How to Stop Feeling Guilty For Every Damn Thing
LISTEN TO EP 20: ITUNES | SPOTIFY
Guilt is something that I struggled with a lot at the beginning of grieving my mother. I replayed a lot of shoulda coulda woulda’s, aka I wasted a whole lot of time on things that didn’t serve my healing experience. But the gag is (because there’s always a gag with our emotions), guilt is completely normal. And to be human means that you’re going to feel guilty occasionally, but it doesn’t have to become a psychological burden interfering your emotions.
7 Ways to Move Through Guilt and Towards Healing
1. Determine why you feel guilty. Did you even do anything wrong? Or was it something out of your control?
2. Decide on your response. Your options: an apology, a plan of how you’ll prevent a repeat. Not an option: ghosting. (Check out ep #6 for a communication cheat sheet.)
3. Be willing to forgive yourself. You ever notice how much easier it is for you to forgive someone else than it is to forgive yourself?
4. Write a letter. You can write to yourself or the other person. Treat it as an emotional release exercise. Purge the feelings of guilt.
5. Do something positive that will boost your self-esteem. Maybe volunteer or donate. Any way to remind yourself that you’re a good person. Because you are!
6. Make changes instead of feeling guilty. Ask yourself, ‘What are some positive changes I can make that are related to the cause of my guilt?’
7. After you’ve done these things… it’s time to move on! There’s absolutely no value in holding on to guilt. Guilty feelings suggest that you did something wrong and need to learn from it. So, learn from it. Then, move on.
Before I leave you today, I want to leave you some affirming phrases to help with your release of guilt. So, repeat after me:
As I forgive, I grow stronger.
By forgiving myself, I can forgive others.
I am at peace with the past.
I allow myself to move forward in life.
Hope you loved this episode. If you did, please do me a favor and submit a review on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Also be sure to subscribe to the podcast so that you can be the first to get new episodes. And I’d like to encourage you to share this episode on IG stories, Twitter, Facebook. Make sure you tag me, I am @tyalexander on IG and @lovetyalexander on Twitter. Just share it, girl!
Head over to https://www.patreon.com/selfcareirl to sign up for our exclusive membership community to receive daily pep talks, downloadable monthly self care guides, ad free podcasts, exclusive soul dump audio, guided meditations and more.