When you start to experience depression and anxiety, feelings of guilt and shame tend to creep into your thoughts. I help patients process the feelings usually present when they are not feeling well and/or are very anxious about life. When you feel as if you are not doing the right thing or are not far enough along in the world, it is important to pause to evaluate whether your thoughts are justified. More than likely, they are not.
While the terms guilt and shame are often used interchangeably, they are very distinct emotions with different paths to healing. Simply stated, guilt is when you think you did something wrong. Shame is when you think there’s something fundamentally wrong with you.
Guilt is usually related to an incident that you feel remorse over, whether it was an action or inaction. It’s also possible to feel guilt for things outside of your control, which is often the cause of survivor guilt. Guilt can also sometimes lead to shame, if you come to believe that there is some personal flaw in you that caused the incident.
Shame is often rooted in insecurity, which may be caused by negative experiences that become internalized. While it is usually fairly easy to find the reasons for guilty feelings, shame usually requires a deeper examination of root causes.
Self-talk for guilt and shame
When you experience guilt, your self-talk may include statements like, “I can’t believe I did that! What was I thinking?! I really hurt his feelings and I feel so terrible about it.” This can often lead to self-condemning statements such as “I’m so stupid. Why did I do that? I feel like such a terrible person.” These statements, if not checked, can lead to a deeper sense of shame. But if the guilt is caught early enough and addressed, you may be able to avoid falling into the pit of shame.
When you experience shame, the self-condemnation is deeper. Your self-talk may include statements like, “No one loves me. I’m unlovable. I don’t deserve good things. I’m a terrible person. I’m broken and unfixable. There’s something really wrong with me.” These kinds of statements are dark and deeply harmful, making you turn in on yourself and away from others.
How to address guilt
The emotion of guilt can actually be helpful because it can lead you to address behavior that you perceive is wrongful. As a therapist, I work with people through their feelings of guilt to discover the incidents that may have caused those feelings. At times we may discover together that the guilt is unfounded and we discuss ways to overcome the false guilt. But if it is built upon an incident that you determine is truly a mistake that you made, the first step is to address it, take responsibility, and admit you were wrong to the person you wronged. Ask forgiveness and promise to change your behavior. If you must make amends in some way, discuss with the person how you can make it up to him or her.
Sometimes, if a relationship has been harmed, repairing the damage may take a lot of effort because trust has been broken. But try. If you try to change your behavior, your friend or loved one may begin to trust you again and you can patch up the relationship. I have seen marriages heal when the wronged spouse sees that the repentant spouse is really trying.
One of my areas of focus is cognitive behavioral therapy, which helps people make changes to their lives by focusing on automatic thoughts that lead to specific behaviors. We go through a variety of techniques that can help you positively retrain your automatic reactions and thoughts in order to help overcome actions or behaviors that have led to guilt in the past.
How to address shame
Shame is caused by deep-seated emotions that may be rooted in past experiences. Psychodynamic therapy, another one of my areas of focus, can help you understand your unique history of thoughts, relationships, and behavior patterns to unlock unconscious internal dilemmas. By looking deeper into early childhood and life experiences you had growing up, we can often find the root causes of shame and help you make more conscious rather than reactive emotional choices.
No one should live with either guilt or shame. Guilt, if caught early, can sometimes be healed without the help of a therapist, but shame often needs the gentle guidance of an expert in a safe environment to address deeper wounds that need to heal. I encourage you to find a competent therapist near you.