guilt

today's post is co-written by my friend LES. i almost feel like she wrote the bulk of the post. and i think it is an important post, so i am going to publish it. 

"Guilt is a cognitive or an emotional experience that occurs when a person realizes or believes—accurately or not—that he or she has compromised his or her own standards of conduct or has violated a moral standard, and bears significant responsibility for that violation."  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guilt_(emotion)

guilt is something that we all feel at some point. whether warranted or not. i feel like we are always already guilty. born with guilt built in as a mechanism of reacting and interacting with our world. the trick is to know how to use guilt as a teacher. 

LES says that there are 3 types of guilt:

1. you have no part to play but feel guilty.
2. you have some part but don't own it all
3. you are to blame and own all the guilt. 

how we deal with these situations is related to our resilience. 

"Guilt and its associated causes, merits, and demerits are common themes in psychologyand psychiatry. Both in specialized and in ordinary language, guilt is an affective state in which one experiences conflict at having done something that one believes one should not have done (or conversely, having not done something one believes one should have done). It gives rise to a feeling which does not go away easily, driven by 'conscience'.Sigmund Freud described this as the result of a struggle between the ego and the superego – parental imprinting. Freud rejected the role of God as punisher in times of illness or rewarder in time of wellness. While removing one source of guilt from patients, he described another. This was the unconscious force within the individual that contributed to illness, Freud in fact coming to consider "the obstacle of an unconscious sense of guilt...as the most powerful of all obstacles to recovery." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guilt_(emotion)

guilt as an obstacle. we get stuck in our guilt and find it hard to move forward. LES talked about full guilt and partial guilt:

with partial guilt, you can look at what is your part, but then look at how it isn't, who else was involved, how you are part of a bigger picture.
and with full guilt- you did do it - how you can learn from it and make sure you dont do it again. how you can understand why you did what you did in the moment and how this can help you release some of the shame /guilt and move forward and learn.

learning from our actions and our behaviour is the most important thing that we can do in life. 

so what? how do we deal with guilt?

1. identify what kind of guilt you are experiencing.
2. identify the purpose of the guilt in your life?
3. make amends. 
4. recognize what you did, and move on.
5. learn from your behaviours/actions

and how is guilt connected to resilience? 

resilience is our ability to bounce back from our guilt, from things that have happened to us, from things that we think are our fault, whether or not they are. 

LES has been exploring resilience, how she can relate to other people's stories and how resilience can hold strength and weakness in one definition.

so what is resilience and how is it helpful?

resilience is the ability to adapt to stress and adversity. it is the ability to get knocked down and get back up again. 

i want to talk about ferns ... yes, that's right ... ferns ... the plant. 

ferns are really cool for a number of reasons. and they are a symbol of resilience. 

ferns have been around for about 360 million years. they grow in various climates and ecosystems, from dry lands to oceans. ferns don't have seeds. they contain everything within themselves to reproduce. ferns grow in adverse conditions. and when conditions are adverse, ferns curl up to protect themselves until after the storm. 

ferns are also used as a spiritual symbol. 

"The tightly curled fronds of young ferns are deceptive and it would be impossible to guess what a full grown fern would look like at this stage of development. Human kind is the same. Our consciousness must be awakened through life experience, learning, and awareness. Like the fern, we grow and flourish if we unfurl toward light or truth. The more we unfurl, the more the tendrils of our true nature begin to show as we loosen, surrender and soften, releasing and opening as we let go of old stories and rigidly constructed belief systems which contribute to negative patterns of behavior." http://www.fernlifecenter.com/about-fern-life/why-the-fern/

LES said: 

the fern has such strength and yet equal vulnerability. It has the ability to let itself be vulnerable and be beatiful in its vulnerability. I love that they also have the strength in their core to keep them going when things get tough and that they are able to curl themselve up and weather the storm - protecting their vulneralble branchy bits… still there, still holding on, just able to keep all the bits safe with the strength of the core. its a resourceful little bugger… i love that about it. it is often overlooked becuase it isn't shiny and pretty on the outside but it holds much depth and strength and intensity…. i like that. I identify with that.

what does resilience mean to you? what images come to mind? what symbols? 

i look forward to your responses. 

be kind to yourself, 

xoxo

...