Second, guilt is something that requires projection. In order for me to feel guilty for something, I have to project that I’ve harmed the life of another person. And by that I mean daily life. Or at least often. Maybe she’s still angry with me for breaking up with her like an asshole. I was. Maybe he blames me for expecting to much in the absence of love. For contributing to a death unredeemed. More simply, in guilt, I project that the transgression still operates in another person’s life. And as long as I think it affects them, I experience a certain level of guilt.
So then what’s it for? It’s some sort of emotional governor that compels people to want forgiveness. “I chose what I knew was wrong. I knew it would hurt you. I would do it differently. I wish I could. I am sorry.” It’s an odd gift. Ridding something awful. Offering something of value. Hopefully, value. Maybe even hope. Maybe it’s hope against that fear that I’m not the person I wish I were. Not hope that I might be that person I wish I were. But hope for something else instead. It has to be unrelated. Guilt can’t undo an acknowledged wrong. Neither can forgiveness.
Actually, I don’t think we can rid these heavy guilts. Not if we really accept them. That was me who did that wrong. That was me who is now me. This me is either still that me or this me born of that me. I can’t undo something done. An honest person can’t undo the past. Unless then didn’t understand it and now they do. So pray that you don’t understand what you think are your transgressions. Don’t talk yourself out of them. Get to the honest intention. The responsibility. Too often, there, I’ve found my own wrongs. And guilt. I neglected our friendship when I met her. You needed me. I knew both. I decided anyway. And that is the me of which this me is born. Can’t be undone. And so I live with it. And it changes me. Colors the colors of my day. Green is a different green. Yellow is a different yellow. But cottonwoods are still cottonwoods. And bananas are still bananas. So the guilt fades, not away, but into the emotional noise of everyday. And eventually, there is only green. And there is only yellow. And then something reminds me of the transgression, and I remember the other green and the other yellow and the me I thought I was. The life you lived before something changed because of me. Nostalgia is somewhere on the other side of guilt.
I wish this weren’t the way I understand guilt. I wish it were something I could slough. Something I could leave behind. Forget. And sometimes there is. When something happens, and I know the effects of my wrong have subsided. It doesn’t always happen. Sometimes never. Sometimes I have to talk myself into thinking that it must no longer operate in your life, in hers, in his.
And then maybe forgiveness. Maybe theirs of me. Maybe yours of me. Maybe mine of me.
I think you hit the nail on the head–that guilt is a kind of emotional governor, only I don’t think it compels people to want forgiveness. I think it prohibits forgiveness. And it is an odd governor, as our emotional governors always are. Liars and cheats. That’s what confuses me. Why would we prohibit forgiveness? Maybe I should explain that I understand, like you, that guilt does no good. Not to the other person and not for ourselves. We can only see or recognize in our hurt feelings or in the other person’s response to the situation, what we’ve done. Guilt arises in the resistance to feeling that sorrow or empathy. There is no need for it.The recognition is enough. Or, as Krishnamurti says, “seeing is action.” We can feel it and be done. If we allow ourselves to actually feel it, it is done.
Probably guilt remains because we hold onto it, thinking it can’t be that “easy” or it needs to take a certain amount of time. But do we love ourselves and each other so punily as that? That we want to elongate unhappiness? To what end? David Lynch said on twitter that we have left that unfortunate time in which suffering was considered a necessary part of life. Others have variously said the same thing, Do you believe it? Can we control that?
Control is not the right word. Is our role accepting or allowing that?
Oh wow, have you seen this website? I like today’s post, which is tangentially related to our guilt conversation.
http://www.soulpancake.com/view_post/224758/what-will-it-take-to-change-our-excessive-behaviors.html