My personal development journey has had some curious side effects. Since starting on this journey, activities I once enjoyed now give me little pleasure. Or, if I do want to try to enjoy them, I often end up feeling guilty. Some examples are: sleeping in, eating fast food, having a big night out, or watching TV. What’s going on ???

The Diagnosis

I have developed a name for this “condition”: Personal Development Guilt (PDG). Essentially, PDG is a type of guilt we never experienced until we started taking an interest in personal development. You see, my personal development journey has changed me in many ways. Once upon a time I was unconsciously drifting through life (see my 5 Signs You Are On Autopilot article). These days, however, I realize just how valuable my time and health are. So now I think twice about activities that are unproductive (sleeping in and watching TV) or that are unhealthy (eating fast food and having a big night out).

The Cure

How should one deal with PDG? Personally, I know that if I don’t sleep in every so often, slump on the couch in front of the TV for a couple of hours each week, or occasionally have a big night out, I will go crazy. So I want to be able to occasionally do these things and not feel guilty, neither at the time of doing them nor afterwards. At the same time, though, I know too much of these activities is not a good thing.

With this in mind, I have come up with a 3 step process I recommend for successfully dealing with PDG:

1. Awareness: The first step of dealing with a problem is always having an awareness that there is a problem. PDG will typically appear when you are trying to relax or have some fun, and comes in the form of nagging self-talk. When this happens, I simply suggest you take a deep breath and tell yourself: “for whatever reason, I feel guilty at the moment”.

2. Assess: So you feel guilty. The next step is to get to the bottom of why this is. Some questions you may like to ask yourself are:

• Are you being lazy?
• Are you avoiding doing an important task?
• Are you sabotaging your goals?
• Are your actions in alignment with your principles and values?

When answering these questions, one thing may become clear: there could be a good reason why you feel guilty. Often, the guilt we feel is a result of breaking a promise we made to ourselves. If you are sitting on the couch watching TV, when you told yourself you would go to the gym or make an important phone call, the little voice inside your head may be nagging you for a good reason!There are times, though, when you need to relax, and in these cases the last thing you need is some voice in your head making you feel guilty.

So when you become aware of PDG, assess whether or not you need to listen to the voice or make it go away. The best way to do this is to have a clear understanding of your goals and objectives. One example may be you want to increase productivity at home, so you decide to drastically cut the number of hours you watch TV. However, you know you can’t survive without watching So You Think You Can Dance and a few other shows, so you allow yourself one hour each day for TV. With this type of realistic plan in place, we can then move onto the third step.

3. Act appropriately: Now it is crunch time. You feel guilty and are aware of why this is. If you assess your current activity as being in alignment with your goals and objectives, it is time to tell that nagging little voice in your head to shut up. And hopefully because you know it is in alignment, this will be relatively easy and you can be free to relax and enjoy yourself.

If, however, you assess your current activity as being out of alignment with your goals and objectives, it is time for some self-discipline. It is always easier to give into temptation, but remember if you want to live your best life you will very often need to do what it resists. The following quote has appeared in a few of my articles, but I believe it is so true and therefore worthy of repeating:

“The price of discipline is always less than the pain of regret”

Moving along, another option is that PDG will appear due to past actions (eg you have a hangover from drinking too much). The important thing is to learn from the experience. There is no point in feeling guilty over something that cannot be changed, but at the same time I suggest taking a moment think about how you will act differently in the future.

Final Thoughts

My life has undergone numerous positive changes since I started on my personal development journey. Feeling guilty, though, was something I didn’t expect and which therefore went undiagnosed for sometime. Essentially, curing PDG involves being able to manage the self-talk that appears in our heads. Remember, in certain circumstances we may be feeling guilty for good reason. The key is being able to properly assess this (which comes from being clear on our goals and objectives) and then having the strength to act appropriately.

Tags: Happiness, Life, Personal Growth, Wellbeing //