Got guilt? Restore and feel better after guilt
Guilt is an emotion that most people learn during their normal childhood social development. It works like an alarm to let us re-examine our behavior, learn from it, and restore any relationships damaged due to our wrongdoings.
Is it healthy?
As most things in life, there is a pang of good guilt and a bad one:
-The healthy guilt is an alarm that allows us to learn from our actions and move on.
-The unhealthy guilt is more like an obsessive pinprick.
It becomes an unhealthy emotion when there is no lesson to learn and no way out of guilt. It does not drive us to rebuild our relationships. This unhealthy emotion has a lot of shame. Being shame that distressing feeling of how bad we are. In shame it is about the individual, but it no longer is about the moral individual in its environment like guilt is. Guilt is a socially driven emotion.
Our emotions can influence how we act and think. If we feel bad about ourselves, we usually withdraw from social life. We can sometimes misbehave; and use any excuse to corroborate our bad feelings, especially when we are sure others wrong us (when sometimes it may be the other way around).
Be skeptical about your feelings of guilt, especially if there is no lesson in it. It can be a sign of depression or another condition. If this affects your social, academic, and professional functioning, call (314) 714-5227 and start feeling better.
