Skip the Guilt Trap: Simple steps to help you move on with your life

Skip the Guilt Trap: Simple steps to help you move on with your life Gael Lindenfield Free yourself from the guilt trap and move on with your life.Simple steps to free yourself from guiltGuilt is a major underlying cause of emotional disorders such as low self-esteem, depression, OCD and other mental illnesses.This easy-to-read guide, written by one of the UK’s most respected psychotherapists and now bestselling author, Gael Lindenfield explains how guilt damages our health, relationships and career prospects. It explores the many different types of guilt and provides practical exercises and advice for how to manage this emotion more effectively. Dedication (#ulink_5e97daa7-8825-501e-845a-cf37447690cd) To Stuart, my husband, who has been the most wonderfully supportive partner to have beside me when I needed to pull myself out of a guilt trap, or just to have a good laugh with about the fact that I had slipped back in there again! Contents Cover (#u690dfd44-beed-5ad4-889f-94d5227c4eed) Title Page (#ua71624b3-7545-5a48-b019-a4aff2d11725) Copyright (#litres_trial_promo) Dedication (#uf6d6f2e8-5ef0-519d-aa65-4412218da2b2) Introduction (#ulink_e547fb9c-c14b-5fe0-899a-0606a97ef288) Chapter 1: What Exactly Is Guilt, and What Is the Point of It? (#ulink_b990a133-c9fb-595f-bbbb-e3410fabbed8) Chapter 2: Ten Different Types of Guilt (#ulink_3160809b-9158-5fdc-8190-50d311d1173f) Chapter 3: The Four Key Personal Qualities That Will Help You (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 4: The Five Key Life Skills (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 5: The DREAM Repair Kit (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 6: Dealing with Guilt-tripping (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 7: Tips for the Nine Problematic Guilts (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 8: How to Help Others with Their Guilt (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 9: Guilt into Goals (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 10: Keeping Yourself Free from Guilt Traps (#litres_trial_promo) Notes (#litres_trial_promo) Further Help (#litres_trial_promo) Acknowledgements (#litres_trial_promo) About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo) Introduction (#ulink_3f53778b-36bb-5794-baae-247b5b5a07e1) Guilt is not a bad feeling any more than love is a good feeling. If we do bad things in response to either feeling, we are likely to be in trouble. If we do good things in response to either feeling, we are likely to be rewarded. If we do nothing in response to either feeling, we are likely to become trapped by emotion and depowered. To some people these statements may seem obvious, but it took me many adult years to be able to say them sincerely. From early childhood I was terrified of guilt. It wasn’t so much the fear of hell fires that caused my terror; it was the fear that I would never become a saint. That had been my burning ambition from as far back as I could remember. So as a child I seriously strived to be so pure that I would never feel guilt. But however many good conduct badges I earned, I still did. At that time, I belonged to a religion that required me to confess all my sins before receiving Holy Communion. Not only was it expected of me to receive this sacrament, I wanted to do so. I knew it gave you grace and that was what I needed in abundance to become a saint. When the time for confession approached, I would panic. I felt guilty about not having any guilt to confess! My solution was to invent some sins just so I had something to say to the priest. One of those was, of course, lying. I hoped that God would understand. When in my late teens I stopped believing in God, my guilt problem didn’t disappear. I started to do things that ‘should’ have made me feel guilty but didn’t. So then I was back once again to feeling guilty about not feeling guilty! Unsurprisingly for a wannabe saint, I drifted into the helping professions. There, I found that I was certainly not alone with my problem. In fact, I was spending a good deal of my working days trying to persuade others not to feel so guilty. Eventually, I decided that I needed to get a firmer grip on the issue of guilt. I could see that it was causing innumerable kinds of relationship and mental-health problems. I started researching and experimenting with strategies for dealing with this feeling. When I reached a point where I felt confident enough to write a book on the subject, I took the idea to my publisher. A contract for Triumph Over Guilt was signed. That book was never written because my younger daughter was killed in a car accident. Guilt once again became a major personal issue for me. Over twenty years later I have now written this book. I believe it takes a more kindly approach to the subject than my first synopsis did. I now appreciate more fully the positive aspects of guilt. In contrast, over this period guilt has been categorised by psychologists as a negative emotional state. It appears that many other mental-health professionals are also concerned about the increasing negative impact this feeling is having on people’s mental health. But my aim in writing this book is still the same as it ever was. Above all, I wanted to write an easy-to-read, USEFUL book that could be used as a self-help programme by someone on their own or with a small group of friends. Is this a book for me? • Yes, if you are someone struggling with guilt issues in everyday life situations such as: – losing your concentration because you still feel guilty about the mistake you made last time you tried that same task; – when faced with a difficult decision, you think, Well, I know I’ll be damned if I do and damned if I don’t; – obsessively looking over your shoulder to see what others are doing and wondering if you are doing it right; – when a relationship ends you can’t stop thinking of what you wished you had done that might have made it work; – when someone has died and you find it hard to move on because you feel guilty about enjoying life when they are not around; – being a parent who says and does things that you regret and who keeps on thinking that you might have damaged your child or their chances forever; – feeling so guilty about being happier or richer or more successful than others around that you cannot enjoy what you have; – feeling constantly bad about not being able to look after someone in the way you think you should; – dwelling on things you wish you could have done differently in your childhood; – feeling bad about something you did in the past but have not owned up to; – feeling partly responsible for something that went wrong when others were accused and punished and you were not; – having cheated and now regretting your actions; – being a survivor of a disaster or serious illness when others were not so lucky; – if you feel guilty about hurting others by your own life choices; – if you feel guilty about not feeling guilt! • Yes, if you would like to become clearer about when you should feel guilty and when you should not. • Yes, if you would like to just check that you are dealing with guilt in a confident and assertive manner. • Yes, if you want to help anyone else handle their guilt more effectively. And also, • Maybe yes, if you have been treated for a mental illness in which guilt has played a part and are now on the road to recovery. This book should help to handle any future guilt in a constructive and self-affirming way. • Maybe yes, if you have committed a crime and been punished but still feel guilty. But it would be advisable to work through this book with the support of someone who is a professionally trained psychotherapist or counsellor. How to use this book I suggest that you first read this book through quite quickly. You need not bother with the exercises or to practise the strategies now, but do mark up the parts of the book that you think could be useful for you. It would also be good to note down any examples of situations in your life that you have found difficult as they come into your mind when you are reading. On your second reading, do the exercises and try out the strategies as you go, taking special care with the ones that you have marked. Again, make notes as you go along. After this reading, it could be very helpful to discuss the book with one or more of your friends. This might help to jog your memory and feel less alone with your problem. Finally, make a prioritised list of issues that you want to resolve or work on. Then return to Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo), Guilt into Goals, and do an action plan. Don’t forget to try to find a supportive person to help keep you on track. Over the next few months, keep the book in a handy place where you can consult it whenever you need to. Having it lying around at home may encourage others to dip in and start wondering if this is something that may help them as well. I do hope that you will find the book interesting and stimulating to read. I also, of course, hope that it will help you to move on with your life more happily and confidently. CHAPTER 1 (#ulink_f19aac0a-e174-5814-aba9-ea601ca8362c) What Exactly Is Guilt, and What Is the Point of It? (#ulink_f19aac0a-e174-5814-aba9-ea601ca8362c) Psychologists call guilt a ‘self-conscious’ emotion. Other emotions in the same category are pride, embarrassment and shame. All these emotions differ from our basic emotions such as fear, disgust and joy, which are more instinctive and universally felt during the first year of our lives. Self-conscious emotions develop later when we begin to get a sense of ourselves as separate from others. This usually occurs towards the end of the second year and through the third year of our lives. Before we can feel guilt, we must be able to make judgements. This can’t happen until the thinking centre of our brain (the neocortex) is sufficiently developed. This means that babies and very young children cannot feel guilt. Their brains are simply not well enough developed to process it. Physiologically, they cannot understand the difference between right and wrong. At thirteen months, my little granddaughter sometimes appeared to know when she had done something not allowed. She would throw her food on the floor and look at us with a big grin on her face. This was not because she enjoyed being wicked (that will come later!). Her smile had been generated because she was enjoying seeing the reaction of us adults. And perhaps because we were still in the honeymoon phase of grandparenting, we found her behaviour funny and so would laugh along with her. Unsurprisingly, she would then instantly repeat it without the slightest hint of guilt! However, this guilt-free phase of life is all too short. I was recently taking a walk along a fairly deserted beach when I came across two little naked girls at the edge of the sea. When they spotted me one of them hastily stood up and placed her bikini pants over her private parts. Although they were giggling and smiling, I noticed that their heads were bowed. My guess is that they were around three years old, the age at which guilt starts to creep its way into our psyches. Fortunately for them it had not yet developed well enough to spoil their innocent enjoyment of being ‘naughty’. This pleasurable stage in guilt’s development is one that many adults often try to recapture. Here are some examples you might recognise: • Girls’ days out in health spas where groups of gym-toned, professional women get drunk on champagne and greedily devour forbidden desserts. • Boys on get-fit golf breaks, egging each other on to have yet another drink until dawn appears. • Carnival participants dressing up in outrageously shocking costumes and singing songs that in everyday life would not be tolerated. • Office parties where people let their hair down and the next day return to work smiling but with their heads down, just like the little girls on the beach. • Buying food and drink labelled guilt-free, while being aware that they may still be far from nutritious. On a more serious note, some people simply cannot feel guilt at all. Early in my career I used to work on the locked wards of a large psychiatric hospital. Many of our adult patients had a reduced capacity to reason. Through disease or arrested development, the centres of their brains that are used to process guilt were not functioning. As a result, much of their behaviour would have appeared to the outside world as selfish, anti-social and excruciatingly embarrassing. Because they were incapable of feeling guilt, I – along with other members of staff – had to learn to accept and tolerate their behaviour. It was a good lesson to learn so young, because since then I have met many adults and young children in the outside world who are also incapacitated in this way. What’s the point of guilt? Guilt, like other self-conscious emotions, probably emerged in our human evolutionary development at the time when humans started to form groups. They did this in order to work and protect themselves from enemies more efficiently. The function of the self-conscious emotions was probably to make these groups stronger by encouraging loyalty and self-discipline. Anyone who has set up or led a group will know how important these two qualities are. Basic emotions such as fear and anger can be used to encourage or enforce discipline only up to a point. After a while they induce resentment and rebellion. Guilt, on the other hand, encourages self-control. We keep to ‘the rules’ because we don’t want to feel it. The pain induced by guilt is internal and therefore not as disruptive to the rest of the group as, for example, anger might be. This is how we think nature first intended guilt to work. Note that nature has a back-up plan if Plan A doesn’t work (always an excellent idea!). NATURE’S ORIGINAL PLAN A FOR GUILT A group member breaks a written or unwritten group rule: The thinking centre in their brain assesses that they have done wrong and sends an alert to the emotional centre of their brain. They feel guilty. They assume responsibility for the wrongdoing. They are motivated to either repair any damage their wrongdoing may have caused, or to leave the group. The wrongdoer is either integrated back into the group or forgotten, and business carries on as usual. NATURE’S ORIGINAL PLAN B FOR GUILT A group member breaks a written or unwritten group rule: On feeling guilt, they don’t follow through with Plan A. They don’t own up, and they don’t make things right. The other members or the group leader notice the body language of guilt (e.g. perhaps that give-away bowed head). The person is accused and either punished or expelled. The wrongdoer is either integrated back into the group or replaced, and business carries on as usual. Of course, we all know that nature’s plans (like our own) do not always work. If they did for guilt, I wouldn’t feel the need to write this book! But it is important to remember that, in its essence and when well managed, guilt is a good and useful emotion for both the individual and any group to which he or she belongs. It is there to ensure the healthy survival of the group. This is why positive guilt is one of ten categories of guilt that I have chosen for us to discuss and work on in this book (see Chapter 2 (#ulink_3160809b-9158-5fdc-8190-50d311d1173f)). At some later stage in human development individuals began to formulate their own moral codes. At first, their personal rules for living a ‘good’ life would be shaped to a large degree by their country’s culture and laws. But today, in our global world, people are also internalising moral influences through travel, the Internet and the media. The problem is that this ad hoc absorption of so many differing philosophies, religions and laws has sent our moral compasses spinning. We either feel guilty about whatever course of action we take, or we give up on guilt because we think, I’ll be damned if I do and damned if I don’t. The psychological effect of this moral confusion is bad news for the individual’s mental health and bad news for any group or society to which they belong. The good news, though, is that you will find many of the tips and strategies in this book will help with these tricky contemporary moral issues. The difference between guilt and shame These two emotional states are often referred to interchangeably in everyday language. It doesn’t help the confusion that they are also often experienced together. But there are some important differences between them. The simplest explanation of the difference that I have heard came, surprisingly, from a comedian: Guilt is feeling bad about what you have done; shame is feeling bad about who you are – all it is, is muddling up things you have done with who you are. MARCUS BRIGSTOCKE, BRITISH COMEDIAN But if you wish to have a more academic evaluation, Christian Miller from Wake Forest University, USA, did an interesting summary of the differences that have been found by researchers. Below, I have selected a few of the points she made that are relevant to our work in this book. Remember, these are only some of the differences that have been found through research. • Guilt is a private emotion, whereas shame usually develops as a result of disapproval – real or imagined – from others. • Shame can be triggered not just by moral wrongdoing, but by failing to abide by certain laws, rules or usual etiquette that do not have a moral base, e.g. wearing the wrong kind of dress to a wedding, forgetting to brush your hair before going to work or failing an exam. • Guilt relates to wrongdoing that has been done. Shame concerns how you feel about yourself. You don’t like yourself at all, or you don’t like an aspect of yourself, rather than you don’t like what you have done. • Shame makes you feel helpless, but guilt doesn’t always do so. In fact, guilt often prompts you to try to make amends or makes you wish that you could. Shame makes you want to hide yourself away so you and your failures are not noticed. • When we are ashamed, we are less likely to feel empathy with anyone else who might have suffered as a result, e.g. people who put a lot of time and money into helping us with a project that we failed to deliver. With shame, we might be feeling so sorry for our failings that we cannot feel sympathy for anyone else who has suffered. With guilt, our focus might be on how we have let people down. • Guilt is more likely to make us want to get into action to help others in some way. Shame doesn’t do this because it makes us feel useless. As this kind of information always makes more sense when we apply it to our own personal experiences, try this exercise: EXERCISE: CLARIFYING THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN GUILT AND SHAME The purpose of this exercise is to help you judge which aspects of your response to a past wrongdoing indicate whether you were feeling shame and/or guilt. Being aware of roughly to what degree you felt each emotion will help you to decide the kind of action you need to take. As you know, this book is largely about dealing with guilt, but we will also deal with one kind of guilt that has a large element of shame mixed in with it. I call this Shameful Guilt. My two examples here illustrate how a wrongdoing can trigger both emotions. Think of a time when you felt guilty and/or ashamed and ask yourself these questions: a) Did I feel that I wanted to hide away or did I want people to know how bad I felt? b) Did I do something that was morally wrong or not (as opposed to just breaking a rule or law that many people think is daft or out of date)? c) Was my focus primarily on myself or on others? d) Did I feel bad because I had done something ethically wrong (e.g. I wish I hadn’t done that) or did I feel bad that others would judge me as stupid/inept/inadequate/too ugly, etc. (e.g. I’m such an idiot). e) Did I do something to repair my wrongdoing or did I do nothing? Using a scale of 1–10 (10 being the highest amount for either feeling), score yourself separately on the amount of guilt and/or shame that this aspect of your response indicates you were feeling. Example 1 Wrongdoing: I was unnecessarily cruel to say what I said in that meeting – he was only a trainee. I was so shocked by my behaviour that I was speechless. a) a) I only wanted to hide away. I didn’t consider acknowledging my guilt to others. Shame 10/10Guilt 0/10 b) Morally, I was totally in the wrong. The trainee was trying and I was unnecessarily aggressive about his na?ve suggestion. Shame 0/10Guilt 10/10 c) My focus was largely on myself – I hardly thought of what he must be feeling. Shame 8/10Guilt 2/10 d) I knew what I had done was very wrong, but I was more worried about how others would judge me. Shame 9/10Guilt 5/10 e) I didn’t even apologise. Shame 10/10Guilt 10/10 Example 2 Wrongdoing: I lied to Mum in my message. I told her I had to work all weekend. I just couldn’t face driving all the way there – she’s such hard work these days. But I did worry about her and rang her on Sunday for a chat. a) a) I told Jim what I had done but wouldn’t have told anyone else. Shame 7/10Guilt 2/10 b) Jim said stop worrying, it was only a white lie. But I do think lying is wrong and I could have just told her that I was exhausted. Not going to see her every weekend is not that selfish – I do go often. Shame 5/10Guilt 3/10 c) My focus was largely on Mum. Shame 0/10Guilt 7/10 d) I was largely concerned about whether what I had done was right or wrong in relation to my own values. I was also slightly concerned about what Mum would think of me. Shame 1/10Guilt 9/10 e) I did make good enough amends. Shame 0/10Guilt 9/10 Repeat this exercise two to three times for other occasions when you felt guilty and/or ashamed. As you continue reading this book, repeat this exercise and think of other occasions when you felt guilty and/or ashamed. It might help to have some photocopies of the exercise ready to fill out. By the time you have finished the book, you should have become an expert on the differences between these two emotional states. What does guilt feel and look like? Most of us think we know the answer to this question. We will readily describe what we feel inside our bodies and how it makes us behave. But your personal experience may be different from what others feel. People notice and describe the ‘signs’ of guilt in different ways. They may also behave differently. To confuse us even more, many of the signs of guilt can be due to other causes. So we may have to rule these out first before we can be confident that they can be attributed to guilt. But the lists that I am going to give you below are a good clue as to whether or not guilt could be at the root of a problem. Here are some of the ways different people have tried to describe their personal experiences of guilt: How different people experience guilt IN THE BODY There’s a permanent knot in my stomach. It’s like pain and sorrow mixed with each other. I feel like I want to cry but can’t. I go quiet – it’s as though my throat has tensed up and I can’t speak. It’s like a bunch of moths eating at my insides. I often feel like I am going to be sick. I want to hit my head … and I often do! I find myself hitting my leg as soon as I remember it. I want to curl up in a ball and my body starts to do that. I feel scared and go all jittery. I have this tension in my head – and I just can’t get my body to relax. I want to hide – my head bows and my eyes close. I feel like I am carrying bags of lead weights. My head feels like it weighs a ton. There’s like a weight on my heart. It’s like I can’t stop sighing. It’s weird … sometimes I just feel dirty and that I need to wash and wash … Perhaps I’m going mad, like Lady Macbeth! IN THE MIND It makes me think that I should not have done what I did because everyone else thinks it is bad. I feel like my mind is going to explode. I go over the situation again and again in my head. I think people may be talking about me – thinking I am bad or am doing something wrong. Thinking again and again of what my father would say if he could see me now. I always think I am making a mistake. I keep having flashbacks to when it happened. I am constantly thinking that I should have done it differently, even though others are pleased … Telling myself if only I had worked just that bit harder I could have … It’s like I keep thinking that I will be ‘found out’. I keep imagining what could have happened if I hadn’t been lucky. Sometimes I feel guilty about being alive … I just can’t get it out of my mind that others died through no fault of their own. Constantly telling myself I was such an idiot. I can’t get the thought out of my mind that life isn’t fair – why have I got everything I have when others can’t? Just the luck of the draw. I just worry all the time that I am getting it wrong and should know better. It feels as though I am an impostor at work. I just find myself dwelling on the fact that I could have done more … even though I really know I did what I could at the time. Sometimes people are not aware that they are feeling guilt. When they first come to me, many of my clients may experience some of these ‘symptoms’ and think they are due to ill health or external stresses. If the latter have been ruled out, we will then look together at how they have led and are leading their lives. This is when it is helpful to also know what the common behavioural signs of guilt are, which may be the underlying cause of distress. In the next chapter we will be examining in some depth the different types of guilt and the behaviours associated with each. But for the moment here are some of the more common general signs of possible guilt that you may recognise: Behavioural signs of guilt • Avoiding certain people or all people, or subjects of conversation. • Playing too safe. • Overcompensating with extremely ‘good’ behaviour. • Overwork. • Obsessions. • Depression (without an obvious cause and no bipolar disorder diagnosed). • Agoraphobia. • Dependence on alcohol or drugs. • Rebelliousness. • ‘Bad’ behaviour. EXERCISE: MY PERSONAL SIGNS OF GUILT • Re-read the lists of physical, mental and behavioural signs that I have given above, and mark the ones that you commonly experience. • Ask a couple of people you know what they feel and notice in their mind and behaviour when they feel guilty. You could show them the lists above. Note the differences in your experiences of guilt. Who is more likely to feel an unreasonable amount of guilt? Although there is no definitive research that can prove the cause of this problem, there are some reasons that are commonly accepted among therapists and counsellors as to why some people feel excessive or unreasonable levels of guilt. Below, I am listing the main ones that I have come across in my own work. Having an idea of how a problem started or was encouraged (and maybe still is) can help us to identify possible ways to deal with it. We are more likely to get caught in a guilt trap if we: are generally known to have an emotionally sensitive temperament; are introverted; did not have enough love given or shown to us in our childhood; were ‘outsiders’ or considered to be ‘different’ in our family or childhood institutions and became resigned to being so; as children were bullied or have been repeatedly so in adulthood; were brought up in an overly disciplined family or institution; have spent a long time in a highly disciplined and authoritarian profession; have lived a long time in a politically repressive society; have been members for a long time of a social group with a very strict ethical framework; belong to a group that has strong moral directives; belong to a religious group that does not encourage interaction with people of other beliefs or faiths; have chronic low self-esteem; do not have a secure idea about the kind of person we are or want to be; are perfectionists; are not good at standing up for our own rights; still feel the need for parental approval; never like to rock the boat and almost always strive to keep the peace; do not currently have a strong supportive network. On reading this list you may have noticed that I did not include any gender issues. Although I often hear and read the opinion that women feel more guilt than men, to my knowledge there is no research to back up this belief. Women perhaps talk more openly in everyday life about their guilt. Men do not do this so much, but will drink, overwork or bash a boxing bag to reduce the tension, but then suppress it. However, in the confidential confines of therapy, I see little difference between the genders. Certainly the causes appear similar, as does the degree of distress. EXERCISE: HOW PREDISPOSED AM I TO GETTING CAUGHT IN A GUILT TRAP? 1. Re-read the above list again. This time do so more slowly, giving yourself time to think about each characteristic. Mark the ones that have some significance for you. 2. Discuss with members of your family or a friend. 3. Make some notes. Summary • Before we can feel guilt, the neocortex regions of our brain must be fully functioning and we must able to: a) understand the difference between the concepts of right and wrong; b) learn and remember that there are standards that others may expect us to meet or that we ourselves may want to meet; c) be self-aware enough to notice the sensations that we experience when guilt has been triggered. • Guilt has evolved along with other self-conscious emotions to strengthen groups by encouraging loyalty and self-discipline. • Guilt and shame are different. Guilt is a feeling we have when we think we have done something wrong. Shame is what we feel when we think we are a bad person because we have done something wrong. • We may each feel guilt in different ways, even though some of the signs of guilt may be shared. • Some of us are more predisposed to get caught in a guilt trap than others. CHAPTER 2 (#ulink_79dbaddd-3fc0-592a-94ba-cb2c36d45082) Ten Different Types of Guilt (#ulink_79dbaddd-3fc0-592a-94ba-cb2c36d45082) We often hear guilt described in oppositional terms such as ‘healthy’/’unhealthy’ or ‘rational’/’irrational’. I confess to having talked about it in these terms many times myself, and I still do occasionally. But the reality is that people who have difficulty in managing guilt are usually experiencing a messy muddle of a number of types of guilt, including both oppositional kinds. And to make matters worse, people’s inner cauldron of guilt is forever changing. As we can’t see or touch feelings, naming and describing the problem we have with them is very helpful. It makes the issue more real and is an important first step towards dealing with it. Furthermore, if we see it in black and white outside our head, our thinking brain becomes top dog, rather than our emotional brain. We can then often see clues as to what we may need to do to manage the problem better. This is not just true for us as individuals; it also applies to groups, organisations and societies, too. So I have compiled a list of the ten most common types of guilt that I have encountered. I will describe each kind and give you some examples. This should help you to identify the types of guilt that trouble you, and understand the kinds that other people you know may experience. Please remember that my ten types do not constitute an exhaustive list. If you don’t feel your guilt fits under any of these categories, try creating one or more new labels and write a short description for each. I am confident that you will be able to apply the advice and strategies in this book with minimal adaptation. Positive guilt As we noted in the last chapter, guilt evolved in humans as a helping mechanism. For those of us whose experience with guilt has been quite negative, it is important to remember that it can still be very good for us, and also for the world we live in. When guilt is felt appropriately, and the wrongdoer feels the motivational urge to make recompense and then takes constructive action, it has the power to be positive. Let’s look at a couple of examples: a) 1. Ian had a journey from hell coming back from work. When he arrived home, his six-year-old son jumped on him to greet him. Ian irritably brushed him aside. On seeing the tears well up in his son’s eyes, he felt a surge of guilt. He immediately took his son in his arms and said he was sorry. He then asked if he could make up for his bad temper by having a kick-around with him with his new football. His son was delighted! 2. Janine was newly appointed as a manager in a store. Her brief was to improve the turnover. This was her first management post and she had been told by her boss that she would now have to ‘toughen up’ her style of relating to her team, many of whom had become her friends. For the first six months she tried and failed. Turnover didn’t improve and she became alienated from her colleagues. She knew that she was doing something wrong, but she didn’t know what. Her staff were obviously demotivated and Janine felt guilty and concerned. She decided to try a weekend course in interpersonal skills that she had seen advertised in her store’s newsletter. The course was enlightening and helped her to see that her style of management had been aggressive and was having a demotivating effect on her staff. She was recommended an eight-week evening assertiveness training course and decided to do it. At work the next day, she called a meeting of her staff and told them what she had done and intended to do. She apologised and asked for their help in giving her honest feedback while she was trying out a better style of interacting with them. The end result was that morale improved enormously, and so did the turnover. Hard though it may be to accept, remember that guilt is sometimes a friendly internal voice reminding you that you’re messing up. MARGE KENNEDY, NOVELIST AND PLAYWRIGHT Ian and Janine’s examples show that positive guilt can be beneficial not just to us, but also to others. It can also be used for the prevention of wrongdoing. This is particularly so if it is used in conjunction with empathy. Here’s a simple example of good parents using it well: Twelve-year-old Joe is kicking up a fuss about having to go to his grandmother’s birthday tea. Instead, he wants to spend the afternoon with his friend. His mum tells him his gran will feel very hurt and disappointed if he doesn’t go. She adds, ‘I know how much you love your gran, so wouldn’t you feel guilty if you hurt her feelings?’ Of course, some might argue that Joe’s mum may be using guilt in a manipulative, controlling way here. But let’s assume that she isn’t, and that she is simply using it to help her son become more empathic and kind. There are many other different examples of anticipated guilt being used positively as a preventative aid. Instilling a sense of loyalty is a powerful way of getting people to conform of their own free will. It motivates people to keep ‘in line’ and avoid the guilt they would feel if they let the side down. Additionally, it doesn’t provoke the resentment that formal authoritarian power can induce. Leaders of all kinds use the ‘threat’ of guilt to build loyalty within their staff or team members. • CEOs will create values-based mission statements and urge their employees to live up to them. • Sports coaches will motivate their teams by reminding them ‘not to let the side down’. • Soldiers are regularly told that being part of a battalion is an honour, and to ‘stand by your mates whatever’. • Actors are fed the message that for the sake of the audience and the other actors ‘the show must go on’, however tired or hungover an individual may be. • Card manufacturers and social networks encourage us to keep our personal support systems alive by sending caring messages saying ‘Thank you’, ‘Get well’, ‘Good luck’ and ‘Congratulations’. Anticipated guilt is also used more directly to encourage helpful behaviour. For example: • donor cards sitting by shop tills and medical reception counters; • the rattling of charitable donation tins in full public view; • ‘Smoking harms others’, ‘Drinking and driving kills’ and Neighbourhood Watch scheme posters. All these examples give our positive-guilt buttons a gentle push. Sometimes, however, guilt buttons need a stronger push to transform them into a positive force. Interestingly, a series of research studies done by Stanford University in the United States, led by Professor Francis Flynn and Becky Schaumberg, revealed a strong correlation between guilt proneness and leadership. Guilt-prone members of the research group seemed to the rest of the participants to be making more of an effort than the others to ensure everyone’s voice was being heard, to lead the discussion and generally to take charge. Even when they did the test in a real-world setting, a strong link emerged between a participant’s guilt proneness and the extent to which others saw the person as a leader. Becky Schaumberg reported that these guilt-prone people showed the most responsibility. They were prepared to lay people off in order to keep a company profitable, even though they felt bad about doing so. … the most constructive response [to making mistakes], and the one people seem to recognise as a sign of leadership, is to feel guilty enough to want to fix the problem. PROFESSOR BECKY SCHAUMBERG, STANFORD UNIVERSITY4 Is it any wonder that leaders tend to use guilt frequently to push or pull the people they lead? Finally, it is important to remember that for guilt to work positively, there does need to be an element of caring involved. For example: • The people involved are part of a group who love or respect each other such as a family, friendship group or team of close colleagues. Miguel, a star footballer, went out on a drinking binge to celebrate his brother’s birthday. It was the night before a big match and the match was lost. The coach had noticed that Miguel had not been performing anywhere near his best. When he confronted him, it was obvious that Miguel felt more than usually gutted and quickly confessed what he had done. He expressed his guilt to his teammates, apologised profusely and asked for their help to stop this happening again. • The guilty party has empathy with the victim’s suffering and cares enough about them to want to make amends. Sometimes this empathy may have to be induced to prompt a caring feeling. For example, a ten-year-old boy had stolen from another child at school. The teachers arranged for him to meet with his victim and hear about how the boy felt and the difficulties that the theft brought him. • The guilty party cares about the goal that has been mutually agreed and is still mutually wanted. When Carole had an affair, she and her husband Bob agreed to stay together and try to make it work for the sake of the children. A year later Bob started an affair himself. Six months later, his fourteen-year-old son uncovered his secret. Bob didn’t feel bad for his wife, but he did feel guilty that he had not been careful enough to hide it from the children. He broke off the affair and committed to couple counselling with his wife. Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do. VOLTAIRE Summary: Positive guilt • If guilt is a justified response to some real wrongdoing and motivates the wrongdoer to take constructive action to repair the wrong, it is positive. • Anticipated guilt can be used positively to strengthen and motivate individuals and groups of all kinds. • Pressing our positive-guilt buttons can encourage us to be more empathic and helpful. • If we are prone to guilt, we could make a good leader. Suppressed guilt This is the kind of guilt that occurs when someone is aware of the feeling but consciously keeps it hidden inside, although it does then have a habit of surfacing into the mind from time to time. This can happen without any obvious prompting, but more frequently a reminder will trigger it. The person may well intend to do something about their guilt one day, but as time goes on they find this harder to do. So their guilt grows, and then they beat themselves up for procrastinating. The longer they leave it, the harder it becomes to deal with. Nothing is more wretched than the mind of a man conscious of guilt. PLAUTUS, ROMAN PLAYWRIGHT Over the many years since my daughter Laura’s death at age 19 in a car accident, I have had quite a number of emails, cards and letters expressing this kind of guilt. They have come from a range of people, including many of her friends who were her age at the time. Most have said similar things: they have often thought of Laura and felt bad that they had never expressed to us what she meant to them. They have then told me about the qualities they appreciated in her and how much they missed her. They have apologised for not letting me know this earlier, when others did come to see me and send cards. They say, or imply, that they have felt guilty ever since. What a shame that they were unnecessarily troubled internally for so long with this bad feeling. Their ‘wrongdoing’ was so understandable and forgivable. Festering inner guilt does our mental health no favours. It eats away at our self-esteem and makes us more prone to anxiety. It can also cause people to behave in inappropriate ways. For example, a person who is having (or has had) an affair will often take out their tension on the family whom they love and don’t want to desert. Or they may do the opposite and overcompensate by spoiling the children and even the spouse they are cheating on. The longer we leave suppressed guilt locked away, the harder it can be to confess and deal with. Firstly, the wrongdoing can become less forgivable by the victim, even though they may appear to have moved on. Secondly, by the time the wrongdoer is ready to deal with it, the chance that trust and respect can be established between the parties has probably diminished greatly. Thirdly, after a very long period even sensible people can suddenly get a now-or-never urge to confess or apologise. By then, their overwhelming emotional need is so strong that they can make a clumsy or inept attempt to talk to the victim. Here’s a sad example: A well-known and internationally respected person recently confessed on the radio that she felt bad about the way she had run away from home some twenty-five years ago. She hadn’t spoken to her parents since. She found out that they were due to travel from a certain airport and decided to go there. She found their check-in queue and went up to them. She wasn’t recognised, so she told them who she was. They greeted her politely and then walked on, and she hasn’t seen them since. How very, very sad. I was tormented with guilt for years and years. In fact, it was so bad that if I didn’t feel wrong, I didn’t feel right! JOYCE MEYER, AMERICAN AUTHOR Then fourthly, an overdue ‘outing’ of guilt often causes the victim’s and their supporters’ thirst for revenge to be intensified. This can lead to inappropriate and sometimes cruel punishment. Recently, for example, a number of court cases have taken place in our country against people who committed seriously dreadful crimes over 40 years ago. Several were given prison sentences, even though they are now in their late eighties and nineties and are seriously ill. Mercy was not considered an option, even when remorse was expressed. There is only one way to achieve happiness on this terrestrial ball, and that is to have either a clear conscience or none at all. OGDEN NASH, AMERICAN POET Finally, the torment of suppressed guilt, especially when the above problems have been witnessed in others, can lead to these attitudes: I will be damned if I do, so I might as well not try, or more scarily, I’ll be damned if I do, so I might as well be even more evil or die. In Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo) I will be suggesting some more effective ways for dealing with suppressed guilt. Summary: Suppressed guilt • Suppressed guilt is the kind that is consciously felt, but is not outwardly expressed. • It damages the mental health of the guilty person. • It can have knock-on negative effects on the people with whom they interact. • The longer the guilt is suppressed the more difficult it is to deal with and there is a risk that the consequences of outing it will be more negative. Disguised guilt This is guilt that has been suppressed, but the person feeling it is not currently consciously aware that they feel guilty. It becomes apparent only because of other mental-health symptoms or other problems. The mental-health symptoms can vary enormously from classified illnesses such as depression, OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorders) and addictions. The other problems may be more everyday issues such as persistent relationship difficulties, career issues, low confidence or anger mishandling. It is during the investigation of possible causes of these problems that buried guilt is uncovered as a contributing cause. Traditionally, and probably most commonly, this takes place with a therapeutic professional such as a psychiatrist, psychotherapist or counsellor. At the start of consultations clients often say, ‘I have no idea why – everything was fine. I have a good job and a great family. The first panic attack came out of the blue. I didn’t know what was going on. That started me off getting anxious. I just worry about what to wear, about getting lost, food contamination – you name it and I worry!’ Alternatively, they could deny they have a problem or lay the blame on others: ‘She thinks I’ve become anti-social and prefer my tablet to people. Yes, I like games, but I’m not addicted – I’m shattered after work and they relax me.’ Professional therapists are trained to look for hidden causes of problems, especially where there seems to be no obvious reason for symptoms. They are skilled listeners who will focus as much on body language and what is not being said as on what the person is saying. If the cause isn’t evident in their present life, they will also take an interest in the person’s past as well. In this way they may uncover guilt about a wrongdoing that the client may have completely forgotten about, or not considered relevant to their current issue. Sometimes this guilt is rational and sometimes it is not. Very often it is a mixture of the two. In my twenties I was diagnosed with serious depression. Luckily for me I was referred to an excellent (and very patient!) therapist. The main reasons for my mental state were plentiful and complex and I don’t need to spell all these out now. But it is relevant to share with you how disguised guilt played a part in stopping me from moving forward once my depression had lifted. Leading up to my depressive illness, I had made myself jobless. I had failed miserably (in my eyes) at two jobs that I had desperately wanted to succeed at. My first was as a childcare officer. One of my clients had beaten his first child so badly that she was taken into care. When the couple had their second baby he and his wife sincerely wanted to make sure that this couldn’t happen again. They both adored their new little girl. I visited them regularly and my colleagues and supervisor agreed that they had made great strides in their parenting and stress management. They didn’t think it would be necessary to admit the baby to care while I was on holiday. However, when I returned I was told that the father had lost his temper and killed the baby. No one for a moment thought this tragedy was in any way my fault. And in my rational mind I knew that this was true. But my guilt and despair were too great, and I resigned. I vowed to give up social work forever. After working for some months quite happily as a shop assistant, a friend of a friend told me that a housemother of a children’s home was urgently needed. He thought I would be ideal and should apply. As I had spent the majority of my own childhood in children’s homes, I was keen to try. And try and try I did. But ultimately I failed. As staff our days were spent stopping the children from beating each other up. The quality care I had wanted to give them, and my staff, was an impossible dream. This time I blamed the system and underfunding and resigned. I felt angry and hopeless and eventually got so seriously depressed that I ended up in hospital. My psychotherapist cleverly sniffed out guilt as a persistent issue in my troubled history. She unearthed a mountain of forgotten remorse and self-blame dating back to my early childhood. My habitual way of disguising my guilt was to become a rescuer of others. As a child it had started with my kid brother and sister and children weaker than me. By the time I reached adulthood my cause had become global. As you have probably guessed, this habit is still with me. It is, however, no longer disguised. This means that I can control it and use it in a more focused and constructive way. An added bonus is that this personal experience has left me with a nose for sniffing out buried guilt! Here’s an example: Jeff came to see me because his marriage was falling apart. It emerged that one of the main causes was that his wife thought he had a drinking problem. He didn’t accept that his drinking was an issue. He spoke defensively about it and said it was just part of his job. He had to drink sometimes, as that was the way you met and started relationships with new customers. I encouraged Jeff to tell me a little more about his job. It was one that involved quite a bit of travel. We talked about some of the places he had been to. It emerged that one of them was Budapest. In sharing our impressions of this city he recalled having a one-night stand with a Hungarian colleague. He had virtually forgotten the incident. He laughed it off, saying he was young then and they had both been drinking a little too much that evening. At first he couldn’t even remember her name or the year it had taken place, but when we explored it a little more his memory became clearer. As it did, he started to fidget and his hand started covering his mouth. He then recalled that, at the time, his wife had been pregnant with their first child. I noticed that his eyes were looking watery and I quietly asked him how he was feeling. He said, ‘Guilty, I suppose, and a bit fearful.’ The fear that he felt was that he would end up like his dad, who was ‘a true alcoholic and womaniser’, and that he, too, might lose his family. He felt immense guilt about not having been able to help his mother more. She remained depressed and bitter until the present day. Jeff was feeling less and less inclined to spend time with her and so feeling even guiltier. The good news at the end of this story is that Jeff and his wife did repair their marriage. Jeff found new ways to network for new customers and gained a clearer and more rational perspective on his responsibilities towards his mother. As we know, many people are unwilling to go to a therapist, especially if their problem doesn’t feel like a big issue to them. Jeff did, but I don’t believe most people need to do so. If the disguised guilt is caught early enough, a partner or close friend who knows the person well may spot it. In Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo) I will outline some guidelines and give some tips on listening in a way that helps people to open up. Summary: Disguised guilt • This is guilt that the person is not aware they are currently feeling. • It can produce emotional and behavioural symptoms that are attributed to other causes. • The habit of disguising guilt (real or imagined) can often be traced back to childhood. • The process of outing this kind of guilt needs to be done skilfully and sensitively. A therapeutic professional often does this. Others who know and care for the person can also achieve it. Childhood guilt This is a subject that I could easily write a whole book about, and so could most psychotherapists. Childhood guilt is one type that surfaces so frequently. It is one of the main contributing causes of chronic low self-esteem and a host of other common mental-health problems. As is now common knowledge, our default emotional auto-responses are largely ‘wired in’ during our childhood years. This makes them much more difficult to control. This is especially so if we experienced guilt repeatedly or it arose as a result of a traumatic experience. Even when, as adults, we can see that many of these responses are not rational and are indeed harmful to us, they still have stubborn sticking power. Additionally, parents, or other significant adults who had power and influence over us when we were children, induce much of this guilt. Here are a few brief examples of these kinds of ‘messages’ that I have come across through words, attitudes or consequences: You’re supposed to be a bright boy; the trouble is that you’re just lazy. That’s why you failed … I feel so ashamed of you when I hear this from teachers. You’ll drive me to an early grave with all that noise. I’m shattered. [From a mother who died of breast cancer in her thirties.] Now look what you’ve made me do. [From a father who had just turned over a table in anger and cut his hand picking up a broken glass.] Having to do this hurts me more than it hurts you, but you deserve it. [When being given an overly severe punishment.] She’s a bully and a liar … I suppose every family has a black sheep. She’s my cross. [Overheard telephone conversation.] I told you to watch them … now look at what has happened. Your brother is in A&E. [Told to an eldest child when she was nine years old.] You’re going to end up just like your father – you just can’t be bothered and think only of yourself. [Father abandoned the family and has been on benefits most of his life.] I told you that you looked like a slut in that dress …What do you expect when you dress like that? [After a 14-year-old had been through an upsetting sexual advance.] And, of course, damage can also be done indirectly through nobody’s fault. I met someone in her eighties recently who, when she found out what I was writing about, said she still feels guilty about her own birth. She was premature and her mother was unable to have any more children afterwards. Here are some other examples I have known where people feel guilty about being who they were born to be: Being born blind, and knowing that his disability has restricted his parents’ and siblings’ lives. Being less intelligent than average and needing private tutoring before all her exams. Being more intelligent than her brothers and sisters and getting a scholarship, which enabled her to go to university and have a good career. Being a promising sports person whose training and matches have required sacrifices from all his family. Being born illegitimate and “… bringing shame on the family and ruining my mother’s life’ (shared by a very elderly man). And then, of course, there are the guilty secrets that some children felt they had to keep (rightly or wrongly), such as: stealing from Mum’s purse and Dad’s wallet; hating a brother the parents favoured and praying he would die; lying repeatedly to cover up hurting a younger sister; blaming a school friend for doing something you know he didn’t do; masturbation and other sexual explorations; feeling attracted to the same sex; missing Dad and secretly meeting him after the divorce; going to the synagogue even though they no longer believed; lying repeatedly about where they had spent the night; being sexually abused by an uncle. Of course, many people have these experiences and grow up to be able to talk about them or laugh them off. Others unfortunately cannot do this. When they are ‘confessed’ or discussed, the emotion of guilt visibly floods back into their system. They typically bow their heads or cover their faces with their hands. Unsurprisingly, they commonly feel shameful guilt, which we will be looking at later. Having guilt from childhood still live within us in adulthood renders us more vulnerable to feeling guilt in the present day. We shall look at ways of dealing with childhood guilt in Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo). Summary: Childhood guilt • Many of the behavioural responses that we used to deal with this guilt in childhood become hard-wired into our brains and become our default emotional responses. This makes them hard, though not impossible, to change. • Parents and other significant adults in our childhood usually induce this guilt, and our relationship with them would have coloured our responses. • Some of this guilt is no longer relevant to us as adults. It relates to the value systems of other people and not to our own current values. It can, however, still trigger inappropriate responses, which need to be kept under our control. • Some childhood guilt relates to secret wrongdoing from childhood, which may need our attention because it is affecting our life, relationships or peace of mind today. • Childhood guilt is often mixed with shame and therefore diminishes our self-esteem. Parental guilt Now to the other side of the coin! There cannot be a parent who hasn’t been besieged by guilt at some time during their lives. It is a role that the vast majority of us desperately want to do more perfectly than any other we may take on. But, of course, we don’t and we can’t. I’m trying to avoid, you know, guilt, even though before the child is born you’re already thinking you’re doing things wrong … Why do I think that will probably carry over until the day you die? EMILY MORTIMER, BRITISH ACTRESS Once you become a parent, guilt is guaranteed. Nowadays, it even starts nudging us before the baby is born. Recently, I was scrolling through a pregnant mums’ internet forum and here are just a few of the ‘sins’ they were confessing: sleeping in the ‘wrong position’; drinking a coffee; eating chocolate, Brie and goat’s cheese, a fried runny egg and a biscuit that had fallen on the floor; drinking one glass of wine in a week; moving furniture without asking for help; getting stressed at work; not doing my yoga breathing; not playing classical music for ‘the bump’. After more years than I care to mention, just writing this list managed to trigger guilt in me, too. And that happened, even though in my time we didn’t know such ‘sins’ might harm our unborn babies. Health professionals with positive intentions induced this guilt. Through leaflets, adverts and face-to-face advice, they pass on the wisdom that has been accumulated from research into pre-natal care. They want mothers to feel guilty if they don’t take this new knowledge seriously. When the guilt starts to feel too weighty, most will joke it off in the way they are doing in the kind of forum I mentioned. However, many parents can’t do this. This kind of guilt-inducing information stresses them out and frightens them. They can’t change the habits of a lifetime overnight. When the baby is born, that guilt burden will undoubtedly grow. Their pre-natal guilt will leave them predisposed to absorbing more and more. Parental guilt is now a common subject of casual conversation and is regularly addressed in parenting manuals, magazines and websites. But to my knowledge there hasn’t been any serious academic research that has proved this rise or pointed conclusively to the reasons for it. From my own practice of working with parents, I have noticed a number of issues that in recent years have kept reoccurring and can cause this accumulation of guilt: • Dual careers. A recent survey by the website Mumsnet.com claims that fewer working mothers are feeling guilty, but now I find that working fathers are adding to the numbers. • Financial restraints. Perhaps some of these are due to lifestyle choices, but many are not. Many people cannot afford to meet their own and their children’s needs and expectations. The latter are soaring as globalisation increases and advertising has become so sophisticated. Not so long ago smartphones and individual computers for children were a luxury, but now, when your child’s best friend is moving to the other side of the world and they want to keep in touch, and 50 per cent of their class have this year’s model, it becomes difficult to say no. • Longer working hours. This may be a problem particularly in the UK where our working hours are extra-long, and it is hard and expensive for families to find quality childcare. Because families are increasingly geographically distant, traditional support is becoming less available. • The strains of marital break-up and blended families. Although these problems are now commonplace, the parental guilt that they trigger seems as high as ever. • Rapid rise of mixed-culture families. This is an exciting development, but it is also challenging for parents. It appears to demand extra commitment, time and negotiation skills. The clash of parenting values and expectations often leaves at least one party feeling guilty about not giving their children the upbringing they believe to be right. • The increasing volume of information about childcare available through the internet. Much of this is good and supportive. However, to unconfident parents encountering difficulties, it can be overwhelming and confusing. • The trend that appears to equate a parent’s worth with the success and behaviour of their children. This has become increasingly internalised and parents’ self-esteem and confidence are being affected by this trend, too. This has become an increasing problem as the media constantly confronts us with the images of perfect parents with perfect children. These beautiful images stick and make us wish, ‘If only …’ When parents do seek help, guilt is always the first issue that therapists and counsellors have to deal with before they can move on to their main issues. This is happening in spite of our increasing knowledge of the role that genetic, physiological and cultural issues play in shaping our children. So if it is true that parental guilt is on the increase, it is imperative that we learn how to manage it well. Laughing at it or ‘giving up’ by slipping defensively into laissez-faire parenting brings only very short-term relief and does our children no favours. Almost all the advice and strategies in this book will help. In Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo) there are some tips on how to help children with their guilt, too. Fatherhood is great because you can ruin someone from scratch. JOHN STEWART, AMERICAN SATIRIST Summary: Parental guilt • Parental guilt is virtually inevitable for everyone who has a child. • It arises because parents are naturally programmed to want to do this role as perfectly as possible, and perfection is unachievable for humans. • It has increased because the contemporary world floods parents with an overwhelming amount of information, which is often contradictory, and due to the stresses of everyday life parental aspirations are often unachievable. • Parents associate their self-worth today with their children’s successes, and this often causes additional guilt. When their children fail or commit a wrongdoing parents are commonly blamed or blame themselves. Survivor guilt This kind of guilt was first identified as a special type in the 1960s. It was first applied to survivors of the Vietnam War. But, of course, it did exist before that time, and is now applied to numerous kinds of survival issues. Sometimes it has a rational element and sometimes it does not. Whatever kind it is, it needs to be managed well because it can block sufferers from being able to move on from their traumatic experiences. These are the kinds of thoughts that continually chain survivors to their past: I had no right to survive. I don’t deserve to be here still when they are not. If only I had been able to do something differently. I should have helped. I should have been there. It is disrespectful to be happy when they cannot be. I shouldn’t be successful on the back of their misfortune. Let’s look at some examples of people who have experienced this kind of guilt. These brief quotes illustrate how it can occur in a wide range of life situations and at any stage of life. I felt guilty for years that maybe I should have run back and tried to get her to stay with me. Maybe I didn’t do enough to stay together. Maybe I was too selfish about saving myself. JOSEPH, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR I have started to experience what I can only describe as survivor guilt. Some of my classmates were also good candidates and had similar grades, but they didn’t get a place. I have also heard about people who have applied loads of times and they didn’t get in either. FERN, AN 18-YEAR-OLD GIRL IN HER FIRST YEAR OF A POPULAR UNIVERSITY COURSE I felt so bad about being among the few that didn’t get made redundant. I still haven’t made contact with anyone to see how they are getting on, so the guilt is getting worse. No one expected this crash, but perhaps we should have done. ALAN, AN INVESTMENT BANKER He may have walked away with his life, but he has been haunted by survivor’s guilt ever since. RELATIVE OF PETER, WHO WAS ON A PLANE THAT CRASHED, KILLING HIS FATHER AND 69 OTHERS Mum, it should have been me. At least I have had more life. MY 21-YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER AFTER HER 19-YEAR-OLD SISTER DIED IN A CAR CRASH He couldn’t get past it, he felt really guilty and he kept saying it should have been him that died. SISTER OF A SOLDIER WHO WAS FOUND HANGED AFTER RETURNING FROM THE AFGHAN WAR AFTER HIS TWO BEST FRIENDS DIED I did not feel survivor’s guilt until two years or so after my bonemarrow transplant. It took me another six months to finally pick up the phone and call my doctor to ask if other bone-marrow transplant survivors ever had these dark feelings of depression and guilt (although I would not have recognised it as guilt). A 47-YEAR-OLD MAN WHO SUFFERED FROM LEUKAEMIA AND HAD A TRANSPLANT The soldiers I’ve talked to involved in friendly-fire accidents that took their comrades’ lives didn’t feel regret for what happened, but raw, deep, unabashed guilt. And the guilt persisted long after they were formally investigated and ultimately exonerated. NEW YORK TIMES WAR REPORTER A dozen decisions that I made over the course of a two-month period could have been wrong but that didn’t occur to me at the time. Any one of those made differently may have saved his life. I am still dealing with the guilt of having cost him his life. A RETIRED ARMY OFFICER TALKING ABOUT THE ACCIDENTAL DEATH OF ONE OF HIS SOLDIERS All this recent unveiling of sex abuse in the past has made me think back to my own schooldays. There was a history teacher who I am sure was dodgy. He invited me a couple of times to his flat for some extra tuition. He started being different with me – friendlier, putting his arm round me. I didn’t go back. Now I am haunted by the faces of the boys who did – they were quite shy. I should have said something. MAN IN HIS SIXTIES WHO HAS STARTED TO FEEL GUILTY ABOUT NOT RAISING THE ALERT ABOUT A TEACHER AT HIS SCHOOL Would you believe that I still get pangs of guilt about my twin Peter. I wonder if he would have made a better job out of his life than I did. My parents so much wanted a son and she couldn’t have any more after our births. A 77-YEAR-OLD FRIEND OF MINE WHOSE TWIN DIED SOON AFTER SHE WAS BORN Most of these people did, of course, move on with their life after their trauma. But many will have suffered with their survivor guilt for longer than they needed to. There are some tips on how to help anyone with similar issues in Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo). Summary: Survivor guilt • Survivor guilt was first identified as a condition in the 1960s and for a long time was just applied to people who survived war traumas and felt guilty about living when others died. • Nowadays it is increasingly accepted that anyone can feel this guilt if they have survived a major trauma of any kind while others were less fortunate. • This guilt can seriously block sufferers from moving on with their lives. Affluence guilt This kind of guilt is about feeling uneasy with having a comfortable lifestyle while others do not share that privilege. It has become an increasing challenge for people in developed parts of the world. The media constantly broadcasts images of those in pain and poverty. Financially strapped charities are now quite understandably using powerful advertising techniques to turn the knife into the consciences of those who are better off. Cheap travel has also let many more people see for themselves the contrast between their lives and those of people in less-developed countries. The latest global financial crisis has also brought many face to face with the hardship of others. We don’t need statistics to tell us that, in spite of all the aid programmes, the gap between the poor and the rich has widened. I know that a man who shows me his wealth is like the beggar who shows me his poverty; they are both looking for alms from me – the rich man for the alms of my envy, the poor man for the alms of my guilt. BEN HECHT, AMERICAN AUTHOR Of course we need to face these uncomfortable facts, but we also need to remember that affluence guilt can become a burden to bear. When this happens we can lose the will to aid those whom we wanted to help. When people become depressed by their guilt they can sink into cynicism or powerlessness. This tragically ironic quote from John Lennon says it all. Guilt for being rich, and guilt thinking that perhaps love and peace isn’t enough and you have to go and get shot or something. JOHN LENNON, WHO WAS SHOT AND KILLED IN HIS FORTIETH YEAR There are many people who would argue with me that the very opposite of affluence guilt is starting up. They might point to the incredible queues that I, too, have seen outside designer shops in some of the poorest countries. They might also draw my attention to the ‘canonisation’ of celebrities and the way they are worshipped. They would say that their expensive clothes and wealthy lifestyles are emulated rather than criticised. I feel bad sometimes that I ever did it. JOHN SYLVAN, A MULTIBILLIONAIRE, ON THE GROUND COFFEE CAPSULE HE INVENTED Ultimately, everyone has to choose which of these positions to take. The choice will affect the amount of guilt they carry themselves and notice in others. I know it is a subject that troubles many of the people I meet and encounter via the media. But you don’t need to have billions before you feel this guilt. It has been a lifelong issue for me. My childhood experiences undoubtedly were a major influence. As I have mentioned before, for much of my childhood I was brought up in poorly funded children’s homes. From an early age I was aware that I was more deprived than the children around me at school. However, the nuns who schooled me kept me aware of others who were worse off than myself. When I had to choose a saint’s name for my first communion, I chose Elizabeth. This saint was a noble lady who was beatified because, in spite of her mean and aggressive husband, she found ‘miraculous’ ways to help the poor. Throughout my childhood I prayed to this saint to help me become like her. Although during my life I have worked for and given to charities, I have never been able to match her and I never will. No wonder I continually battle with affluence guilt! At this time my only guilt comes from having to charge for the work I do, otherwise I can’t put a roof over my head! FRANCESCA, A TRAINER AND DEDICATED VOLUNTEER The tips in Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo) are based on those that have helped me and many of my clients to manage this guilt, which I hope I will never be without. Summary: Affluence guilt • Contemporary life presents a constant and often overwhelming stream of information and images of people who are less fortunate than those in affluent, developed countries. • Charities are using increasingly sophisticated means to nudge the public’s conscience, but most people have only limited amounts of money and time to donate. • Some people are programmed by childhood influences to be more vulnerable to this kind of guilt. Carer’s guilt This is the guilt we feel when we know we should be caring more effectively for members of our family or others who feel like part of our wider family. The latter could be a friend or neighbour, or a colleague with whom we have a special emotional connection. It is a condition that is now widely acknowledged in most developed countries. Generally, it is applied to people who have members of their family in need of extra-special nurturing and attention because they are unable to manage well on their own, usually because they are elderly or sick or have a disability. There are others – some pregnant mothers, for instance – who may have a temporary need for extra help. Like most of the guilt types we have discussed, carer’s guilt does appear to be on the increase. For centuries, women have traditionally taken on the role of carer within families and communities, but in contemporary society this is no longer necessarily the case – most women have careers as well as families that make heavy demands on their time. In addition, we are living longer and needing more care in our old age. Improvements in medicine have also meant that sick younger people are being kept alive when only a few years ago they would have died. The most recent change in society that has affected this issue and is a constant feature of media attention is that the quality of care given by the state and private institutions seems to have deteriorated. Regardless of whether or not the scare stories we hear are misleading or unrepresentative, our overall impression is that institutional care is best avoided. This has triggered even more guilt in those who have no alternative other than to put their loved ones in a home. Carers will always feel guilty – it’s part of being a good carer and feeling that there is always more that we can do. ALZHEIMER’S SOCIETY Everything I have learned from working with carers myself and from the organisations who currently support carers has convinced me that guilt feelings are inevitable. This is because, as a carer of someone in need, we will always feel guilty when we: leave them; say no to them; begin to feel resentful; snap at them because we are so tired and stressed; have to leave them with someone they don’t know; see them look sad or hear them beg us to stay; forget to ring them or check up on them; learn that they are ill and think we should have noticed; see other carers who appear to be doing so much better than us; know we are neglecting our family and friends; are less effective at work and take time off in crises; don’t have enough money to give them a better life; recall something we did or didn’t do that hurt them in the past; start to feel sorry for ourselves; take time to give ourselves some nurturing or treats. Our aim must not therefore be to eradicate carer’s guilt completely. We need to rid ourselves of the irrational stuff and learn helpful strategies and techniques to manage the inevitable rest. You will find some tips in Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo). Summary: Carer’s guilt • This is guilt we feel when we think we should be caring more effectively for people in our lives who have a reduced capacity to look after themselves. • Women have traditionally taken on the role of carer, but as most now work they cannot necessarily do this any longer. • Through the media we are being made increasingly aware of the inadequacies of institutional care and the rising tide of people who are dependent. • A certain amount of guilt is inevitable for every carer. Shameful guilt I’ve got the Jewish guilt and the Irish shame, and it’s a hell of a job distinguishing which is which. KEVIN KLINE, AMERICAN ACTOR We have already looked at the difference between guilt and shame in Chapter 1 (#ulink_b990a133-c9fb-595f-bbbb-e3410fabbed8). Shameful guilt is simply a combination of two kinds of guilt. We feel it when we have done, or think we’ve done, something wrong and also have a sense that this proves that we are intrinsically bad or not as good as other people. It therefore attacks our inner confidence, which is the bedrock of our mental health. The consequences of feeling shameful guilt are bad for us, and often bad for others as well, because we may: not own up to what we have done, or think we have done, because we don’t want even more people to think we are bad; feel less inclined to apologise, because we believe that they won’t want to listen to us; not believe someone who says they have forgiven us and wants to wipe the slate clean; not make amends for what we have done because being bad means we will probably do it again; go on to do even more and possibly worse deeds because that’s what people as bad as us do; consciously or unconsciously seek out the company of people who are as bad as us; become cynical and very negative in our thinking; isolate ourselves or not allow people to get too close for fear that they will discover who we really are and the bad things that we are capable of doing; start to ‘worship’ people whom we believe are better than us, and allow that to blind us to their failings; become a ‘rescuer’ of others to the extent that we neglect ourselves in order to be regarded as ‘good’; become very religious, because only a higher power can forgive us; become overly self-obsessed and introspective, and so have less empathy with others; become depressed and suicidal; not seek help because we are worthless and/or others are more deserving. You may have noticed that some of the possible consequences above are contradictory to each other. This is because shame and guilt are essentially different emotions and have different effects. They can therefore pull you in different directions. So, unsurprisingly, shameful guilt is the most difficult kind to both feel and overcome. This may also be why it is used to exert power and influence over people. Throughout history, dictators and politicians have used shameful guilt as both a threat and a punishment. Lead the people with administrative injunctions and put them in their place with penal law, and they will avoid punishments, but will be without a sense of shame. Lead them with excellence and put them in their place through roles and ritual practices, and in addition to developing a sense of shame they will order themselves harmoniously. CONFUCIUS, CHINESE PHILOSOPHER Teachers were also using it in the days when they put the dunce cap on children, and still do when they make children answer questions in class they know they will get wrong. Even parents use it; for example, when they tell their seven-year-old child in public that they’re behaving like a three-year-old. Inducing shameful guilt is also one of the techniques that advertisers use to sell products. Sometimes they will use it in a direct way by showing, for example, pictures of people with zits on their face or without deodorant looking isolated within a crowd, or indirectly by showing people using their products being super happy and successful. Political parties will also employ advertisers who use shameful guilt to win elections or get people to change their views or behaviour. Конец ознакомительного фрагмента. Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес». Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/gael-lindenfield/skip-the-guilt-trap-simple-steps-to-help-you-move-on-with/?lfrom=688855901) на ЛитРес. Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.