You're listening to The Overthinker's Guide to Joy, episode 79. This is the one
where I'm going to talk about a different kind of addiction. The addiction to guilt.
Let's dive in. This is a podcast for overthinkers, overdoers, and overachievers who
are tired of feeling overanxious and just want to feel better. I'm your host,
certified life coach, Jackie de Crinis.
Hey there and welcome back So I thought I would do an episode on a subject that I
love which is self -help books Self -help books were something that I always adored.
I mean way back in college long before I was a life coach It's my favorite section
of the library. It's my favorite section of bookstores. I have some Amazing self
-help books that I have recommended to clients over the years, and I have some that
I don't love. But I think what I love the most about self -help books, and my
husband jokes because I have a library full of them, he says, that's because you're
a constant self -improvement project. And like most of my husband's comments, I think
there's a compliment buried in there somewhere, but it's a bit of a backhanded
compliment, but it's true. I am a little bit of a self -improvement project. But the
thing about self -help books is, as I said, there's some good ones, there's some
great ones, and there's some that are just really good titles and good book covers.
But in general, I think there's something to learn from everyone. And what I have
found over the 30 plus years that I've been reading them is that usually there is
one message that will resonate for me within the book, whether it's a line,
a quote, a technique, a chapter, and that's fine.
If a book is 300 or 500 pages long and I get one kernel of information out of
it, that's a win for me. And if I can share that with a client or a friend,
it's even better. So I thought I would start by just talking about some of my
favorite of the self -help books. The summer, I took a class from Jen Sincero,
who is the New York Times bestseller who wrote the book You Are a Badass. And then
she wrote a series of books and workbooks that followed with a very similar title.
And it was my girlfriend Lindsay who had recommended You Are a Badass to me shortly
after it was published, I think in 2015, I may have read it in 2016. And I loved
the whimsical nature of Jen's writing. And I found her just very inspirational.
And I was transitioning out of my career in television. But there was one chapter
on meditation that ended up motivating me to start meditating. That and the fact
that my friend Bill had been telling me to start meditating for about a year or
two earlier. Another one of my favorite books is written by Shakti Gwayne. She wrote
a book called Creative Visualization, and it's really to help people find their
passions and manifest their dreams. But my favorite part of the book taught me about
self -talk, and that's the importance of speaking kindly to yourself and about
yourself. And it was actually brought to my attention by one of my former or my
current yoga teachers. he would say to me, "You tend to talk negatively about
yourself." And I would do it in jest. I would do it as self -deprecating humor. And
he said, "The body doesn't really know the difference." When you say things like,
"Oh, where's my brain today?" Or, "I'm such a dummy." Or, "Oh,
I'm fat." Or, "I'm not good at something." Then what happens is,
You start to believe it, whether it's in jest or not, but your body actually
listens, your brain actually listens to the words you think and the words you say.
And Shakti Goyan's book really brought that home for me, which is that by saying
kind things about yourself and to yourself, you start creating a pathway of success
for yourself. I mean, there's many, many other things in the book, but that was
sort of my big takeaway of that one. I loved The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron.
Again, a very old book, but this is the one that introduced me to morning pages,
and that is getting up every morning and just journaling or brain dumping onto a
piece of paper, clearing your head so that you can then clear your mind for a more
creative or productive day. I've talked many times about the book's Atomic Habits by
James Clear and Tiny Habits by BJ Fogg. And both authors and researchers talk about
the effects of adopting good daily habits, but not just like throwing out the baby
with the bathwater, but really developing good habits in very, very small ways.
So adopting tiny habits or atomic habits so that they become part of who you are.
It's not like going on crash diets or deciding to run a marathon. It's about
adopting a habit of daily exercise or learning to eat healthfully by making better
choices. It's all done in micro ways so that they become lifetime habits and then
of course, over time, success occurs from those micro habits.
Another book I'm a big fan of is Dr. Sarno's book, Healing the Back, which is
actually not about chronic back pain, but the connection between mind and body on
any kind of chronic pain. This is a book that was recommended to me when I hurt
my back years ago by my friend Charlie, Charlie, and then I have since recommended
it and given it to dozens and dozens of people who have suffered from chronic pain
in one body, part or another, and many of them have come back to me and says it
changed their life because there is such a huge component to the mind, body
connection and healing. I loved Gabrielle Bernstein's May Cause Miracles book and also
the universe has your back because sometimes I just need a dose of trusting that
the universe and believing that there are things such as miracles. And then I was a
big fan of, first, we make the beast beautiful. And this was a book about embracing
anxiety by Sarah Wilson. Sarah Wilson was a woman from Australia, an author from
Australia who also gave up sugar and talked about the role that sugar played in her
anxiety. But this book is not one of or culinary books or diet books,
it's literally just about embracing anxiety and letting go of the concept of needing
to conquer it. But sometimes embracing something instead of fighting it can often
release us from the very thing that plagues us, thus the title, "Right First We
Make the Beast Beautiful." So anyway, I could just list dozens and dozens and dozens
of more books that I have loved and that have inspired me in one way or another.
But my biggest problem with self -help books is that they're often overwritten. I
think that too often to justify sometimes a simple concept,
authors or maybe the publishers demand too many pie charts and graphs. And I feel
like when you're in pain physically or emotionally. Sometimes you just need a very
simple concept to grasp on to. And like the message or the simplicity of the
message gets lost in just these big massive books. But my point is,
it doesn't really matter the size of the book or the reputation of the author or
how pretty the book cover is. It's really about whether or not something in it
resonates for you. And it doesn't all need to resonate. Really, you just need one
little kernel. So if something sticks or motivates you or changes your perspective to
get you out of the mud, then use it. Write it down, talk about it, memorize it,
repeat it, share it, reread it or re -listen to it. If someone recommends a book
and it doesn't resonate for you, sometimes it might later. I've had several clients
who have found different books that I've recommended on their shelves and realize
they just never bothered to read them. And once they did and were open to receiving
a particular message, it suddenly was like loud and clear. It's like trying new
foods. Like I didn't like mushrooms or seafood as a kid. And when I became an
adult, I couldn't get enough of Linguine with clams. And now I love all kinds of
fish. Our tastes change and our minds open up at different times.
So This all brings me to my latest read. I've been listening to "Breaking the Habit
of Being Yourself" by Dr. Joe Dispenza, which is a great title,
by the way. And my favorite chapter is chapter three. He talks about guilt.
And guilt is something that I struggled with and many of my clients, particularly my
female clients, tend to struggle with. I don't know why There is a propensity for
women to carry so much guilt, particularly irrational guilt. I don't know if it's
societal. I don't know if it's just upbringing. I don't know if it's cultural. But
what I love about this chapter is he talks about guilt being addictive.
And I was like, wait, what? And boy, did that resonate with me. So if you're a
lifetime people pleaser, You may have found yourself always apologizing when things go
wrong even if it isn't your fault and it turns out There's a neurochemical reason
why we develop this habit Are you one of those people who are quick to take the
blame for things? Saying things like I'm sorry all the time or it's my fault or
oh, I shouldn't have done that or if only I had done this I know that there's
just sometimes a de facto response of saying, I'm sorry, whether it's because
somebody bumped into you at the grocery store, or you find yourself always
apologizing, like I'll be on the tennis court, you know, and I'll miss a shot and
I'll be like, I'll say to my doubles partner, oh, I'm sorry, oh, I messed up. And
it's like, that just takes us out of the moment, just takes us out of the game.
But it's a habit that feeling guilty of it's my fault or I need to apologize.
So after years of doing this, you might have created, I certainly did, neural
pathways and neurochemicals to reinforce this feeling, that feeling of guilt.
And so what Dispensa says is the receptor sites in our brains adapt to continue
this chemical expression of guilt. So apparently when guilt becomes a habit or a
pattern, our brains develop like an autonomic response and they become desensitized to
the flood of neurochemicals that are creating the response of guilt. And so like any
good addiction, it requires more stimulus to get the same reaction from your cells.
So you actually need stronger hits of guilt or neurochemical guilt for your cells to
perk up. So the rush of feeling bad is actually required to feel alive.
How crazy is that? Now, I'm paraphrasing from the book, but the sense of it is
that you can basically be unconsciously guilty most of the time because you've become
addicted to guilt. Now, it is only when somebody brings this to your attention that
maybe you'll stop it for a moment. Somebody might say to you, "Why is this your
fault or why is this your problem or why do you feel guilty about that?" Now, you
might even promise yourself to take a break. You may say, "Okay, I'm not going to
allow this default pattern to happen anymore. It's like somebody who says, "Oh, I'm
not going to drink tomorrow or I'm not going to eat sugar tomorrow. And yet a few
hours go by and you feel really good about yourself, but your cells, neurochemically
speaking, are still waiting for its chemical needs. So Dispenza says it's not that
different than being addicted to drugs or alcohol. Trying to change an emotional
pattern is like going through an emotional withdrawal. Your intention is to produce
more positive thoughts, but your neurochemistry is actually jonesing for the
neurochemicals that are missing. Now, look, he's a doctor, so there's a lot more
specific chemical explanations in his book. But the bottom line is this, it becomes
good to feel bad. I know, that sounds so weird. But the mind starts playing tricks
on us, digging up the past and playing the devil's advocate to our good intentions.
So it's absolutely no different than, again, quitting smoking or drinking or doing
drugs or eating junk food. It just is a chemical addiction. And we basically have
to un -memorize an emotion that has become part of our personality. So the answer is
we're just one thought away from changing these patterns. I know that sounds a
little simplistic. But the thing that actually all of these self -help books have in
common is the agreement that everything starts with your thoughts. It's not just
about positive thinking, though. Trying to just think one way cannot simply override
these chemicals and strongholds of lifetime habits. It's getting in touch with the
feeling under the thought or the emotion that's directly connected. Feelings and
emotions are chemical memories. So how do we rewire our brains to break the
neurochemical emotional habit of guilt? Well, like with any addiction, the first step
is awareness. By recognizing that you're feeling guilty and identifying the thoughts
and situations that trigger the emotion. So that's step one. The step two is
mindfulness, and of course, you know I'm going to recommend this, Meditation.
Practices like mindfulness and meditation can help you observe your thoughts and
emotions without judgment. And by regularly practicing mindfulness, you can increase
your awareness of guilt and its associated patterns. Now what's the third? Challenge
your negative beliefs. If guilt starts to creep up inside your being, challenge the
beliefs by asking yourself, are they rational and evidence -based. In other words, are
you being overly self -critical or is there a legitimate reason for your guilt? The
fourth thing, positive affirmations. You use positive affirmations to counteract
negative self -talk. Repeating affirmations to promote self -forgiveness, self -compassion
can gradually rewire your brain to think more positively about yourself. What's number
five? gratitude journaling. I've talked a lot about journaling in this podcast, but
regularly writing down things you're grateful for. This can shift your focus from
guilt to appreciation and help break the addiction to negative emotions.
Number six, visualization. Dr. Joe Dispenza often emphasizes the power of
visualization. This is something Shakti Gwain does too in her creative visualization
book. You can use this technique to imagine yourself free from guilt,
living a life without the burden of that emotion. So you might do this in your
meditation, you might do this in your journaling, you might do this just while
you're taking a walk, but really visualizing who you would be without that guilty
overlay. Then there's neuroplasticity. Now you've heard probably a lot about
neuroplasticity. But this is just the brain being able to rewire itself. So by
engaging in activities to promote positive neural pathways, such as learning a new
skill, exercising, engaging in creative pursuits, this can be anything from painting,
drawing, writing, pottery, running, yoga, just doing something that alters the neural
pathway so that you're not sitting in the guilt stew that can help rewire the brain
and the thought processes. Seeking support. If guilt is deeply ingrained and affecting
your daily life, consider seeking support, whether that's from a therapist or hiring
a coach. We can provide you with personalized strategies to address and overcome
guilt. Remember that breaking the addiction of guilt or any other negative emotion
takes time and consistent effort. The key is to be patient with yourself and to
stay committed to the process of rewiring your brain for more positive thought
patterns and emotions. It's also important to note that guilt can be adaptive in
certain situations by helping us learn from our mistakes. So it's not bad to have
guilt if it helps us learn and do better. It's when excessive or irrational guilt
creeps in that it can be detrimental to our well -being and those are the ones we
want to stop in their tracks. Alright friends, that is what I have for you today.
I am wishing you a healthy happy week and let's go break the habit of excessive or
irrational guilt and let's go have some fun. Alright, bye for now. Thank you for
listening to this episode of The Overthinker's Guide to Joy. If you're enjoying these
episodes, please subscribe or follow this podcast so you can always be in the know
when the next episode drops. If you would like to learn more about working with me
as a coach, you can connect with me through my website at jackiedecrinis.com
