Overcoming guilt day three

People handle guilt in different ways. Some people try to cover it up by working themselves to death. Some people try to ignore guilt by drinking themselves into a stooper. Some people try to mask their guilt by doing charity work or good deeds. Whenever we carry alot of guilt we often have an overwhelming feeling that we need to make up for our failures in some way. Are there some better ways to process guilt? We will discuss that later on.

There are some people who make a habit of failing in their responsibilities that they have. Often they justify their actions by saying to themselves, 'I'll make up for it later.' This is a complete deception of self though. Whenever we treat people around us as 'unimportant' by not fulfilling our responsibilities we can try to make it up, but in the end you will continually be remembered as the person that makes a commitment but does not follow through. When we do this we gloss over the feelings of guilt that we have by convincing our self that it is OK to break a commitment as long as you make it up later. Since we gloss over our guilt, we hurt people around us over and over with our selfish behavior and in the end isolate our self. Should we bend over backwards to try to keep a commitment we made, even if it cost us significantly? Yes, we should. Of course there are times that we have to break a commitment, that is a part of life. However, when breaking commitments is a pattern in your life it is usually because you are promising too much to too many people. If you are a busy person, don't over extend your commitments. If you are a selfish person don't try to act like you aren't selfish by making promises to others that you later break.

Alot of guilt that we get stuck with is the result of over commitment. We want to please our spouse, our kids, our boss, our friends, and we hope to have some time left to eventually do what we want to do too. One of the hardest things to admit to yourself is that you simply cannot be all things to all people. Making a list of priorities, or getting someone to help you make a list of priorities is essential. This topic goes both ways. There are some that are so self centered that all they want to do is the things they enjoy. They absolutely despise doing things for their kids or spouse, or others. Then there are others that ignore their own happiness, even to the point of destroying their health just to be there for other people. Neither of these extremes are good for us. If we can bring balance to this area of our lives we can be on the road to overcoming both our stress and our guilt. Our upbringing plays a big part in how we deal with guilt in our lives.

As long as you are measuring your life by what someone else expects of you, guilt will always be your master. Parents can sometimes be demanding on their kids. The feeling that you did not live up to your parents expectation can haunt you your entire life. That lays a bed of guilt in your soul that colors everything you do. Often we pass on these high expectations to our own kids, simply because we are trying to live up to our own parents expectations of us through our kids. Then your kids pass the same thing on to their kids. Does it ever stop? Yes, the cycle is broken when we begin to realize that we can set our own expectations for our lives. When we have the confidence to feel good about what we have accomplished, we don't need the approval of other people any more. If you lay out a set of principles and goals for yourself and accomplish those goals and find happiness in that, most parents in the end will be very proud of what you have done with your life.

Where do you start in setting goals to better yourself. The best thing to do is look at your life and think about the things in you life that bug you the most? Your exercise habits? Your job pay scale? Your bad habits? Your relationships? What is it that bugs you the most about you. Pick just one thing and the decide you are going to do something about it. Alot of times we know what needs to be done, we just have never got up and done anything about it. If you seriously don't know what you need to get yourself moving the right direction, take some time to ask your spouse of your friends. It won't take too much time to hear from them the areas in which you need some work. You may not like what they say, but really take time to think about it. When you begin to do some of the things that you have failed to do, you will find that you are feeling much better about yourself and the feeling of guilt and self doubt that you have are getting less.