A Problem of Guilt

It’s time for therapy blogging with Matt.  Tonight’s topic: Guilt.

I have a problem with guilt.

All the time.  Even when things are going well and right, I feel guilty. 

Tonight, while I was playing the piano, my mind began to wander (as it often does when I’m playing the piano), and I remembered back to a day in my sixth grade English class with Mr. Soltis.  We were doing a vocabulary lesson where we had to take our spelling words for the week, and place them into sentences.  In my hormone-addled Jr. High School mind (Jr. High is the armpit of human existence) I thought it would be funny to use the vocabulary words to poke fun at Mr. Soltis himself.

Now, normally, I was a pretty good kid in school.  I didn’t sass the teachers or cause problems in class.  It was exceptionally rare that a teacher got mad at me…at least to the point that they let it show.  But Mr. Soltis was my neighbor from across the street.  His daughter and I were in the same age and knew each other pretty well.  I felt like he would understand my playing around.  So, I started writing these mild jabs using my vocabulary words. 

Eventually, when it came time for us to read our examples, I started reading through mine.  Being a class full of Jr. High kids, they laughed at my jokes, which was really what I was after.  Mr. Soltis, however, didn’t find it funny.  He exploded and told me that I was so cynical, and to stop reading.  I was mortified.  I just wanted to have a little fun.

I relate this story not because I think that the story itself is particularly interesting, but more because it illustrates a problem that I’ve carried with me for my entire life.  I still, to this day, feel guilty about it.  Mr. Soltis’ class was my third class of the day, and I remember trudging home feeling horrible about making him mad.  I even confessed to my parents because I felt so bad.

It’s not uncommon for me to involuntarily recall various moments of my life that make me feel guilty: the time my mom found a piece of "erotica" in my pocket that I had written as part of a meme in my highschool where my circle of friends were writing filthy letters to "Dear Diary," the times I’ve destroyed friendships, the lies I’ve told to people who trusted me, the times I’ve failed to keep my commitments.  They just flow like water.

I don’t really understand where my nearly crippling sense of guilt comes from, or why it has become such a demon in my life.  But it’s omnipresent for me.  I seem to remember every single thing that I’ve ever done wrong, and I feel terrible about it.  I’ve got a mental catalog that I am able to pull out at a moment’s notice and flog myself over.

This wellspring of guilt has, of course, managed to shape my life pretty significantly–particularly in regards to those issues surrounding my sexuality and, even moreso, my participation (or lack thereof) in church.  I spent most of my life feeling guilty about not being able to get married and have kids and be the "ideal" the Mormon man.  I felt insane levels of guilt every time I struggled with feelings I didn’t choose or couldn’t control.  When I decided to take a step back from participation in church and re-evaluate my life a little, I felt guilty.  I still feel guilty that I’ve disappointed my parents and family members.

Guilt has been such an overriding emotion (is it an emotion?) in my life.  I was so worried about doing something wrong, I feel like I’ve missed out on a lot of experiences.

Does anyone else feel like this?  What do you do to get around it? Because I would really like to stop feeling like the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale and figure out a way to live my day-to-day life without having to flog myself with a mental cat-o-nine-tails.