Among the various types of psychotherapy, psychoanalysis pays special attention to the feeling of guilt. How does he interpret it? How does he suggest that we find inner freedom? Psychoanalyst explanations.
Psychologies: Everyone knows the feeling of guilt. When does it become necessary to consult a specialist?
Ekaterina Kalmykova: To answer this question, we must first of all separate two concepts: «conscious guilt» and «unconscious». In the first case, we understand that we did wrong, we realize our mistake and feel its consequences. We may experience awkwardness, discomfort: we are tormented by remorse, we think about how it was necessary to act in this situation or what could be the “payment” for what we have done. If we have caused trouble to another person, we reproach ourselves for this and are looking for a way to make amends for our guilt, to minimize the damage. Such experiences are natural and familiar to any of us. But when guilt arises for no apparent reason, when it begins to put pressure on us, deprives us of the ability to control ourselves, or when events that happen to us look like self-punishment, we can assume that we feel an unconscious sense of guilt. In order to understand what exactly is happening in reality, the help of a specialist is needed.
At what age does a person develop the ability to experience guilt?
E.K .: According to traditional psychoanalytic views, during the oedipal phase, one of the stages of a child’s psychosexual development, when, at the age of three to five years, children strive to have sole control over the parent of the opposite sex. It is at this time that boys have a fantasy of “marrying” mom, and girls dream of “marrying dad”. Such a desire inevitably gives rise to a desire to get rid of the parent of the same sex, whom the child loves and at the same time is jealous of his second parent. Such aggressive desires and fantasies arouse in the child an unconscious fear of punishment, which makes him give up forbidden love and look for a way out of this situation. This way out for the child becomes identification with the parent of the same gender. And this means not only becoming like dad or mom, but also accepting, recognizing, absorbing all the norms, all the prohibitions that come from them and which cannot be violated. It is during this period that our conscience (or “Super-I”, as Freud called this structure of our personality) is formed: we learn to distinguish between good and evil, we begin to fear punishment for “illegal claims” or aggressiveness, and feel guilty if we understand that violated a ban. At the same time, when something goes wrong in the mental development of a child, an unconscious feeling of guilt may form in him.
What exactly can «go wrong» in the inner world?
E.K .: For example, a child can emerge from the oedipal phase as a “winner”: the relationship between mother and son is often warmer, more emotionally close than between parents. And the boy in this situation has an unconscious fantasy that he “defeated” his father, his mother’s love belongs to him, he pushed his father aside and took his place next to his mother. In the same way, a father can give more love and attention to his daughter than to his wife — and the girl has a fantasy that she has forced her mother out of his heart. This is a very difficult situation, because a child who has won such a “victory” over one of the parents has a colossal unconscious feeling of guilt for life. More examples: a girl, without being aware of this, may feel guilty before her parents for not being born the boy they dreamed of; or the son will unconsciously blame himself all his life for the fact that, because of his birth, his mother was forced to leave the institute and did not receive a higher education. Such people, as a rule, are guilty without guilt — they do not remember and do not understand what their sin was, but they constantly feel that they have done something unlawful, they have committed some kind of misconduct. And they are waiting for punishment.
How does unconscious guilt manifest itself?
E.K .: As an inexplicable anxiety or constant fear of an impending disaster: it may seem to a person that his happiness is short-lived, that something terrible will happen to him (or loved ones). He unconsciously perceives any illness, accident as a punishment, although he consciously does not consider them as such.
- “In the new situation, existing problems will multiply rather than disappear”
In what situations do people suffering from an excess of guilt most often turn to a psychoanalyst?
E.K .: If the behavior of a person who lives with an unconscious sense of guilt leads him to failure: due to the fact that the punishment does not follow from the outside, he seems to punish himself. Many students face this: they know the subject very well, but during the exam they cannot remember anything, because they do not have the right to succeed. In the same way, a person who has been working on a dissertation for several years may refuse to defend at the last moment. The decision to turn to a psychoanalyst matures even when some kind of life situation constantly repeats itself (always the same failures, the same disappointment), — at some point a person stops attributing failures and anxieties to inexplicable vicissitudes of fate and begins to think about the fact that, probably, the matter is something in him too. Naturally, it is extremely rare for a patient to come into the psychoanalyst’s office with the words: “I suffer from guilt. Help!» Later, in the course of analysis, it turns out that the cause of his difficulties is a feeling of guilt that arose in the distant past — even in his very early childhood.
Does this mean that the only way to find the causes of our problems and worries is to turn to our past?
E.K .: Psychoanalysis is based on this assumption. Freud believed that one of the therapeutic effects of the method he created is that it allows you to get rid of painful and personality-destroying feelings (including unconscious guilt). This is due to the fact that the patient manages to remember the event that once provoked these experiences. Memories lead us step by step to traumatic situations, and gradually we understand why we had to punish ourselves.
Is it enough for us just to know what exactly happened a long time ago?
E.K .: Unfortunately, knowledge alone is not enough. Imagine the following situation: a father suddenly disappears from the life of his little son — for example, parents divorce at the moment when the son goes through the oedipal phase of development and experiences complex, including aggressive, feelings for him. Such a dramatic combination of circumstances greatly affects the subsequent mental life of a person. And it will not be enough to treat the symptoms that this boy developed as an adult by explaining that they are related to guilt. If the symptoms are «expelled» through the door, they will return through the window. When the therapist suggests a series of exercises or says «no need to feel guilty,» he is not helping the patient to penetrate into the unconscious and find out what is causing his problems. Psychoanalysis, on the other hand, allows you to get to the very essence of guilt, to realize it, to consider how it manifests itself in various situations, and affects relationships with people. That is why this method is so effective.
What “tools” of psychoanalysis help a person cope with guilt?
E.K .: Psychoanalysis has a whole set of «working tools». One of the main ones is the method of free associations: speaking out loud the thoughts, fantasies, memories that come to mind at the moment, without selection, restrictions and prohibitions. In the psychoanalyst’s office, we can say things that before that we did not dare to admit even to ourselves. Remembering events from the past, talking about situations that are significant to us, we experience feelings that we were not aware of. And we can finally express them and understand how and when they arose and how they now affect our lives. In addition, the ability of the analyst to listen to the patient and to grasp the unconscious fantasies that underlie his symptoms is very important. And only in this way, thanks to the method of free association and the ability of the psychoanalyst to listen to us, it is possible to unravel the tangle of unconscious feelings and fantasies that cause our problems, including those associated with guilt.
Should we strive to be free from guilt?
E.K .: To some extent, it is irresistible. It is an integral part of our mental life, the basis of our conscience and morality. Therefore, it is worth striving not to “cure” the feeling of guilt, but to accept it and learn to understand where we are really guilty and what is not our fault. In the psychoanalyst’s office, we finally realize our own real responsibility for what happens to us, get rid of the repetitive destructive scenario and get the opportunity to live a full life. This path takes a lot of time, but we do not waste it in vain.