if people were not familiar with this feeling, life in our society would simply become dangerous. However, tension and anxiety in real life may influence our actions bad influence, because they are a reason for senseless self-flagellation.
The main feature in the psychology of feelings of guilt can be called a state when a person condemns himself. For everyone there are their own moral rules, such as not to lie, not to take what belongs to others, not to break their words, and so on. If suddenly, for various reasons, in imagination or in reality, a person stumbles, does not act in accordance with his own rules, he strives to correct the state of affairs.
Shame is a social emotion, and most of the fear stems from the fact that society will reject or condemn certain actions. As a result, the person will be excluded from a certain social group. Under the influence of a feeling of shame, complexes develop, so a person begins to think that he is worse than others. For example, doubts arise regarding the conformity to society on various grounds.
Because of the feeling of guilt, tension and anxiety arise, and regret arises that a certain act was committed. In such a situation, everyone realizes that there was an opportunity to do differently. Despite the heavy burden of guilt, he also has positive qualities. An image of an action that is correct is recreated, as it should be done in a certain case.
It is through regret that the opportunity to repent appears. This topic is widely discussed by existentialist philosophers. In their opinion, a person is able to choose his own path thanks to a feeling of guilt. This is hard spiritual work on yourself, but in the end you can find yourself and receive forgiveness.
Emotions that are considered universal are highlighted, and wine is one of them. Many scientists emphasize that a person may have an innate sense of guilt. It is significant that people with mental illnesses often do not experience a feeling of guilt; they do not have it. That is why there is a statement that this emotion confirms mental health. You should not force yourself to look for ways to get rid of guilt. It is more important to distinguish a real feeling from an imagined one. It is known that feelings of guilt are often manipulated; this emotion is quite easily cultivated, and it is often used.
For example, elderly relatives complain that we rarely visit them. Moreover, as a decisive argument, they remind you that they will soon die, and there will be no one to visit. Of course, such words can exert a lot of pressure. Therefore, you begin to feel acute guilt and worry that you do not meet moral standards.
Having come up with an ideal image for themselves, people blame themselves for imperfection. In addition, the feeling of guilt acts in such a way that a person can punish himself. He gives up his own interests and begins to pay intense attention to the problems of other people.
Considering various situations In order to understand how to do the right thing, you should pay attention to what not to do. This means that you should never solve a problem with alcohol. In this case, you will only intensify the feeling. Of course, it makes no sense to make excuses, it doesn’t work, but you also can’t completely forget about guilt, as if nothing happened.
The correct way to solve this situation is to adequately rethink your actions and motivations. It is important to understand your own desires, to understand at what stage you made a mistake. Don't be afraid of your aspirations. If you try to hide from them, the psychology of guilt will make you even more nervous.
Often people have no idea that feeling of guilt- this is a negative emotion, a negative experience that does not cleanse (as many are used to thinking) a person, but drives him into a corner. Feeling guilty is not a sign of high spirituality, but a sign of a person’s immaturity. This is what a remarkable psychologist, a prominent representative of the psychodramatic approach to psychotherapy, believes, Elena Vladimirovna Lopykhina.
Lopykhina Elena Vladimirovna - psychologist, psychotherapist, organizational development consultant, business coach and coach, director of the Institute of Psychodrama and Role-playing Training, founding member of the Federation of European Psychodramatic Training Organizations, teacher of the Department of Organizational Development and Personnel Management and the School of Consultants for the Management of the Academy of People leg of the economy at Russian Government:
Understanding what it is - a feeling of guilt - is not at all easy. Some consider it socially useful and even a necessary internal regulator of behavior, while others claim that it is a painful complex.
The word guilt itself is often used as a synonym for the feeling of guilt, while the original meaning of this word is different. “Guilt is guilt, misdemeanor, transgression, sin, any unlawful, excessive act.” (Explanatory dictionary of the Russian language" by V. Dahl). Initially, the word guilt meant either the actual damage caused or material compensation for the damage caused. The culprit is the one who has violated laws or agreements and must compensate for the damage caused.
There is a big difference between “being guilty” and “feeling guilty.” A person is guilty when he knows in advance that he can, by action or word, harm or cause harm to someone or himself and, nevertheless, does it. Blame is usually assigned to those who caused damage intentionally or due to gross negligence.
There are many people who tend to consider themselves guilty, although in reality there was no intentional damage caused. They decide that they are guilty because they listen to that “inner voice” that condemns and accuses them, based on those, often false, convictions and beliefs that, to As a rule, they were learned in childhood.
Feeling of guilt- an unproductive and even destructive emotional reaction of a person to self-blame and self-judgment. The feeling of Guilt is essentially aggression directed at oneself - it is self-humiliation, self-flagellation, and the desire for self-punishment.
Under the influence of the voice of the “inner curser,” which pronounces the verdict “it’s all because of you,” such people lose sight of the fact that they actually had no intention of causing harm, and by the way, “forgetting they want to find out whether they caused any damage at all.
A person experiences feelings of guilt much more often for what he did not do or could not change than for what he did or could have changed and did not do it. The accumulation of unnecessary, unnecessary and destructive feelings of guilt based on nothing can and should be avoided. It is necessary and possible to get rid of neurotic guilt.
But even when the offense actually took place, the feeling of guilt remains destructive.
Meanwhile, as a result of awareness of the fact of the actual damage caused, people are able to experience various experiences.
An alternative to feelings of guilt is the experience of conscience and responsibility. The difference between guilt on the one hand and conscience and responsibility on the other, in our opinion, is radical. And although these are fundamentally different things, many people do not see or understand the difference between them and often confuse these concepts with each other.
Conscience is an internal authority that exercises moral self-control and assessment of one’s own views, feelings, committed actions, their correspondence with one’s own self-identity, one’s basic m life values and goals.
Conscience manifests itself as an internal, often unconscious prohibition on unapproved actions (including internal ones), as well as a feeling of internal pain that signals the person century about the protest of the internal moral authority against committed actions that contradict one’s own deep system of values and self-identity. Mys, “ygpyzjeeni” is given to the City of City, to the same time in the CIL-TO PICHINED IS IT IS CLEASED AND PROVENT PPINCIP AND PROMENTED INTERN Subsh.
Conscience is closely related to a sense of responsibility. Conscience evokes a powerful internal urge to fulfill moral standards, including standards of responsibility.
Responsibility is a sincere and voluntary recognition of the need to take care of yourself and others. A sense of responsibility is the desire to fulfill the obligations undertaken and, if they are not fulfilled, the willingness to admit a mistake and compensate for the damage caused, take those actions information that is needed to correct the error. Moreover, responsibility is usually recognized regardless of intention: whoever did it is responsible.
Feeling guilty, a person says to himself: “I am bad, I deserve punishment, there is no forgiveness for me, I am giving up.” Metaphorically, it is described as a “heavy load” or as “something that gnaws.”
When a person plunges into his guilt, berates himself for the mistakes he has made, it is very difficult for him - in fact, impossible - to analyze his mistakes, to think how to improve his situation. So, find the right solution, do something really to correct the situation.
Sprinkling ashes on his head (“If I hadn’t done this or done this... then everything would have been different”), he looks into the past and gets stuck there. While responsibility directs one's gaze to the future and encourages movement forward.
Accepting a position of responsibility is a necessary prerequisite for personal development. The higher a person’s level of personality development, the more likely he is to use such a negative regulator of behavior as a feeling of guilt.
The feeling of guilt causes deep harm to a person. The feeling of guilt, unlike the feeling of responsibility, is unrealistic, non-specific, vague. It is cruel and unfair, it deprives a person of self-confidence and lowers self-esteem. Brings a feeling of heaviness and pain, causes discomfort, tension, fears, confusion, disappointment, despondency, pessimism, melancholy. Guilt devastates and takes away energy, weakens, and reduces a person’s activity.
The experience of guilt is accompanied by a painful feeling of one’s own wrongness in relation to another person and, in general, one’s “badness.”
Chronic guilt turns into a way of perceiving the world, which is reflected even at the bodily level, literally changing the body, and primarily posture. Such people have a slumped posture, hunched shoulders, as if they are carrying the usual “load” on their “hump.” Diseases of the spine in the area of the seventh cervical vertebra in many cases (except for obvious injuries) are associated with a chronic feeling of guilt.
People who carry chronic guilt since childhood, as if they want to take up less space, they have a special stiff gait, they never have a wide, easy step, free gestures, loud voice. It is often difficult for them to look a person in the eyes, they constantly bow their heads low and lower their gaze, and there is a mask of guilt on their face.
For a morally mature and psychologically healthy person, feelings of guilt do not exist. There is only conscience and a sense of responsibility for every step you take in this world, for agreements made, for choices made and for refusal to choose.
Negative experiences associated with conscience and responsibility cease when the cause that caused them is eliminated. And making any mistake does not lead such a person to a debilitating internal conflict, he does not feel “bad” - he simply corrects the mistake and lives on. And if a specific mistake cannot be corrected, he draws a lesson for the future and the memory of it helps him not to make similar mistakes.
I would like to emphasize that the feeling of guilt, based on self-punishment and self-humiliation, is directed at oneself. A person consumed by guilt and self-flagellation has no time for the real feelings and needs of others.
While experiences caused by conscience include regret about what they did and empathy for the victim. They, in essence, are focused on the state of another person - “his pain hurts in me.”
Willingness to admit one's real guilt is one of the indicators of responsibility, but not sufficient in itself. Feelings of guilt can also (although not always) prompt her confession. However, the very fact of admitting one’s guilt is often presented as sufficient atonement. You can often hear indignation: - “Well, I admitted that I was guilty and apologized - what else do you want from me?” But for the victim, this, as a rule, is not enough, and if he does not feel the inner truth in this, it is not necessary at all. He wants to hear about specific measures to correct the error or compensate for the damage caused. It is even more necessary, especially if it is impossible to correct it, to sincerely express empathy and regret to others, and also (if the action was intentional) also honestly repentance. All this is not only necessary for the victim, but also brings relief to those who caused real damage.
Where does our sense of guilt come from, and why, despite its destructiveness, is it so widespread?
Why do people hold on to self-blame so much in situations when they are not to blame for anything? The point is that guilt covers up helplessness.
The feeling of guilt is formed in early childhood under the influence of the characteristics of the child’s mental development on the one hand and parental influences on the other.
The age of 3-5 years is the age when a persistent feeling of guilt can form as a negative internal regulator of behavior, since it is at this age that a child develops It is the very ability to test him that his parents quickly detect and use.
This age period provides suitable soil for this. “Creative initiative or guilt” - this is what Erik Erikson calls this period and the corresponding main dilemma of child development.
A feeling of guilt naturally arises in a child at this age as a psychological defense against the terrifying feeling of helplessness and shame associated with what he is experiencing during this period the collapse of the feeling of one’s omnipotence. The child unconsciously chooses guilt as the lesser of two evils. It’s as if he was unconsciously telling himself “I already feel like I can’t do everything, it’s unbearable, no, it just didn’t work out this time, but in general I can do it.” I could, but I did. That means I'm to blame. I’ll try, and next time it’ll work out if I try.”
With the positive influence of parents, the child gradually accepts his or her non-omnipotence, overcomes feelings of guilt and the dilemma is resolved in favor of successful creative development th initiatives.
In the event of unfavorable influences from parents, the child remains prone to feelings of guilt and restrictions on the expression of creativity for many years, and sometimes for the rest of his life. initiatives. The “weight” of guilt that a person carries with him since childhood, and in adulthood continues to prevent him from living and communicating with people.
Note that although the origins of chronic feelings of guilt lie mainly at the age of 3-5 years, the tendency to experience guilt as a protective mechanism can also turn on in adults age, even with a relatively favorable childhood. Thus, a feeling of guilt is one of the obligatory forms of manifestation of the protest phase in the process of experiencing a significant loss, including a serious illness and death of loved ones. Protesting against the enormity of what happened, before coming to terms with what happened, accepting their helplessness and starting mournful mourning, people blame themselves for not doing something to save niya, despite the fact that it was objectively absolutely impossible. With a favorable childhood, this feeling of guilt soon passes. If a person has a childish guilt complex, the non-existent guilt for the loss can remain in the person’s soul for many years, and the process of experiencing the trauma of loss does not It's being resolved.
Thus, instead of experiencing helplessness and shame in situations where we are weak and cannot change anything, people “prefer” a feeling of guilt, which is an illusion of hope oh that everything can still be fixed.
Those unfavorable influences from parents that induce and create a constant feeling of guilt actually come down to direct accusations and reproaches, as well as reproaches and reproaches. Such pressure on feelings of guilt is one of the main levers that parents use to form an internal regulator of behavior (which they confuse with conscience and responsibility), and for quick control of the child in specific situations. Induced guilt becomes a kind of whip, spurring to actions that parents seek to encourage the child to take, and a whip that replaces the upbringing of a sense of responsibility. octy. And parents resort to them, as a rule, because they themselves were raised in exactly the same way and still have not been able to get rid of their eternal guilt.
Blaming the child is essentially wrong. In principle, he cannot be guilty of what his parents accuse him of, because he is not responsible for his actions at all and is not capable of bearing it. And adults easily shift their responsibility to the child.
For example: a child is scolded or reproached for breaking a crystal vase. However, it is obvious that when there is a small child in the house, parents must remove valuable items, this is their responsibility. If anyone is responsible for breaking the vase, it is the parents, since the child cannot yet control his efforts, control his motor skills, his feelings and impulses and, of course, not I am still able to track cause-and-effect relationships and the consequences of my actions. Adults who do not understand the psychological characteristics of a child first attribute to him abilities that he does not have, and then blame him for actions committed due to his absence Yes, as if they were intentional. For example: “You deliberately don’t fall asleep and don’t feel sorry for me, don’t let me rest, and I’m so tired” or “You couldn’t play neatly in the street, now I’ll have to wash your jacket, and I’m already tired.”
Worse, often parents and other adults present the child with an unfair ultimatum: “If you don’t admit your guilt, I won’t talk to you.” And the child is forced to admit unnecessary guilt under the threat of a boycott (which is unbearable for the child) or under fear of physical punishment.
Pressure on feelings of guilt is a manipulative influence that is certainly destructive for the psyche.
For the time being, the child is not able to critically evaluate what is happening to him, so he accepts all the actions of his parents at face value and, instead of opposing I obey the destructive influence of parental manipulations and obediently obey them.
And as a result of all this, he will begin to believe that he is guilty, to feel guilty for unnecessary sins and, as a result, to feel that he always owes everything.
Such unreasonable, usually unconscious and inconsistent pressure from parents and other significant adults on feelings of guilt leads to confusion in the child’s head. He ceases to understand what is required of him - a feeling of guilt or correction of a mistake. And although, according to the educational plan, it is assumed that, having done something wrong, a child should experience a feeling of guilt and immediately rush to correct his mistake, child, on the contrary, he learns that to experience and demonstrate his guilt is a sufficient payment for a perfect offense . And now, instead of correcting mistakes, parents receive only a guilty look, a plea for forgiveness - “Hey, please forgive me, I won’t do that again” - and its heavy, painful, self-destructive other feelings of guilt. And the feeling of guilt, thus, replaces responsibility.
Forming conscience and responsibility is much more difficult than a feeling of guilt and requires not situational, but strategic efforts.
Reproaches and reproaches - “how are you not ashamed!” “How could you, this is irresponsible!” - can only cause a feeling of guilt.
Conscience and responsibility require not reproach, but a patient and compassionate explanation to the child of the inevitable consequences for those around him and for himself of his truly wrong actions. twee. Including, on the one hand, about their pain, awakening not guilt, but empathy, and on the other hand, about the inevitable emotional distance of other people from him, if he is in the future how to behave. And of course there should be no unfair criticism of the child for something that he could not control.
If the feeling of happiness may not be familiar to everyone, then everyone knows what guilt is. The feeling of guilt is deliberately cultivated in us from childhood by our parents and teachers. We grow up with an established pattern: “if you know what’s wrong, correct the mistake.” Whether this is right, whether it is useful to feel guilty or not, we will learn from this article.
Let's turn to scientific formulations. Psychologists associate guilt with a whole set of emotional states, intertwined, first of all, with a feeling of “remorse.” To be more precise, guilt in psychology means the experience of dissatisfaction with oneself or one’s actions, as well as some resonance between an individual’s behavior and the values accepted in society. Some psychological schools believe that guilt can only be experienced by members of a highly developed society, while it is unknown to people who are backward and intellectually undeveloped.
What is curious is that it manifests itself in nonverbal communication even in animals. Remember what a naughty dog looks like? The eyes are squinted, the ears are lowered to the head. If a cat steals a sausage, then after what he has done he will try to leave, because he understands that his action resonates with the moral and social values of the family where he lives. Consequently, the feeling of guilt is something that is familiar even to animals, not to mention highly developed and civilized people.
According to the research of Doctor of Psychology D. Unger, who studied what guilt is, this feeling of a person consists of such components as repentance and admission of being wrong.
Repentance manifests itself in accusations made by the offender against himself. “Why did I do this?” - the one who feels guilty asks himself a question. The second component is admitting that you are wrong. This factor is expressed in worries, shame, fear and sadness.
Why should a person experience a feeling that has such a destructive effect? Eat interesting version, proposed by Dr. Weiss, that this experience is simply necessary for establishing relationships between people. According to his theory, the feeling of guilt is an adaptive quality formed in the process of long relationships in society.
Wine is an ambiguous concept. Therefore, there are many interpretations of this experience. The world-famous Dr. Freud and his colleague, working in the same field of psychology, but somewhat later - Dr. Mandler, suggested that guilt and anxiety are the same feelings, named with different words. If a person has made a mistake or was close to it, he becomes anxious about the expected punishment. To get rid of anxiety, a person may try to make up for his mistake. Also, some researchers associate guilt with fear. Fear of punishment is what makes a person repent of his wrongdoing.
How natural is it for a person to feel guilty? Apparently, even if animals and babies can feel remorse, guilt is therefore not an invented concept. But do people confuse a sense of personal responsibility with a sense of guilt?
Let's go back to the childhood of each of us. No matter who raised the child, these people benefited from our obedience. As soon as the child does something that does not please the adult, the adult begins to get angry and express his dissatisfaction. The educators represented by parents and teachers can be understood. They believe that if a feeling of guilt is developed in the child’s mind, the child will grow up to be a responsible, serious and honest person. However, therein lies a big mistake.
In fact, every person has what is called an “inner voice” or “voice of conscience.” When a person, whether he is a good citizen or a notorious swindler, does something wrong, he hears this voice. However, what is considered wrong? Theft, betrayal, treason, fraud, deception - these are dishonest things. But should you blame yourself if you want to take care of your elderly parents and don’t tell them that you were fired? Is it worth feeling guilty if you don’t want to communicate with a person anymore and tell him about it? We are told that to be happy we need to follow the expectations of others, and if we don’t, then it’s your fault.
Parents are the first to achieve this. The baby must respond to all their requests and instructions; in case of refusal, punishment occurs. Then, kindergarten teachers and school teachers impose certain behavior at school. You must study well, be quiet, not raise your voice and not argue. Let's take a sober look at the situation. There are children who are born “excellent students”, and there are active kids who will make excellent athletes or dancers, so they have no inclination towards science. They receive C grades, criticisms, and at the same time, parents and teachers develop a feeling of guilt in them. Further more. The teenager becomes a young man, a boy or a girl, shackled by all these restrictions.
Current and modern society largely consists of irresponsible people. This is not their fault, because it is the merit of the teachers. Instead of cultivating a sense of responsibility in the child, a feeling of guilt is actively instilled in him. What is wine? for not meeting the expectations of others. What is personal responsibility? This is a feeling of understanding that you cannot do wrong things to others.
A person who has not developed a sense of responsibility can commit atrocities and wrong actions absolutely fearlessly if he knows that there will be no punishment for them. If a person is fully responsible for everything that she does, then she is aware of all her actions not because of fear of punishment, but because of internal sensations.
Based on all of the above, the following conclusion can be drawn. The feeling of guilt is invented and imposed on each of us. If you are already an adult, try to get away from this feeling, replacing it with a feeling of awareness. If you are a parent raising a child, do not make your child feel guilty for not meeting your expectations.
