Guilt, like bodily pain, is information which can be used to our benefit. The sooner we comprehend what it signifies—that is, what we can learn from it—the sooner we are rid of it. As with pains of the flesh, the longer we persist in ignorance the more debilitating and intractable our discomfort becomes. By discerning the cause of an aching back we are in a far better position to remedy it, strengthen it, and avoid injuring it again in the future. Guilt is really a species of spiritual pain, wrought by ethical considerations.

 Guilt is analogous to the creation of a low pressure zone; an outflow of self-assuredness attenuates the psyche’s natural “pressure,” which, as in a gaseous system, then draws in external element to equilibrate itself. In the course of this psychic evacuation we displace some measure of our own desires, will, beliefs, or feelings with those external to us. We have literally been deflated and lack our usual resistance, as we have come to doubt and question ourselves in a deep and disconcerting way. Sometimes this is needful and proper. We all make mistakes that ought to make us seriously question our motives, character and beliefs. Guilt is an opportunity to confront ourselves absent our typical egoic blindness. It can and should be utilized to help us confront unpleasant aspects of our person, so that we may then work to overcome them.

 Yet guilt is every bit as dangerous as it can be helpful. It is not always legitimately revealing our faults. Sometimes it has been implanted in us by external forces on spurious grounds, in service to nefarious ends. Note that a guilty conscience presents an ideal opportunity for manipulative people to sink their hooks in and wrest control over our thoughts, feelings and behavior. Beware all who would inculcate guilt in you, for they invariably wish—consciously or not—to supplant your autonomy. Such people are always dangerous, even if they're well intentioned.

 There is no nobility or wisdom in becoming and remaining either a self-flagellating depressive or a dejected puppet. Guilt is to be understood and overcome by transcending the faults which led to it, if indeed it was warranted in the first place. To let even legitimate guilt linger and fester for years or decades is poisonous and destructive. To let an ill-defined sense of disgrace, which was foisted upon us by others, to cripple us is even more perverse. It disconnects us from our sense of ethical integrity and places the locus of power firmly in the manipulator's hands. Their judgments now lead us about by the nose, and we become increasingly desperate to please them on the false supposition that we will be relieved of our guilt when they finally, mercifully absolve us.

 This is an illusion. What you cannot recognize and understand in the light of your own sovereignty of mind will have no beneficial effect on your character. To kowtow to the demands of others in a misguided bid to escape a guilty conscience will lead only to further destabilization and deterioration of one's character. To cloak a moldering spirit with the will and beliefs of another, to lapse into servility and meekness in the hope that it will redeem us, is a tottering deception which will inevitably crumble into ruin. It is not ethical progress. If we've committed horrendous acts in our time the best thing we can do is to commit as many wholesome and benevolent acts as we are able with the time we have left. An initial realization of our being in the wrong, of feeling guilty, could well kickstart this process. If we haven't commited horrendous acts, then a guilty conscience has no business in our lives, and any who try to say it does ought to be regarded with the utmost suspicion.