Shame and/or guilt go hand in hand with anxiety. These emotions are old, primitive lodestars in our development. It is commonly thought that guilt serves as a more evolved feeling than shame. Guilt has to do with feeling one has broken a particular law or rule and merits punishment. Freud thought that feelings of guilt experienced in childhood became the superego, or censor/dictator of the mind that keeps us from acting on our base desires.
He also believed that this superego allowed for human civilization to continue. He who feels guilty often seeks a medium for confession in which he can relieve himself of the anxiety over his perceived guilt. The anxiety of guilt is expected; one knew better, especially if he had the poor luck to be caught in the act. Conscious guilt does not rock a sense of self in the same way as shame.
One might even joke about it being easier to ask for forgiveness than permission. Unconscious guilt—a feeling that we need to suffer for our actions, and particularly for our successes because we do not deserve them—can wreak havoc on lives as people set themselves up for punishment and then worry (realistically) about the potential consequences of their lying, stealing, cheating, etc. Shame seems to go much deeper. A more primitive emotion, shame represents a deep sense of humiliation, mortification, or defectiveness.
We try to hide that of which we are most ashamed. Therefore, patients feeling guilty use treatment to confess that of which they wish to unburden themselves. Those feeling shame tend to keep their anxiety more secret. The roots of this wish to conceal seemingly shameful thoughts and feelings then proves central to their psychotherapy, as undoing these mental constraints offers liberation from a symptom’s burden.
Anxious, guilty, shameful feelings often draw from material either sexual or aggressive in nature. Experiencing sexual urges or fantasies which seem socially unacceptable leave us feeling guilty, unsafe, or ashamed. Likewise, feeling hostile, aggressive yearnings can seem intolerable.
The anxiety over having these wishes yet not feeling comfortable having them—let alone talking about them—prompts our minds to handle or not handle this dilemma. For instance, a patient who begins to wash his hands compulsively may report that he feels dirty for pursuing a woman exclusively for her vagina; he washes out of a perceived need for punishment.
A woman who presents to the emergency room with an acute sense of chest pain from a panic attack may coincidentally report in a careful history that she has started an extramarital affair. A boy who becomes sexually involved with a male relative at a young age may develop compulsive symptoms to be sure. He may in addition feel the need to hide his sexual secret for fear of being discovered, not only for having such deep sexual longings but also for having ones that involve a male.
Rick’s comments:
If my baseball skills had been honed as sharply as my sense of guilt and shame, I might be playing third base for the Yankees! I think a lot of my anxiety—my OCD—has to do with control. I use both my thoughts and rituals to maintain or to try to maintain a sense of control.
At the same time, I feel controlled by the rituals, thoughts, and behaviors I act out on. This need for control is, I’m sure, based on guilt and shame, and the nature of my OCD is such that I relive the guilty feelings and what has led to them again and again. When these feelings have a hold of me, they become the entire focus of how I see myself; and this causes shame.
What have I pronounced myself guilty of? Spending a lot of my adult life as a recluse or feeling unworthy of being with people are common accusations. For example, at one point in my life, I would make plans to be with friends and then always get sick and be unable to join them. Eventually this pattern cost me all my friends.
Also, I left law school in my first year and did not return. The fallout from these actions—like not starting a family, or being under- or unemployed for years—has caused me shame and, ironically, has intensified the feelings and behaviors that caused the problems in the first place.
I don’t know how or why or what purpose it serves, but I’m pretty sure that my biological mom’s illness and death when I was very young are behind a lot of my guilt and, therefore, my OCD and anxiety. That’s a shame, given the fact that my mom loved me and would only want the best for me. Is this all a vicious cycle? Yup. Has it made me feel hopeless or like giving up? Nope.