I\u2019ve experienced just about every emotion that exists over the past months, and one of them is guilt. I\u2019m pretty sure guilt is something that just about everyone struggles with from time to time. But I was just thinking \u2014 we often think of guilt in an unfavorable way. Claire used to speak of \u201cCatholic guilt\u201d from time to time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And I guess, if you think about it, guilt is not always a bad thing. According to Charles Darwin, emotions evolved to help us respond to out environments. Guilt, like other human emotions, serves important functions in our lives and is often helpful. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Psychologists say that guilt is the feeling of regret for something we have done. There are various kinds of guilt, or at least various degrees of guilt. If you gave up drinking for lent and you had a drink, that\u2019s a relatively minor guilt. If you said something bad about one of your best friends, that\u2019s a more serious kind of guilt. And if you do something like cheat on your wife, that\u2019s a much more serious, or deep-seated kind of grief.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Usually, when I feel guilty, I have the urge to do something to \u201cfix\u201d whatever made me feel guilty. If it\u2019s something like taking a drink during lent, just saying, \u201cI won\u2019t do that again\u201d is usually enough. If I\u2019m feeling guilty about something that had an impact on someone else, probably at least an apology is in order and maybe some work to repair a relationship, or something like that. Really bad guilt is much harder \u2014 that\u2019s something that just eats on you and we feel miserable about whatever wrong we\u2019ve done.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Guilt is the result of two related processes \u2014 the standards we hold for ourselves and our interpretation of our behavior against those standards. When it comes to evaluating guilt in todays world, it\u2019s the underlying beliefs that matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So what about a person who experiences no<\/em> guilt? I\u2019m pretty sure that that\u2019s at least part of the definition of a psychopath \u2014 someone with no sense of guilt. People like that exist\u2026. people that practice human trafficking, unethical business practices, bombings, terrorism, drug pushers, serial killers\u2026. maybe even future \u201cleaders\u201d of our country.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n So maybe guilt can be a good thing sometimes for good people\u2026 for bad people, it\u2019s probably not even a \u201cthing.\u201d\u00a0 I\u2019ve experienced just about every emotion that exists over the past months, and one of them is guilt. I\u2019m pretty sure guilt is something that just about everyone struggles with from time to time. But I was just thinking \u2014 … Continue reading
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