Jason: In pursuing virtue, my main problem is that I am often overcome with powerful feelings of guilt and shame. Some of it is because of situations in my life I am not proud of, and I know I need to resolve them. But a lot of the guilt and shame seems to come out of nowhere. The thoughts seem non-volitional, menacing and incessant. I am so sick of the kind of mind they create, it’s unbearable at times. There seems to be no way for me to inoculate myself that does not involve self-harm or denial. I am struggling to understand this.
Sundari: Do not feel alone, this is the plight of most people. The non-volitional thoughts originate from the Causal body (the macrocosmic unconscious mind) or beginningless ignorance, and there is no inoculation from them other than Self-knowledge. Vedanta offers the only means of knowledge that is capable of reliably and permanently managing our non-volitional thoughts and emotions, and these tools are karma yoga and jnana yoga (guna knowledge). While there are many therapies and medications that purportedly help manage the irrational mind and tame the self-destructive ‘beast within’, there is nothing like Self-knowledge. Without the understanding of what the mind is, where it originates from and what creates these destructive thinking/feeling patterns (the impersonal gunas), there is no protection and no guaranteed peace for the mind.
The endless guna generated thought and emotional patterns conditioning the mind wear everyone out sooner or later. I have mentioned many times that it is negative thoughts that result in people taking their lives, not karmic circumstances. Only the lucky ones find Vedanta. If it were simple for the jiva to be totally objective about thoughts and emotions as happening to them instead of coming from them, life would be so much easier. But sadly, that is not the case for most people trapped in their minds, i.e., trapped in duality. Thoughts and feelings seem so very personal because of the karma associated with them, but they are not, and nor is the karma that comes with them. There is nothing new under the sun, everything is just an apparently real perpetually replaying program.
Shame and its cousin guilt do have a function in rectifying adharma. There are certain things humans do or avoid doing that we should be ashamed of or feel guilty about. But that shame and guilt should resolve us to make necessary changes and stick to it. The downside of shame in particular is that it seems to exist to keep us objectified from ourselves. For many, shame is the water we learn to swim in as children, and in which some of us drown. It is more of a problem in the West, where we have the luxury of neurosis.
People who are focused on survival do not have that luxury. For those of us whose main concern is not survival, our biggest problems come from the privilege that affluence affords. I read an interesting article in the Guardian recently titled “One Billionaire At A Time”, about the clinics for the super-rich in Switzerland, it boggles the mind. Their wealth is no protection from the shame and the void of entitlement, the crushing emptiness of samsara, the hypnosis of duality.
Though shame and guilt are related, they are not the same. Shame is a focus on the small egoic self and guilt is a focus on behaviour. Shame is most often (but not always) unrelated to reality and highly destructive for the most part, while guilt is usually related to things we have done or failed to do. Shame says, ‘I Am Bad’. Guilt says, ‘I did something bad’. Guilt says ‘sorry, I made a mistake’. Shame says: ‘I AM a mistake.’ Shame is a dangerous state of mind for the jiva, it is directly and highly correlated with self-destructive behaviour. Such as unhealthy relationships, addiction, violence, depression, aggression, bullying, suicide, eating disorders, social isolation, avoidance, the list is long. Guilt is inversely correlated to all those things. Meaning, guilt is more likely to be a motivation to rectify self-insulting actions or bad behaviour than shame.
Guilt is useful as an indicator that dharma (the natural laws of life) has been broken and appropriate actions must be carried out to remedy the situation. If we have broken the laws of life in some ways, injuring ourselves or others, whether it is to our body/mind (any self-insulting action) or ‘others, meaning the field, our environment, we need to rectify this by ‘punishing’ ourselves. Note the parenthesis. We do this in a positive way by taking appropriate and corrective action, however unappealing to us, or by sacrificing our needs and desires to restore balance, such as denying ourselves our self-indulges. It may be very hard but we will not feel good unless we do so, and being sick of the kind of mind that is the result of adharma is a very good incentive to achieve this.
Shame is definitely more toxic than guilt, but where does it come from, and why does it affect almost everyone? Psychologists tell us that between the ages of 3 – 7 we develop the moralistic part of the psyche, the ‘superego’, which is a conglomeration of the positive and negative values we have absorbed from the people in our lives responsible for raising us and the environment we grew up in. It forms a kind of ‘superego’, which is meant to keep the childish ego in check. But sadly, in most people it becomes part of the (mal)adaptive child program, which we talked about some time ago. The adaptive child persona becomes a permanent resident of the mental construct that we identify as who we are, and a toxic inner judge and jury.
There are many reasons why we feel ashamed and most are not caused by things we do or don’t do. It originates from and builds on the lie that we are ‘flawed’ and unworthy, the scourge of duality. It causes an ugly, dark, and thoroughly negative psychological condition attaching itself like a parasite to everything good about life or about who we think we are. The shame scourge affected me from a young age because I was so different from my family, my clan, and I did not know why. I felt bad because I was not more like them and yet I had to follow my own path regardless, and that required abandoning that part of my life. Only Self-knowledge finally put an end to the bad feelings, even though the pattern still rears its head from time to time. Such as the situation I described last week, when I was unfairly accused of something, defensiveness of the jiva arose instead of brushing it off as the Self. Thankfully, Self-knowledge neutralized it quickly. There is nothing more powerful.
How to Heal Shame and Guilt
1. Acknowledge, Make Reparations and Forgive
If reparations can be made, we must make them. If not, we must forgive ourselves and everyone involved. Self-forgiveness brings out the only antidote to non-specific shame: self-empathy. Self-forgiveness is not about justifying anything. It’s about having the courage to love yourself, warts and all. On that level, we are all flawed, that’s life. But we are so much more than the small self. If you have broken dharma, punish your(not)self by doing what is right and dharmic to correct and put an end to all self-insulting behaviour and injury, whether to others or yourself, without making excuses. It will not be easy but the alternative is far worse.
2. Acknowledge the Source of the Shame/Guilt and Discriminate With Self-knowledge
When shame is the root cause of a deeply buried mental/emotional pattern, it is very difficult to eradicate by transforming it into Self-love. But it can be done when we have the courage to face it through discrimination, the understanding that all thoughts, however toxic, come from the collective unconscious or Causal Body, and not ‘from’ us. They are all guna generated. Nobody makes themselves think negative tamasic thoughts—they just appear in the mind from buried mental patterns. Shame is an ugly hidden secret which never stays hidden.
Nobody would hurt anyone or themselves if they truly knew better. Everyone is a product of their karma and conditioning, until and unless Self-knowledge obtains. That is where the buck stops. There is no blame; we all do our best or worst with the self-knowledge we have (or don’t have). Taking responsibility for our actions does not require blame. It is an opportunity to assume the ability to respond appropriately to what the Field of life has presented to us. See the persistent repetitive patterns, and manage the mind with guna knowledge instead of trying to fix the jiva or its story. Hand the whole jiva construct over to Isvara, to whom it belongs.
Step 3. Karma Yoga
We practice self-empathy when we say NO! to the voices of diminishment with the karma yoga attitude. Karma yoga is an attitude of gratitude to life, consecrating all our actions to the Field, knowing that the results are not in our control and taking what comes as a gift. Isvara does not make mistakes. If you got a kick in the butt, or failed to get what you wanted, that is the result you need, however painful that truth may be for the poor ego. Karma yoga is existential burnout insurance and the only way to objectify the ego. But there is no law against saying no to the voices of diminishment because no matter what we have done or failed to do, they never speak the truth about who we are.
We must be vigilant and keep practicing karma yoga, no matter how long it takes. One thought at a time. Never give up. Take small steps but keep at it. It can take a while to beat a lifetime of negative thinking patterns into submission. As stated, the first law of dharma is non-injury in thought, mind and deed, and that applies to us first. Aim for peace of mind by managing the thoughts and emotions that constantly and repetitively appear unbidden in the mind with Self-knowledge. Do not listen to the neurotic voice of the ego, but clean up your act!
Step 4. A Devotional Practice
Instead of allowing the voices of diminishment to cause inner mental chaos, occupy your mind with thoughts of God by chanting identity mantras. They will instantly transmute the negative thoughts as the mind turns towards the Self. It has no option but to do so because that is the truth of who you are. So make use of this super power!
Hari Om
Sundari
