Mini Blog: Overcoming Guilt

Guilt’s function in an interpersonal and familial context often exists to ensure that all systems continue to operate as usual. The presence of guilt, then, is not simply to name whether you have at its core done something “wrong”, but rather to point out what is shifting outside of normal operating procedure. It’s merely a clue that something is different, that something has changed. That’s all.

It’s important, then, to not credit its presence to a failing of yours. This is an invitation to treat guilt less like a state of being that requires you to retreat and shrink in response to it and instead to neutrally observe what’s shifting in order to expand yourself to align in values and relational boundaries. This framework then asks for your sincere accountability, not punishment, but true accountability, which involves autonomy and action forwardness. 

“Oh no, I feel guilty! I’ve done something wrong. The end.” Changes to “I’m observing guilt. What has shifted? Does the shift align with the direction that I see for my life? What’s my next value-aligned action?”

This is a door in normalizing guilt, not as a thing to avoid, but as an often inevitability that presents itself in your new ways of being as you try on different hats and say new words.  

In lesser words, you do not need to quickly dissolve in guilt quicksand. 

Ultimately, you have the allowance to decide whether a behavior brought on by guilt is aligned with your values or not. Either way, your next steps are values-aligned action. This is the humane way forward.