fear, guilt, grief, and the withdrawing of condemnation

In life, we experience fear as well as the fear of displaying our fear to others, which can be called anxiety or paranoia or even guilt. (We do not FEEL guilty unless we have a sense of anticipating possible “exposure” and fearing that, wanting to avoid that)

With guilt, there is the potential for regret as in grief and shame or a sense of humiliation. All of that is naturally-occurring. Everyone can relate to these experiences.

 

Dangerous Risk Adrenaline Suicide by Fear of Falling (Photo credit: epSos.de)

 

However, it is optional to relate to any pattern in the past with regret (“it should not have been like that”) just as it is optional to relate to any model of ideals as more important than the rest of reality (which “should” be like those ideals, so we “should” reform reality and prevent reality from changing to what it “should not be.”) 

That takes energy and attention. That is also suffering. That is “attachment.” 

It is optional, but it is also deeply ingrained. It takes time to relax from the traumatizing that we may have experienced in wanting to hide some historical fact as “negative.” For instance, if we repress anger because it is condemned as “negative,” then that can lead to neurosis and worse.

 

English: Robert Plutchik’s Wheel of Emotions (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

However, it is also socially functional in some situations for certain emotions to be repressed (and certain ones cultivated). Parents suppress their children at least occasionally. Employees are often suppressed by supervisors when job performance is borderline (like when the company is close to going out of business if performance is not improved dramatically).

 

 

 

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• Beauty In Fear (ajinkyadiary.wordpress.com)
• Self Hate, Lonliness and Fear (huggy666.wordpress.com)
• Poetry Friday: Death is Nothing At All (charlotteunsworth.wordpress.com)

 

Tags: condemnation, Fear, grief, guilt