The Web address of this
3-page article is http://sfhelp.org/Rx/wounds/guilt.htm
Preparation steps, continued...
If you feel excessive guilts, your true Self is probably
and your subselves are disorganized and conflictual. You can choose
to improve that by doing some kind of
- i.e. intentionally retraining and reorganizing your subselves.
If you disregard this task, you're likely to achieve temporary
guilt-reduction at best - i.e. your excessive guilts will return.
When your
true Self is
invite each subself
promoting excessive guilt
to meet with your Self
(internally) alone and in groups. Review and clarify
their goals,
jobs, and fears, and ask them to...
-
trust in your wisdom and innate good
judgment, over time,
-
stop
or overruling you, and to...
-
give you a
chance to demonstrate you’re far
wiser and more capable than when you all were young.
Another
guilt-reduction goal is to...
Validate your behavioral
rules per the above. Firmly encourage your
Critic to use these new rules
in re-evaluating your past and present marital and divorce decisions. Note
that this is not asking your Critic to stop judging. Moderate guilt helps identify current needs to fill!
With your
Nurturer,
coach your Critic on
to pronounce judgments respectfully,
vs. with impatience, scorn, cynicism, and sarcasm. This is like learning
to express limits and consequences respectfully to a physical child. Your
Critic (inner Parent) may not have observed your
childhood adults doing that…
Introduce your Guilty,
Shamed,
and Scared inner kids to your
Nurturer and your
Spiritual
subselves. These
subselves want to provide the comfort, security,
and reassurance to the kids. To make this more real, evolve inner
images of your subselves
interacting.
Revise
key Guardian-subself
roles as needed, so they don't accidentally increase your Critic's
self-accusations and activate your Shamed and Guilty inner kids. For example,
renegotiate your
values and
personality role, so that s/he’s
less anxious about you disagreeing with or disobeying certain other people's
rules. And objectively...
Identify any people around you who may
criticize your values and behaviors. If any of them cause
excessive guilts,
each person and
for more respectful, constructive
feedback. If they won’t,
review your rights and
dignity, choose to distance from them
without guilt! They’re probably ruled by a false self, and don’t
know it.
False selves often have
rigid, blurry, or no
They can be oversensitive to, and feel
responsible for, someone else's discomfort, like your parent's or a
child's. Practice differentiating your guilt from other people's guilt,
and encourage your subselves to respectfully give other adults and kids
responsibility to reduce theirs while you reduce yours.
Some
Inner Kids and their Guardian subselves live in the past. They
assume your Self is as incompetent (undeveloped) as in your childhood,
and they may fear against all logic that the people who hurt or shamed you
will magically appear today and do that again, unless they (the Guardians) are constantly
alert for that. This rescuing, or "time travel”
parts-work technique offers an effective way to bring all your subselves into the
present together.
Option: over time, become an
expert on how guilt is intentionally reduced. When you feel guilty, build the
reflex of wondering "What am I to learn from this feeling? Have I already
learned it?" Tell your Critic what you've learned, and ask that
important subself too stop reminding you of your rule-breakings, and
re-activating your
Apply relevant
ideas and options in this article on
forgiving yourself and
other people. Your
true Self
needs to be trusted by your other subselves to succeed. Have you experienced
that genuine
forgiveness (letting go) reduces excessive guilt? Finally…
Please treat this parts-work outline as suggestive, not
absolute. As you see, it’s long-term work, not a weekend project.
Use the
Project-1 articles or
to help you
tailor and implement steps
like these. Versions of this basic inner-family framework can help
resolve - or adapt to - most social (family) role and relationship problems.
Stay clear on the big picture: Project 1
aims to help you (a) free your Self (capital "S") to harmonize your
personalities and reduce your false-self wounds, to improve your health and longevity, protect any dependent
kids, and harmonize your key relationships.
Reminder: converting the common
false-self wound of excessive
to genuine self-care and love is a separate, vital part of Project 1.
Shame and guilt feel the same, and are healed differently.
If you're co-raising kids, each co-parent choosing to
reduce false-self wounds will steeply
increase your odds of building an
together, and
earning priceless old-age contentment.
So the first step toward reducing excessive guilts is to choose a
long-range view, and patiently invest in preparation steps like those above.
That will empower you to reduce your guilts by taking several more steps, starting with...
2) Identify and
Evaluate
Your Broken Rules
Pick a familiar guilt, and imagine applying these ideas to
it as you read. A way to do that is to complete this sentence: "I feel badly
when I _____."
Recall: guilty thoughts and feelings erupt when your well-intentioned
and
subselves scathingly blame you for “making a mistake,” "failing," or “doing something wrong” – i.e.
they feel you've broken an
important
Most of
our earliest of behavioral rules (shoulds, oughts, musts, and have to's)
always come from other people - typically our caregivers and
hero/ines.
We form other rules from experiencing significant pain
and pleasure ("If I get a bad report card, my parents get angry.") Across your years, you unconsciously
formed hundreds (thousands?) of
behavioral rules about right /
wrong, good / bad, and safe / unsafe values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors.
To
validate this, reflect, and say out loud the first ten rules you think all
young children should be taught about "good behavior." - e.g. "Always tell
the truth;" "Do your best;" "Be a good friend;" "Love your parents and
grandparents;" "Don't whine;" "Look on the bright side;" "Be kind and
patient with other people;" "Don't be rude or insult other people;" "Don't
be selfish;" "Obey God's commandments, and pray for salvation;" and so on.
Now add
this perspective: invite your tireless
Inner Critic to list some key
attributes of "bad persons / men / women / parents" - e.g. "People are
bad if they lie / steal / are lazy / drink to much / ignore their
kids / are self centered / harm other people / kick small animals / use
pornography / etc. Each of these judgments is based on one or more
associated right/wrong behavioral rules - according to someone. Some
are universal, and some are ancestral, ethnic, and/or religious.
Many don't
apply to you.
Premise: because we all have different values, perceptions, and needs,
we don't need to feel guilty about
breaking someone else's rule that we don't agree with! Example: if
someone insists "You must brush and floss after every meal (or
you're self-neglectful, lazy, and bad), and you believe "No, I think
brushing once a day before bed is enough," you have a different (vs. better)
rule. If your Inner Critic berates you for breaking another person's rules,
your Guilty and Shamed inner kids suffer, and their tireless Guardian
subselves activate.
Premises - you have the unarguable right to identify the rules that cause
you excessive guilts, and decide whether they're your rules or
someone else's. If they're not your rules, you have the right
to discard the old rules and forge and live by authentic new rules of your
own without guilt or shame.
Every other person has the same right. Do you agree?
Consider these examples:
|
Old (Other's) Rule |
New (Your) Rule |
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|
|
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-
See
evasion, lying, and liars as "bad," weak, "wrong,"
and cowardly
|
|
Notice without judgment what you/re
now.
Options: (a) evolve a table like this to help you
clarify your most important old and new rules; and (b) invite other
important people - including minor or grown) kids - to do this and discuss
what results. Expect this to take considerable time,
thought, and discussion...
As you
examine each rule that causes excessive guilt,
watch for
black/white
(absolute or bipolar) thinking.
For instance, are stealing or lying always
“wrong”? Many personal and social rules are relative, depending on our local
inner and outer contexts for "rightness." Some philosophers suggest “There
are no ‘rights and wrongs.’ only consequences.”
Also be alert for widespread rules about rules: "Always honor and respect
(i.e. don't disagree or challenge) your Mother and Father / your elders /
the Bible / the Law." To become an authentic, self-respecting person, you
have to
disagree with some of their rules and form your own.
Doing this is not
"disrespecting" them, it is respecting yourself as an equally-worthy
person. Do you agree?
In defining
your rules, it can help to ask
"Do I
always gain self respect when I act on this rule (should, ought, or
must), or am I seeking the approval of someone else?" If you have a
zealous
like Sharon (and most of us), that subself is relentlessly focused on following other people's rules to
avoid conflict and painful disapproval and rejection.
Living from our
own integrity will inevitably cause some other people discomfort. You can minimize
this by adopting a
attitude, and use the seven Project-2
communication
to invite other people to
negotiate acceptable compromises or acceptance of
your differences.
Recall why you're reading this, and
decide
how you stand on what you just read. Does "identify and evaluate
important
broken rules" make sense to you now? Are you willing to do that now
to reduce excessive guilts? Is your
true Self
those questions? If not,
If
you need to, take a stretch break before studying the
third option for reducing excessive guilts...
3) Plan and Make Selected Apologies
The 12-step philosophy and
fellowship helps many people manage (vs. cure)
and
other compulsions.
One reason it's effective is that it encourages people to (a) choose self-responsibility; (b)
intentionally confront and reduce significant
guilt, embarrassment (shame), and anxiety; and (c) make sincere amends (apologize) to
people they’ve hurt, where possible and safe.
After preparing well, this process usually helps both
people reduce hostility, resentment, disrespect, and guilt. Where it doesn’t, look for
to be in
charge, and other
relationship
that need resolution.
Are you able to clearly define the
ingredients of an
effective apology? I suggest that they include…
-
your
true Self
(capital "S") to
your other
personality subselves;
-
coaching your subselves to believe
that your needs,
rights, opinions, and
are just as worthy as any other person’s - i.e.
to grow and live from a guilt-free
-
taking genuine (vs. pretend or strategic)
responsibility for your past and present thoughts, values, and actions;
-
identifying specifically how your actions have
significantly hurt or hindered other people;
-
fully experiencing
all the emotions related to each such
incident, without editing or justifying;
-
(ideally) describing your feelings to the hurt person,
with good eye contact, in a way that s/he can hear you, and then…
-
respectfully to any
responses,
without explanation, defense, excuses, or arguing.
The
key is accepting responsibility for your own thoughts and actions, rather
than blaming others, God, or "fate." How does this compare to your definition
of an effective apology? Have you ever
apologized successfully to another person? Remember how that felt to
both of you?
Option: for each
adult and child
significantly harmed by your attitudes and actions, design a genuine apology
for each major hurt, and deliver it when (a) your Self (capital "S") is
and (b) the other
person can
(is not distracted). Ideally, do this
in person. Start by apologizing to
yourself, and then focus on
other people. Your
communication
can be a major help here!
When you do this, consider an attitude of
“I am
apologizing to grow personal and relationship harmony, not to
debase myself, submit, or to fill your need.” If saying “I’m so sorry
that I…” feels like losing a battle or giving in, refocus on
your Self.
Recall:
your long-term goal is harmonizing your subselves and reducing significant
false-self wounds, over time. Reducing excessive guilts is an
important part of - and result from - progressing at that.
Pause, breathe, and let go of all these details. Recall why you began
reading this. Has anything changed for you? What are you learning, so far?
Continue with options for (a) minimizing new
guilts, and (b) reacting to over-guilty other people.
+ + +
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