
Someone asked me the other day if something they did annoyed me. If so, they might consider stopping doing it. My question to them was: does it feel wrong to you?
Many of us go through life feeling guilty about things we do, but enjoy doing them anyway out of anger, spite or even a sense of freedom. But often the guilt we feel after overwhelms us so much, it negates the short term ‘gains’ we get from it.
So the question we have to ask ourselves is: do the actions we take benefit us? Does the short term ‘win’ supersede the long term emotions attached to them? If the overall answer is yes, then do them. But if they don’t, we probably need to ask ourselves whether those actions service us.
In the end, we are the ones feeling guilty. We are the ones who have to live with the emotional baggage from our actions. So, if we’re even asking someone what they think, then our question has probably already been answered.
That said, if someone takes offence because of what we see no wrong in, then I believe there’s no need to change to appease another.
In short, if something feels wrong, it often is. And conversely, if something feels right, there’s little need to ask for validation. When trained, our instincts are a far more honed Geiger counter than our brains. Be true to oneself and let another deal with their emotions if they feel wronged. We can’t please everyone, but we can be true to ourselves.