Why Stress Management Fails When You’re Feeling Guilty Doing It, & How to Overcome This

 By the end of this episode, you’ll discover how to recognize when guilt is creeping into your stress management practice and how to shift back to getting what you need again.

Welcome to Stress Management for Highly Sensitive People. A podcast helping HSPs avoid overwhelm, eliminate stress, and find true inner freedom. I’m your host, Todd Smith, a facilitator of the work of Byron Katie. A way to question and reduce stressful thoughts, and you guessed it. I’m a highly sensitive person myself.

In this episode, you’ll discover how to notice when guilt is taking over your stress management practice. What happens if you do nothing, and how to overcome the guilt and start getting deep nourishment from your practice again. This is an addition of Breakthrough Mondays, where I share success stories and helpful insights for highly sensitive people on the path towards inner freedom.

One of my main stress management practices is meditation. Been doing it since I was young, and my partner and I also do it together, and it’s just a part of our daily routine. Also, one of the things I love about the meditation that I practice is that it’s possible to do it and have a. Good results, even if it’s noisy or if there’s things you know around going on in your environment, it still works.

But one day recently, the noise got a little too much. We have a dog that can get up and bark. We have a mother-in-law who can get into trouble and because she’s 92 and has dementia, and we. It was just like too much. We have neighbors next door that like to sit in the backyard and talk in really loud voices or move machinery around and that kind of thing.

So at one point it was just too much and it was too hot to close the door, and so I went and grabbed my earplugs, which I usually don’t do. But oh my gosh, it was the nicest meditation I’d had in a long time. And so by contrast, I realized that without the earplugs, I was almost like subconsciously thinking I should be on duty at all times.

And maybe some of that is true. But I think I was getting too caught in that, and even with the door closed, with the television going on upstairs, I could still be following a little bit the conversation on the television when I’m really wanting to be meditating. And so after that time I thought, I’d really like to wear those earplugs again.

’cause it just blocked everything out and allowed me to just be very inward and settled. But I noticed a little hesitation like I’m being a little bit irresponsible maybe to disappear completely. And I laughed because disappearing completely would probably be the ultimate aim of meditation anyway, just to settle in so quietly and be just completely gone in a way.

But here I was feeling like no, I have to be on guard, on duty, and this. Preventing me from taking a simple step, like putting some earplugs in my ears. So guilt can be very subtle. It can show up in any kind of stress management practice that you may be doing. And it can be connected, I find, to a lot of different things.

Often what’s going on for me is that I feel like I should be doing something or that I’m trying to please someone. Or I’m trying to avoid someone upsetting, getting upset, and so I’m afraid of upsetting somebody. So when I’m feeling guilty, it’s like I’m believing that I’m not allowed to take care of myself.

I’m not allowed to do what would actually bring me balance in the first place, and I subconsciously believe or even overtly believe. That someone else is in charge and that I have to fit whatever stress management I do around the edges. And sometimes there are very few edges to fit it in. But what happens if you don’t do anything with regards to taking care of yourself and the guilt that may be coming up and preventing you from doing your stress management practices?

Let’s say you’re doing exercise, but because of guilt, you start eroding the time and yeah, you we’re gonna do three hours a week and now it’s down to like half hour here and there, and pretty soon you’re taking a break from it and all the while. And then you’re feeling guilty for taking the break.

But at the same time everything else has a higher priority. Like other people have a higher priority. This is what I’m talking about, like who are you trying to please? Who are you afraid of upsetting? If you do nothing, then what happens is that exercise program goes out the window and then you don’t get the benefit of exercise, which is so well known as a great way to reduce stress.

Same with meditating. Same with eating. Say you just like to eat in a way that’s more balanced for you, but other people don’t like it, and you start feeling guilty about it and you start eroding your own choices. And pretty soon people just think, oh, she tried that, but in the end she just came back to our way.

’cause that’s the better way anyway. So it’s like we have the impulse to take care of ourselves, but we we give in because of pressure from outside and because we’re different or our needs are different or because we’ve just given other people the authority. So if we do nothing, then we’re gonna feel guilt, and then we’re going to reduce our stress management practice.

Then we’re not gonna get the benefit of that practice, and we’re gonna be more likely to get overwhelmed more easily. And this act actually ends up bringing more stress into your life and into the lives of those around you, and you can end up feeling resentment towards those that you feel. Are keeping you from taking care of yourself, or you can feel resentment towards your schedule in general.

You may not even feel, you may feel too guilty to actually blame somebody else, but it can at least blame our schedules. So this is how it starts to build and it ends up stopping us from living a balanced life, which could be to the benefit of not only ourselves and our own happiness. But to those that we serve, so that we share something beautiful and balanced and connected to our depth when we’re with other people.

So how do you overcome this feeling of guilt? When we’re trying to do something to take care of ourselves, I come back to these questions. Who are you trying to please? This is so central. And who, probably more importantly, who are you afraid of upsetting. If you’re afraid of upsetting someone, then you’re going to put yourself in last place.

And then if you’re taking care of yourself, you may be feeling like, oh, I better be watching. I better be careful. And it’s this feeling of I’m not allowed to take care of myself. So if you notice that you’re trying to please someone or you’re afraid of upsetting someone, then this is a call for inner work, and this is a great opportunity to look at this relationship and begin to notice what the thoughts you have there and notice what your judgments are, what your beliefs are, and begin to question those beliefs.

Because the beliefs are what cause the guilt. The beliefs are what keep you stuck and unable to be yourself. And so doing some inner work, releasing some of these beliefs and loosening some of these thoughts can end up giving you space again to be yourself. Another thing to look at is where are you?

Exaggerating. Where are you exaggerating that someone is not gonna be happy with you taking care of yourself? Where are you imagining that it’s going to be a big deal when maybe it isn’t? And if you’re like me, I come from a history of not standing up for myself or not taking. The initiative and going with it in the face of opposition, I tend to cave.

And so if that’s you and it’s a common thing for highly sensitive people, then where is it that you’re exaggerating other people’s responses in advance? Like they’re gonna be so upset. Or they are really upset. Is that really the full story here? Because what I’ve noticed over time and doing a lot of inner work is that sometimes people are just surprised and maybe they’re, or maybe they’re a little upset because they were expecting something disappointed maybe.

But what I find is if I’m doing something that really is supporting me and I keep doing it, then that initial surprise or disappointment. Changes and often changes quite significantly to support because they see, oh my gosh, you’re actually taking care of yourself. This is wonderful. I’ve been telling you that for years.

And so this is what I mean by like, why are you exaggerating the negative repercussions of taking care of yourself? Everybody’s gonna hate it. And someone’s gonna be really upset or all that, that can be. An exaggeration in our own minds. And when we look at that, we can often find that maybe that’s not really the whole story.

Also, it comes down to too much attachment to others and what other people think and how they will perceive us and what they like and what they don’t like. Now, we as HSPs are tuned into what people like and don’t like. We can’t help that. That’s normal. We do like harmony. We can’t help that. Also. But it’s all about balance.

If I’m too much attached I can be aware of other people’s preferences, but if I’m too attached to it or I’m trying to avoid it at all costs, getting them upset, then I’m going to be out of touch with myself. And then who am I? I’m not showing up. I’m not bringing myself to the party. So you have a right to take care of yourself.

And what’s interesting is that when you take care of yourself, other people get benefits too. And quite quickly. I’ve noticed, and you’ve probably noticed it too, when you do. Other people actually are supportive. And it’s surprising at first because we’re looking for the worst case scenario. We’re looking for, oh my gosh, I don’t wanna upset anyone.

I want everyone to be happy. And of course not. It’s not always possible. And so we’re on guard, and this is what feeds that kind of guilt feeling of not being able to actually do what we’ve set aside time to do. So the feeling I’m left with today is that your time for stress management is your time. It doesn’t belong to anyone else, and in many cases, the boundary is already there.

It’s already established. In my case, I already had time for meditation, and now it’s about using that time. In this episode, we looked at how to notice when guilt is taking over your stress management practice. And you’ll feel it. You’ll feel that feeling of guilt. You’ll notice your attention is elsewhere and you’re not as focused on what you’re there to do.

And we also looked at what happens if you do nothing. This just increases and the time gets eroded and you don’t end up getting the balancing effect of stress management and you end up becoming more easily overwhelmed, which affects not only you, but everyone around you. And then finally we looked at how to overcome the guilt and start getting the deep nourishment that you need from your practice again.

And it comes from looking at who you are, deferring to who you think you’re, who you’re afraid of upsetting. And who you think is really in control and questioning some of those thoughts. It requires deep work. It requires some letting go and some expanding, and that’s an inner process. But if you can do it, it can open up the possibility for you to get balanced so that you can be a balanced person in your world again.

So thanks for listening. It’s always great to explore with you. This program comes out three times a week on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Join me next time for Self-Compassion Wednesdays, where we dive deeper into understanding ourselves as highly sensitive people by exploring the unique traits that shape our experience.

Tired of feeling overwhelmed by everything all at once. Take the HSP stress test@trueinnerfreedom.com. You’ll also find a link in the show notes. The test will reveal your unique sensitivity profile. Including how your nervous system naturally responds to stimulation, emotions, social energy, and more.

You’ll also gain a clearer picture of how stress might be amplifying that sensitivity. Take the HSP stress test now. It’s a powerful first step. On your journey to true inner freedom.