Why do I always feel guilty? Healthy ways to handle guilt

Do you have a sense of nagging guilt that won’t subside? Perhaps it seems like no matter how well you behave or how much you achieve, you feel guilty and unworthy. Feeling bad when you’ve violated your personal values often makes sense, even if it’s unpleasant. However, experiencing guilt all the time can be confusing and distressing. You may wonder why you always feel guilty and if there is any way you can change your outlook.

Persistent guilt can come from many sources. Some people may develop this tendency in childhood because their caregivers frequently blame them, even when they aren’t at fault. Others may experience misdirected guilt after a traumatic experience or a shared tragedy. Excessive guilt can also arise from mental health conditions that make it difficult to accurately assess your responsibility and self-worth. This article will discuss how to identify the source of your guilt and process it constructively. 

Guilt, shame, and mental health

In psychological terms, guilt might be considered a self-conscious emotion—one of the feelings that prompt us to reflect on our own self-worth and on how others see us. It can often be hard to distinguish guilt from another self-conscious emotion: shame. 

There may be some disagreement about the precise difference between guilt and shame. Still, many researchers agree that guilt tends to be linked to a negative judgment of your behavior, while shame is related to a negative view of yourself in general.

Shame is often considered a greater psychological risk because it’s less likely to spur positive change. For example, research has found that shame, but not guilt, is associated with greater difficulty with substance use disorders.  

For the average person, it may not be so easy to distinguish between feeling bad about what they’ve done and feeling bad about themselves. When you’re perceiving yourself in ways that are self-critical, it can be easy to come up with reasons to feel bad based on your past actions. Many people may identify what they’re feeling as persistent guilt when it’s actually persistent shame, and vice versa.

Constant guilt may be unhealthy

There’s evidence that some kinds of guilt can pose just as much risk to your mental health as shame. For instance, a 2018 study identified two types of guilt that were just as strongly linked to anxiety disorders as shame:

1. “Free-floating guilt,” in which the individual feels guilty all the time rather than about specific things
2. Contextual-maladaptive guilt, in which a person feels guilty about things that aren’t their fault or feels excessive guilt about small transgressions

These types of guilt may be problematic because they typically offer no clear path of action. That is, it could be challenging to make amends for something that’s not your fault or something you can’t identify. 

To build a healthier self-image, you may need to get to the root of your constant guilt. The following strategies might help you manage your guilt more productively.

Name your guilty feelings

Many people may be reluctant to confront feelings of guilt, partly because they’re unpleasant and partly because they might force them to realize they need to make significant changes. However, according to The Greater Good Science Center at the University of California, Berkeley, trying to suppress negative emotions may only strengthen them. Acknowledging your sense of guilt may be a more effective way to find relief. 

Journaling could be a helpful way to start. You can try writing down the words “I feel guilty about…” and finish the sentence with whatever comes to mind. You might continue writing without pausing to correct yourself, noting whatever thoughts arise relating to the idea of guilt. This may help you clarify the sources of your persistent guilt while also helping you determine whether that guilt is justified.

Practice mindfulness

Studies have found that mindfulness—calm, nonjudgmental attention to one’s bodily sensations, thoughts, and surroundings—may increase emotional awareness. Exercises that develop this capacity may help you identify why you’re always feeling guilty.

You can work to cultivate mindfulness in many different ways, including:

• Mindfulness meditation. There are numerous versions of this practice, which is designed to produce a state of mindfulness. In general, mindfulness meditation tends to involve paying attention to your breath, your body, and any thoughts and feelings that enter your mind without trying to control or direct them. 
• Lovingkindness meditation. In lovingkindness meditation, also called metta, the practitioner typically attempts to direct feelings of compassion and empathy toward other people. Research suggests that lovingkindness meditation may increase mindfulness, which may reduce your tendency to judge yourself harshly.
• Everyday mindfulness.  You can also cultivate mindfulness in the middle of your everyday activities. This can be as simple as taking a brief pause and noting what you’re doing with your body, what thoughts and feelings are in your mind, and what’s happening around you.
• Body scan. This exercise typically involves shifting your attention through every part of the body, beginning at the feet and working your way to the crown of your head. For each body part, you can observe sensations without trying to relieve, dampen, or change them. Daily practice of the body scan technique may improve your mindfulness over time.

Look for a way to make things better

The primary difference between healthy and unhealthy guilt may be that the former may promote constructive action while the latter can be debilitating. It may be worth asking yourself if your persistent guilty feelings could be a wake-up call, reminding you that you could be doing more to live up to your personal values. 

One way to test this is to see what happens when you take some action, even a small one, to improve your behavior or help someone else. Does this action decrease your sense of guilt? If so, you may have been feeling what some psychologists call “existential guilt,” which can motivate people to do more with their limited time.

Think back to your childhood

If you’re always feeling guilty, it could be a habit learned early on in life. Receiving punishment or criticism for things that weren’t your fault might have left you with a tendency toward self-blame. Moreover, being frequently accused of transgressions you didn’t commit could have led to a “guilt complex”—an internalized belief that you’re always at fault. If you always felt guilty as a child, it may not be surprising that you now see yourself as guilty.

Abusive behavior from a trusted adult can be an even stronger driver of negative thoughts and feelings about yourself. Children may find it difficult to recognize when the adults on whom they depend don’t have their best interests at heart. Therefore, when they experience abuse, they may direct the blame toward themselves, which may lead to constant feelings of guilt. These distressing childhood experiences may lead to long-lasting challenges with self-esteem.

Consult a mental health professional

Misdirected or exaggerated feelings of guilt could also be symptoms of a mental health condition. Talking with a therapist might help you identify emotional or cognitive distortions behind your persistent guilt. Psychological difficulties that can lead to unhealthy guilt include:

• Depression. If you feel overly intense and long-lasting guilt, it might be a symptom of major depressive disorder. People with depression may feel worthless and judge themselves with extreme harshness.
• Bipolar disorder. During a depressive phase of bipolar disorder, an individual may also feel pathological guilt.
• Obsessive-compulsive disorder. Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) can involve unwarranted feelings of guilt. This guilt can be in response to intrusive thoughts about unacceptable behavior or obsessive worries that you’ve accidentally harmed someone. There’s also a specific form of OCD known as “real event OCD,” in which individuals feel obsessive guilt over past errors or misdeeds.
• Post-traumatic stress disorder. Lingering guilt may also be a response to trauma. Some individuals living with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) may believe they should have somehow prevented the traumatizing event. Others may feel guilty for having survived a situation that others did not, such as wartime combat or a natural disaster.

Therapy could help you address your guilt

If you’re interested in connecting with a therapist about feelings of guilt but you feel hesitant about traditional in-office therapy, you might consider online therapy. The convenience and speed of connecting with a therapist over the internet may mean that you can get started with little delay. Moreover, looking outside of your immediate area for mental health care may make it easier to find the right treatment provider.

Studies have repeatedly found that online therapy is just as effective as in-person therapy. One major meta-analysis concluded that the evidence showed “no difference in effectiveness” between the two approaches. Thus, online therapy may bring you the same mental health benefits in a more convenient way. 

Takeaway

If you’re always feeling guilty, it may be important to identify the roots of your emotions and determine whether they’re pointing toward something you can change. If not, it could indicate that you’re experiencing a guilt complex due to mental health challenges or unhelpful patterns learned in childhood. Processing your feelings through self-reflection, mindfulness practice, and therapy may help you discover where your guilt originated and how to resolve it. With BetterHelp, you can be matched with a therapist who has experience helping people who are living with excessive guilt. Take the first step toward overcoming guilt and reach out to BetterHelp today.