Why Guilt is a useless emotion

            Most emotions are useful in that they teach us something.  It is only when we experience the emotion of sadness that we can truly appreciate the emotion of happiness.  Anger teaches us what it is like to know calm.  Frustration can give us a lesson in patience.  As you’ve probably caught on, we learn from emotion because by experiencing it, we can appreciate another emotion because of it. 

Now, let’s consider the emotion of guilt for a moment. Guilt is the fact of having committed a specified incident or crime.  However, we often place guilt on ourselves without facts.  How many times have you heard or said this statement:  “I feel guilty because/that…”.  Guilt doesn’t aid us in appreciating another emotion or ourselves.  Guilty often does a layer of self-doubt, making us critical of ourselves, and possibly lowering our self-esteem.  The fact is that most of the guilt that humans feel is not for committing horrible crimes or actions.  Most guilt is for neglecting responsibilities or duties.  Most of us feel guilt in forgetting to text back a friend, not feeling we did our best at a presentation at work, buying a store-made treat for our child’s school party instead of making something homemade, or forgetting our sister’s birthday. 

While we all want to be responsible humans and better ourselves as people, guilt aims to put us down.  It doesn’t serve as a reminder to be more responsible or to do better next time.  Guilt says, “You have failed.”  Guilt says, “You aren’t going to succeed next time either.”  If you find yourself falling into the trap of feeling guilty, the best way to move forward is to forgive yourself.  Forgiving yourself allows you to know that everyone makes mistakes.  When we acknowledge we have made a mistake, we can think about learning from it.  First, ask yourself if any excuses need to be made.  Did you miss your Dad’s birthday dinner?  Call to apologize.  When you do, think about how you can make amends.  When we make a plan to make things better, we are more likely to forgive ourselves.