You’re having dinner at a nice restaurant when you remember the news about the hurricane. Thousands of people lost their homes. And here you are, enjoying expensive pasta. The guilt hits immediately. This happens all the time. You laugh at a movie while people are dying in wars. You buy something you don’t need while others go hungry. You feel good on a day when someone, somewhere, is having the worst day of their life....
I was eating lunch yesterday when I saw a news story about floods somewhere. Hundreds of people lost their homes. I felt a familiar pang of guilt. Not guilt about the floods. I didn’t cause them. Guilt about my sandwich. About sitting in a dry room, complaining about nothing. Why does being fine feel wrong when others aren’t? Part of it is mathematical thinking. If there’s a fixed amount of good in the world, then me having some means less for everyone else....
You’re at dinner with friends, laughing about something stupid. Then you remember the news from this morning. The disaster. The injustice. The people who are suffering right now. Suddenly your laughter feels wrong. This guilt is everywhere. You feel bad about buying coffee when homeless people need food. About watching Netflix when there’s a war happening. About being happy when others aren’t. The feeling seems to say: your pleasure doesn’t matter when weighed against someone else’s pain....
I felt guilty eating ice cream yesterday. Not because of calories or sugar. Because I’d just read about famine somewhere. This happens all the time. You enjoy a nice meal while thinking about hunger. You feel bad about your vacation while others work. You hesitate to celebrate good news when friends are struggling. The guilt feels moral. Like enjoying yourself while others suffer is somehow wrong. But think about what this guilt actually accomplishes....
I’m lying in a hammock on a Tuesday afternoon. The sun feels perfect. I have nowhere to be. And I feel guilty. Not because I’m skipping work or neglecting responsibilities. I’ve handled everything that needs handling. The guilt isn’t rational. It’s just there. We do this constantly. Feel bad about feeling good when we “should” be feeling good. Take a vacation we’ve earned, then spend it worrying we’re being lazy. Enjoy a meal, then remember people are hungry somewhere....
I ate an expensive dinner last week while scrolling through news about famine. The pasta was perfect. I felt terrible about enjoying it. This guilt seems reasonable at first. People are suffering. I’m having fun. How can that be okay? But here’s the thing: my misery doesn’t reduce anyone else’s suffering. If I hate my pasta, no one gets fed. If I skip the dinner entirely and donate that money, maybe someone benefits....
I felt guilty yesterday for enjoying my coffee while reading about disasters in the news. This happens a lot. You’re having a good time, then remember something awful exists somewhere, and suddenly your pleasure feels wrong. Selfish. Like you’re betraying the suffering by not suffering too. But this makes no sense. Your misery doesn’t reduce anyone else’s misery. Your guilt doesn’t help the people you’re feeling guilty about. If anything, it wastes the good thing you had and creates more bad feeling in the world....