Should this go under 'mental & emotional'... I don't know...
So Guilt. The big G. I manage to feel a whole load of guilt on a daily basis. I haven't actually done anything that awful, no hidden bodies in the garden but I do spend a whole lot of time feeling guilty. Whether it be that the kitchen should be tidied, the children should do more homework, the plants need repotting etc etc. Now I can rationalise til the cows come home but still it doesn't help. I know that guilt won't get me anywhere. I have tried to do the things that I feel guilty about, repotted the plants, sat on the kids til their homework is done (in turn I feel guilty about sitting on them :D) but then the short period of 'aaaah.. I am a good woman/mother/plant owner' subsides and hey presto Big Guilt creeps it's way back in through all of my open pores (which I haven't cleansed properly - more guilt) and I am back to square one.
I have written lists, I have tried to prioritise but what I really want is acceptance of the way things are.
What are your thoughts on guilt? Do you succumb to guilt daily or just for the big things? Do you have any tricks to deal with it... I look forward to your replies!
Hi Delighted
You almost had the answer in your post when you wrote:
what I really want is acceptance of the way things are
If you choose to accept self, then the way things are does not give you guilt, if you decide that today that you are not happy with the look of the garden, then if you have some time to attend to it, you will go and sort it out so that you are happy with the look of it, if not then it is not of importance, it will get done when you are ready to address it.
It all comes down to self, guilt is a form of self rejection, it makes you feel unhappy, happiness comes from self acceptance, just be happy to be yourself. 🙂
Just beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.....
Just beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.....
~ Delighted. You seem Delighted!
I think it's bordering on mental instability to be honest :D!
I think it's bordering on mental instability to be honest :D!
Well, once that unstable structure has collapsed, there might be buried treasures underneath 🙂
....yeah;) You know it makes sense - I'll look out for the change in avatar:D
Hey Delighted,
Ok, so here are my thoughts.
I think that if you've got to the stage where rationalising is of no use, then the answer to your situation may possibly lie in your emotions somehow. Possibly, at the moment, feeling guilty is a habit and it serves you in some way. Obviously, the way to break the habit would be to make a new habit (of not feeling guilty) But, I guess you have to face up to why you have the 'guilty addiction' in the first place. So here are some questions you can ask and see how you feel within when you ask them. Then relax into the emotion.......you'll find it can't hurt you and will probably subside
What would happen if you just didn't feel guilty? Would people say......oooh, what a bad mother', or 'what an untidy garden'. If so, why do you care? Is it because thats what you would think if the situation were reversed. Would you judge them in thae same way?
If so, maybe you need to consider how you can stop (showing them compassion and realising you may not have the full story on their lives and in turn show yourself some compassion too)
If not, then why do you hold yourself to a higher standard? Are you better than them?
What would happen if you reduced your standards to be just like them?
Ok, ok........I realise this may seem like rationalising again, but maybe I've asked some questions you haven't and this could lead to you being able to accept yourself as you are.
Let me know if you want more questions you can ask!!:D
So Guilt. The big G.!
One of the things that leaves us most often with a feeling of guilt is soul loss.
Hey Delighted,
Ok, so here are my thoughts.
I think that if you've got to the stage where rationalising is of no use, then the answer to your situation may possibly lie in your emotions somehow. Possibly, at the moment, feeling guilty is a habit and it serves you in some way. Obviously, the way to break the habit would be to make a new habit (of not feeling guilty) But, I guess you have to face up to why you have the 'guilty addiction' in the first place. So here are some questions you can ask and see how you feel within when you ask them. Then relax into the emotion.......you'll find it can't hurt you and will probably subside
What would happen if you just didn't feel guilty? Would people say......oooh, what a bad mother', or 'what an untidy garden'. If so, why do you care? Is it because thats what you would think if the situation were reversed. Would you judge them in thae same way?
If so, maybe you need to consider how you can stop (showing them compassion and realising you may not have the full story on their lives and in turn show yourself some compassion too)
If not, then why do you hold yourself to a higher standard? Are you better than them?
What would happen if you reduced your standards to be just like them?
Ok, ok........I realise this may seem like rationalising again, but maybe I've asked some questions you haven't and this could lead to you being able to accept yourself as you are.
Let me know if you want more questions you can ask!!:D
Interesting points Crystal Elf!! Actually it is funny - a lot of the time it is exactly that, I worry about what other people/friends think.. I constantly apologise for the state of the house and whilst I know that it probably does affect the tidiest of my friends, in the most part, I get 'what's wrong with your house?'. Things plague me like, the skirting boards and the lack of cupboard space.. so then I think that I'll build a cupboard, which never happens (although I did make some lovely shelving inside an alcove a couple of weeks ago :D). I have such an enormous list of things to do that I am really facing a never-ending battle which I will never win.
And yes, I have asked myself about being judgmental about other peoples houses/standards and it makes me laugh because other peoples dirt/untidiness doesn't bother me so much - I think it stems from my desire to compartmentalise and also to help keep my depression at bay.
Crowan.. where might my soul be?
Crowan.. where might my soul be?
When something happens that part of our soul cannot cope with, it leaves. The ‘something’ might be a trauma (car accidents and childhood abuse are two classics) or it might be a ‘wearing away’ over many months or years (bullying will do this. So will any situation where we deny who we are in order to ‘get on’ with others or we put aside our dreams and needs in order to cope with life. Anything where we are not following the path our soul knows that it should be following will do it.
The bit that can’t deal with the situation goes – and what is left is more able to cope, but leaves us operating ‘on three cylinders’.
As to where they go? Sometimes, particularly if they went when the person was very young, they simply return to the Land of the Dead. More usually they will be lost in the ‘fog’ between here and the Land of the Dead.
Classic symptoms are guilt, depression, a feeling of not being complete.
(I wish HP had a page for this stuff, or at least a sticky at the start of the shamanism forum!)
Gosh that sounds interesting Crowan. There are certainly parts of what you have said that resonate with me.
Hi Crowan
If there is not a thread within the Shamanic forum about what you term soul loss, then you can always start a new topic in there so that people will understand the terminology. 🙂
There are other explanations for what you term 'soul loss', in the mental emotional forum it would most likely be addressed as the 'inner child', basically when we experience something which we feel will threaten that aspects of us that we feel is precious and vulnerable, then we bury it deep within us and make ourselves forget where we have buried it, so that we can't be forced to reveal its location.
So yes the symptoms of what you describe as soul loss and what is more commonly known as inner child, will be an inner conflict which arrives out of the inner division that we have created within self to replace our wholeness.
Guilt is self rejection the same as depression, they are both a form of anger turned inward and directed at self, they are both formed by the divisions that are created through self judgement which has replaced the wholeness which we experienced through self acceptance.
We sort this out quite simply by reintroducing someone to the aspects of self that they have buried within self, it takes very little time, it is painless and the wholeness is recreated instantly as all aspects once more merge to become one.
If there is not a thread within the Shamanic forum about what you term soul loss, then you can always start a new topic in there so that people will understand the terminology.
There have been such threads. But they get lost with the great number of posts. So I thought a sticky would be useful.
There are other explanations for what you term 'soul loss', in the mental emotional forum it would most likely be addressed as the 'inner child', basically when we experience something which we feel will threaten that aspects of us that we feel is precious and vulnerable, then we bury it deep within us and make ourselves forget where we have buried it, so that we can't be forced to reveal its location.
So yes the symptoms of what you describe as soul loss and what is more commonly known as inner child, will be an inner conflict which arrives out of the inner division that we have created within self to replace our wholeness.
Similar, in a superficial way, but not the same. I posted at length about soul loss because I was asked to. I know you do not believe the basics of shamanism. I dont believe the basics of your practice, either. I was writing about something that happens on a spiritual level, not a psychological one.
Hi Crowan
If you make a post on an old thread, it brings it back to the top of the list of topics, or you can start a new one to express your own understandings. 🙂
Just for clarification, although I mentioned the mental emotional forum and the way that the inner child is usually describe within psychological circles, I do not perceive it that way myself as I do not deal with spirituality or psychology, I deal with consciousness.
To my understanding, if beings of consciousness were to come and steal aspects of people's consciousness and run off with them for whatever reason, then the effect would be catastrophic if not fatal.
If you make a post on an old thread, it brings it back to the top of the list of topics, or you can start a new one to express your own understandings.
The point of a sticky, or an entry under HP therapies, is that they don’t have to be posted on regularly. Besides, they aren’t ‘my own understandings’, they are the understanding / knowledge of shamanic experience.
To my understanding, if beings of consciousness were to come and steal aspects of people's consciousness and run off with them for whatever reason, then the effect would be catastrophic if not fatal.
I really wonder why, every time I mention soul loss, you reply about ‘soul-stealing’, which I have told you before is very rare. Your understanding of how this would work is, of course, limited since (as you have said, yourself) you know little of shamanism.