Overcoming Depression

Help and tips for getting over depression

  • Home
  • Start here
  • Depression
    • Depression Symptoms
    • Depression: a Physical Illness?
    • Cognitive Therapy
    • Mood Analysis
    • Faulty Thinking Patterns
    • Postoperative Depression
    • Teenage Depression and Suicide
    • Achieving Good Self-Esteem
    • Get Rid of Guilt
    • Book Reviews
  • Anxiety
    • Types of Anxiety Disorders
    • First Aid for Panic Attacks
    • Tips for Overcoming Anxiety
    • Myths about Panic Attacks
    • Anxiety Relaxation Technique
    • Anxiety and love
    • Locus of Control
  • Stress
    • Stressed out?
    • Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale
    • Stress Relief Activities
    • Stress and Pregnancy
    • Stress Hives
    • Tips to Beat Exam Stress
    • Reduce Work Related Stress
    • How to cope when you’re looking for work
    • Winning when you lose
    • Crises of Adult Life
  • Alcohol Abuse
    • Codependent Checklist
    • Marriage and alcohol
    • Stress and Alcohol
  • Relationships
    • 5 Tips for Restoring a hurting marriage
    • Signs of an Abusive Relationship
    • Our Birth Family
    • 6 Common Human Needs!
    • 5 Stages of Grief
      • Helping a grieving friend
    • Overcoming Loneliness
    • Successfully deal with anger and criticism
  • Trauma
    • Trauma Survivor
    • Blaming the Victim
  • About Me
    • Contact Me
  • Blog

Getting Rid of Guilt!

April 17, 2012 by Karin Stewart Leave a Comment

Most of us aren’t strangers to guilt but some of us are more familiar with it than others. It’s a common symptom of depression. When depressed the feeling of guilt is just there, even though you can’t always pinpoint what you’re feeling guilty about.

There are times when guilt is an appropriate response. To feel guilty about lying or cheating is right. This feeling of guilt stops us from doing something inconsiderate again. However to live a full and happy life we need to look at our thoughts and decide whether our guilt is right or whether we are taking too much responsibility for things we are not really responsible for.

Getting rid of guilt by self-examination

Nurturers

Many people, especially girls are raised to be nurturers and are taught that it is selfish to think of themselves. Even if we have a legitimate reason for letting down a friend, we feel bad, we feel guilty. We’ve broken our unconscious rule that it is selfish to think of ourselves.

Many people feel guilty when they don’t do exactly what their parents want them to do. I’ve seen many problem marriages where the parents come first even when the adult child is married. When a person marries, the partner needs to come before the parents. Learn to say no, and cut those ‘apron strings’. You will feel guilty, and this is understandable as you feel you’re no longer being the good little child anymore. Actually you’re not! That role needs to be left behind. Make a conscious decision to honor your partner first. This is healthier for you in the long run. Some people even feel guilty about not feeling guilty! It’s as if a feeling of guilt has become normal.

Too High Expectations

Many people have high expectations of themselves and not all of these are realistic. People place a guilt trip on themselves by saying that ‘they should, or must be doing certain things in a certain way’. These expectations can be conscious or in the unconscious, but if they aren’t achieved, the person feels guilty. Become conscious of the word ‘should’ in your speech or in your thinking. The words ‘should, must and ought’ are common to a perfectionist and are the source of a lot of anger and guilt. Much of this feeling of guilt can stem from ones childhood with parents making you feel guilty for example, not doing fantastically well at school. Disappointment probably would have been a better response on their part.

Perhaps you need to examine what expectations you are still holding onto that were passed onto you from your parents. If they are inappropriate and unhelpful, throw them out and replace them with your own unique realistic expectations. Don’t live your life through your parents expectations. You need to become your own person.

Undercover Guilt

Guilt could be hiding other emotional problems. What you experience as guilt could be a cover for another emotion like anxiety. Anxiety plays a major part in the feeling of guilt and it often affects our behavior towards the people we feel we have wronged. You could end up overcompensating to make things right, for example flooding your friend’s inbox with notes of apologies, all in an attempt to make things right. With anxiety you typically start mind-reading that your friend must be angry with you and you blame yourself for maybe not having been attentive enough.

Check out whether what you are thinking is true, before reacting on your thoughts. Guilt also has a strong connection to fear. You feel guilty if you’re not pleasing people all the time and this guilt is then connected to a fear of rejection.

Guilt elicits sympathy

It really isn’t enough to just tell your friend how guilty you feel. You might feel better from the sympathetic words of assurance that everything is going to be okay but the problem with this approach is that you’re not dealing with this inappropriate sense of guilt. all you are doing is getting sympathy.

Giving guilt the boot! 

  • Check to see if you’re getting some sort of pay-off for your ‘guilt’. People feel sorry for you and try and help. This actually meets their ‘need to be needed’ but it doesn’t help you.
  • List the things that you’re feeling guilty about and then make a plan how to change them. Writing really does help. So for example, if you feel that you’re not a good friend, write down the things that a ‘good’ friend would do. Be realistic and see what you can implement.
  • Maybe you need to take situations less seriously. If you miss one day at the gym, you can always go tomorrow. Don’t beat yourself up unnecessarily. and when you do fail, don’t label yourself as a ‘bad’ or ‘lazy’ person.
  • What is really important is to be kind to yourself, treat yourself like you’d treat your best friend. Recognize that there are things that are beyond your control and it is not your role to keep everybody happy.
  • If you do hurt someone, ask them for forgiveness, stop beating yourself up unnecessarily and move on.

Finally become self-aware and be flexible. Learn how to manage your guilt triggers because this will lead to a greater happiness.

Filed Under: Depression Tagged With: guilt

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recent Posts

  • Psychological withdrawal for addicts
  • Need to be needed
  • Why You Can’t Rescue an Addict
  • Your words have power
  • Taking a leap forward!

Like Me on Facebook

Facebook

Categories

  • addiction
  • Alcohol
  • Anger
  • Anxiety
  • Approval
  • Attitude
  • Bible
  • Blog
  • Book Review
  • Depression
  • Perfectionism
  • Relationships
  • slider
  • Stress
  • Success
  • Thinking
  • Uncategorized
  • Work

Tags

Abraham Lincoln addiction alcohol Andrew Verster Anger anxiety approval be creative be yourself Bill Clinton change your thinking cognitive therapy depression Dora Taylor drugs encouragement fight or flight forgiveness friends funny George Bernard Shaw guilt honesty hope interference J.K. Rowling Jared Diamond Collapse Joaquin Phoenix John Gurdon Joy Laurence Olivier life with purpose love nagging perfectionism perseverance poetry self-esteem shyness stress success trauma try again women workaholic

Comments

  • Karin on Why You Can’t Rescue an Addict
  • Tommy on Why You Can’t Rescue an Addict
  • tony deyn on Facing your giants
  • Veronica Frances Watkins on The real definition of relapse and why it matters
  • Roger Johanson on The old farmer and his horse

Archives

Categories

Latest blog posts

  • Psychological withdrawal for addicts
  • Need to be needed
  • Why You Can’t Rescue an Addict
  • Your words have power
  • Taking a leap forward!
  • Nagging your partner really doesn’t help!
  • The real definition of relapse and why it matters
  • The old farmer and his horse

Feeling Good By David Burns

This is the greatest 'value for money' self-help book ever. It changed my life forever and it can change yours! Available from Amazon David Burns

Need help for anxiety?

L- Theanine available from Amazon.coml-theanine image

Copyright © 2022 · Outreach Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you are happy with it.Accept