The Power of Guilt | Ep 326

what's up guys welcome back to build and today I want to talk about guilt so if the audio sounds bad it's because I am traveling and as I'm traveling I don't have my normal recording setup and so I really was like I'm not gonna record this because it's not gonna sound good and I was like fuck that I really want to talk about this right now it's been something that I've been thinking about all week and I was writing down my thoughts this morning as I'm here I'm in California looking for a second home and I'm sitting by the fire and thought you know what fuck it I'm gonna record this so I really want to talk about guilt and I'll tell you guys the reason why I want to talk about that today I have been doing a ton of work on myself this last year and I would say like specifically the last six months and I probably stayed pretty quiet about it because it is you know sometimes I think when you're figuring things out for yourself you just don't feel like sharing them publicly at that exact moment but when I say work on myself I really mean I felt like for the last gosh I want to say three years in starting acquisition.com I just kind of I rode off of all the work I did prior mentally and I'm the type of person that I normally am constantly working on myself but I just threw myself into the work so much that I really just put a lot of those things on the back burner and I'll be honest I don't regret it because I think that I gained so many skills in business and as an entrepreneur that I wouldn't have otherwise but I also just see it as seasons and so I'm really in a different season of my life right now thinking about the next chapter looks like thinking about that looks like for me in the business and I'm really excited to share some updates with you guys in the coming months that are going to be really exciting but that being said I have been working with all sorts of coaches all sorts of therapists all sorts of people not because I think there's something wrong with me but because I think the fastest way to learn is to get within proximity of people that are experts and so I was working with a therapist the other day and I was talking about some of the behaviors that I'm trying to break and I specifically brought up two conversations I was having with two different people and basically you know I brought these conversations up because I didn't love how I left the conversations I didn't like how I felt about myself and as we kept digging in Y Y Y going through the motions then I realized it was like oh my gosh the reason why this conversation didn't go the way that I wanted to go is because I was so fearful of the guilt that I would feel and I thought that's what was so strange about it is that it wasn't fear it was not anxiety it wasn't even like I had some sort of anger or frustration or feeling like I oh the person it was literally just guilt and it was guilt for making a choice that might cause pain to somebody else so that I could have what I wanted and so as I realized that it was like within that moment I was like holy shit I blew my mind like I was like I don't make the choices I want to make very often because I feel guilty about pain it will cause somebody else even if it's what I want for myself and my life and as I uncovered that I started really thinking about it and I was like okay this is something I really want to I want to learn more about I want to dive into it and so I started studying guilt the power of guilt why do we have the emotion guilt why does it even exist and I thought it was fascinating because you know what guilt actually is and why does it exist well a lot of the reason why guilt exists is because it's a feeling that we get so that will stay as part of the tribe because for thousands of years as humans guilt was a very powerful motion to keep us in the tribe and then you know essentially if we stayed in the tribe right then we don't die and so as soon as I realized that I was like oh my gosh like all thousand percent makes sense but I think there's different types of guilt now that one we know that we're not going to get eaten by lions if we don't please people to I think that there's kind of guilt that's healthy and then a kind of guilt that's probably not healthy and I wanted to share with you guys the definitions I have now made of those to help myself really differentiate it and then how I'm walking through I would say like getting over guilt and not allowing it to have power over me in my own life I think that it's a signal and oftentimes it tells you that you violate some sort of moral or ethical code not even necessarily just expectations and I think that's really what matters the most so here's how I define the two types of guilt for myself okay what is healthy guilt healthy guilt is when it's aligned with my values my values and you and I probably have different values but it keeps me from intentionally hurting other people and it's my conscience saying this is not what you want to live your life by that was out of line with your values maybe we should course correct now I will say the healthy guilt is one that I'm totally want to keep I don't want that to go away I don't want to be a psychopath I don't want to be a narcissist so like I'm too totally cool keeping healthy guilt like please stay with me now unhealthy guilt this is the one that I think that I have fallen prey to and a lot of you probably have as well it keeps me trapped in other people's emotions or expectations and so that's really when if I really boil it down it's that voice that's like well you can't change that because so and so will be disappointed so and so will be angry frustrated sad etc and as soon as I realized that that was something that was controlling some of my decisions I was making not large decisions but micro decisions and moderate decisions I really wanted to define those two because I realized that I think healthy guilt is really important to have and I think that that is something you don't want to get rid of but unhealthy guilt it's really that you start letting other people's emotions control your life and your choices and most people let this run their entire lives so interestingly enough after I realized this I had two very difficult conversations within two days and I went into those difficult conversations thinking okay as long as I'm aligned with my values I already know what I know what I want this outcome to be right in each of these situations it was discussions around a decision where me and the other person were not in agreement around what direction to take I already felt very strongly that I wanted to take a certain direction because it's aligned with my values and my life and I have the control in both of these situations and so I knew it was going to upset the person or people and it was I'll tell you guys like in one of the conversations it was insane how much this person persisted to get me to I would say like succumb to their guilt I essentially counted that I had to tell them my decision 23 times 23 times I had to tell this person that I did not agree and I was going to do this other decision anyways it was crazy and I will tell you guys while I was having the decision the discussion you know I have hard discussions all the time but I didn't realize that I have so many discussions where it's like little things like this I'll just go with what the other person wants and so as I'm sitting there saying no no no no no you know my cortisol is rising I'm kind of like sweating I'm but I'm at the same time like no I'm so sorry this has nothing to do with you but this is my decision I don't want to do that and I will tell you though I felt you know somewhat stressed and elevated during the conversation after the conversation I was so fucking proud of myself I was like oh my god I did not succumb to this primal need to fit in and please other people this feels amazing and I've identified people pleasing in many other areas of my life but I've never attached it to this feeling of guilt and as soon as I realize that there's so many things that I feel guilty about that control me this was incredibly helpful and so I'll say the best thing you can do once you recognize that you become aware of these things is just immediately take action because in both of those conversations I left feeling very proud of myself and really glad that I respected my own ethics boundaries and desires rather than the other persons above mine and here's what happens if you don't right if you don't respect yours above all else it really becomes like this self-imposed prison because you start apologizing to people for having boundaries and having your own goals that conflict with their desires of your life right this is where you see people who stay in jobs this in relationships or roles that they do not want to not because they were working for them but because leaving feels bad most people are controlled by punishment not reward seriously punishment feels twice as bad as winning and so what a lot of people do is carry other people's emotions as if they are their responsibility like somehow you are supposed to manage how everybody else feels and that's what what nobody tells you and what I really realize is like we think guilt makes us good seriously think about it we think that guilt means that we're good people good person when the opposite is much more true oftentimes it makes us tired resentful and we don't live within our honesty we're not being honest we're not being authentic because when we're controlled by guilt we're not making decisions based on what's right we're making the base on keeping everybody else comfortable and that is honestly it is people pleasing disguised as good doing so how do we become aware of where we carry guilt okay I want to really just take a second to help you become aware because I think there's really three steps to changing things like this in your life it's awareness acceptance action okay so to become aware ask yourself these questions where in your life do you feel responsible for someone else's feelings what relationships in your life feel really heavy feel hard feel tough where do you find yourself saying yes just to avoid saying no okay so here's a really practical way to spot it notice how often you say I should instead of I want I should call them back I should go to the dinner I should stay late I should get the stunt I should be happy for them every single fucking time you fear yourself say should ask yourself whose voice whose desires whose responsibility is that really and sometimes it might help if you just write it down like every area that that keep where guilt drives your decisions if you write it down it will immediately have less power over you because you really can't change the things that you don't see and it's helpful if you can look and refer to something on ongoing basis to remember ah yes I tend to feel responsibility about this thing which is truly not our responsibility at all okay so now that you become aware right and write that down what do you actually do about it the first piece is you have to separate responsibility from empathy this is something that I've got I've tried so hard my whole life to learn you can care about somebody you can care about someone's feelings without carrying them their disappointment does not need to be your emergency and their discomfort does not mean that you did anything wrong you are allowed to make a choice that's right for you even if somebody else does not like that choice there are so many times where I will make a decision in my business and I know somebody's not going to like it and I have empathy for them but I still make the decision hey here's what we're doing you know I'm gonna bring this personal on blah blah I understand that you're and we just find about this make complete sense I'm here for you but we did make this decision that's empathy empathy is saying you're allowed to have your feelings I am here for you I see you it's not saying oh I feel bad for you and I will change my decision because when we change our decision it's usually out of sympathy it's usually because we think that that person can't handle their own emotions think about that when we take responsibility for someone else's emotions we're essentially saying I don't think you can handle your emotions so I will handle them for you I will make sure you don't have to seal them now the second thing we do from there is we learn to tolerate the guilt okay this is the shift I want you guys to focus on growth often feels like guilt at first so when you set a boundary for the first time you will feel guilty when you leave something that's not serving you you will feel guilty when you choose yourself and not somebody else's feelings you will feel guilty that does not mean stop it means you're in an unfamiliar territory you have to just let the guilt exist don't try to fix it don't try to explain away don't try to overcompensate don't try to reassure the person just let yourself feel guilty it's really like exposure therapy the more that you feel it and you can tolerate it you realize that you don't need to do something with the feeling it can exist in your body and you don't need to get rid of it the stronger you become and the more you can make decisions aligned with your values which brings me to the next point re-anchor to your values so when the guilt shows up right we talked about healthy versus unhealthy guilt I want you to ask yourself this question does this decision violate my integrity and morals or just somebody else's feelings if it's your integrity great we can fix it we can apologize we can repair we can say what are we going to do better next time if it is just somebody else's expectations somebody else's feelings let them be disappointed that is not something for you to take on that is not your responsibility and so that really brings me to my last point which is something that I'd have you know there's a relationship expert which is neateri real talks about this and it's similar in relationships in your romantic relationship that you also do in relationships in general which is practice repair not avoiding the conflict so when guilt is valid when you actually did something that doesn't align with who you want to be own it and repair the damage but don't overcompensate by then allowing that guilt to make you succumb to that person's guilt and feelings thereafter don't apologize for trying to do what's best for you and don't shrink yourself to try and make other people comfortable because you made a mistake one time it's like the punishment must be appropriate for the crime if you did something one time in a fleeting moment that was out of line with your your morals or integrity say it own it practice do not beat yourself up for it and don't think that it means that now you must feel bad and oh you owe that person your guilt therefore instead just get back on the field and keep trying right focus on charging forward doing your best making mistakes and getting really good at repairing things rather than like avoiding holding back not firing because you're afraid that you're gonna set somebody off you're gonna do something wrong we all make mistakes we all fuck up we are human that is part of the human experience I make mistakes all the time if you listen to me think I don't make mistakes I'm so sorry now you're not going to like me but I make mistakes on a daily basis that's just who we are so what I've learned in the last you know week after you know researching a lot about guilt thinking about guilt practicing feeling guilt is that the more that I sit with guilt the more free I am that's it is the cost of freedom because guilt isn't the enemy it's actually a doorway into your own integrity with yourself if you have the courage to walk through it so if you are sitting with guilt right now maybe it's over a decision that you need to make maybe it's a boundary that you need to set or it's like you're not even living the life you want because you feel guilty about what it would to other people I just want you to leave you with this you are not a bad person for wanting what you want you are worth and worthy of becoming who you want to be and that is worth any discomfort that you must pay to get that first