Your guilt is the super ego, not your conscience.

[Escaped_Goat]

I've done a LOT of reading about psychology in the last few years. I've recently be learning about the intersect of the super ego and conscience. When we feel guilty or ashamed we can assume it's always our conscience piping up.

Our super ego is largely built by our primary care givers in our early years. If you had a disordered care giver your super ego will contain many rules about putting them first, not holding them accountable and protecting them from consequences of their behaviour. This is not conscience. Conscience is nuanced and is based on sophisticated reasoning.

I find learning about this immensely helpful when I'm in a guilt spiral about my decision to walk away from members of my family who hurt me. Super ego says 'he's your dad', conscience says 'he gains nothing if I allow him to hurt me, he feels he has does nothing wrong, any attempt to get my needs met through communication results in pain and no gain.'

I just thought I'd share this in case it helps anyone else.

[NarcKiddo]

Interesting. Thank you. I shall read up on the subject.

[Leonor]

Ooh I love this!

I hear (or read, I suppose) so many dear fellow survivors attach themselves so strongly to the concept of a conscience: "I could never live with myself if ..." or "Doesn't s/he feel any remorse for ..." or "I just can't forgive myself for ..."

It comes from a well-intentioned place:  the desire to be self aware, to not want to do harm, to distinguish right from wrong.

But the conscience is just a guilt machine. It's a shame engine, an infinite loop stuck in a past of "What did you do" and "How could you" and "You are bad for ..." It's the voice in our head that tells us we are wrong, bad, awful.

Think about it! When have you ever heard your conscience say, "Gee, that was a nice thing to do!" Or, "Wow, you're pretty amazing!"

And if you ever did hear those things in your head, the old conscience would be right there: "You're full of yourself, you're selfish, you're self righteous ..."

No other living creature shames themselves for living, and lots of living creatures do things that people creatures think are pretty embarrassing. Or impolite. Or horrible. They don't have a conscience because they don't have anyone telling them that they are bad. Their parents do not function to follow them around guilting them into being "good" or "polite" or "kind" squirrels or beluga whales or bugs.

But human parents do exactly that. They give us the idea that we are bad because we were born bad because humans are bad, do bad things, say bad words, harbor bad desires, imagine bad outcomes.

And so it's easy for abusive parents to manipulate their children. They just tap into that poison well they've excavated in their tender minds. And so they beat or harangue or frighten their children, and when the children react, the parents bang the guilt gong. We feel horrible, because we are being abused, but we've been gaslighted into thinking that it's not the beating that hurts, it's our badness. Our conscience. Our guilt.

In the religion I was raised in, today is the celebration of the conception of the only human being to not be born bad, and that was so she wouldn't pass badness onto her son (through the placenta or something?) And there are plenty of stories in the Bible where she tries to lay a guilt trip on him (it doesn't work, btw.)

But the idea that humans are inherently and innately flawed is common in a lot of religions and belief systems. We tell ourselves that we have to be protected from weather and wild animals and each other ... But, most of all, from ourselves. That's crazy! How are you with your little old self going to be a greater threat to your life than a charging black bear or rampant bubonic plague?

As Cheri Huber writes, "Most of what we were taught to believe we had to be taught to believe. We never would have come up with this on our own!"

What if the opposite were true? What about instead of being hounded with guilt and shame we were celebrated and cherished? What if instead of an internal, infernal scold, we had an awareness of a kind mentor or loving presence?

Maybe it doesn't have to be so hard. Maybe we're not bad people trying to be good. Maybe people are as inherently as good and worthy and vibrant as an oak tree or a spotted moth. Maybe we don't have to apologize for being alive after all.

[Srcyu]

That's so true it's horrifying.

[Rose1]

Very interesting thread. There is an interesting ancient definition of conscience "For when people of the nations, who do not have law do by nature the things of the law, these people, although not having law, are a law to themselves". This was written thousands of years ago by the Apostle Paul who was at one time a lawyer and had a way with words.

The thinking here is that a conscience is something we have by nature whereby we obey laws. Interestingly, across all cultures, some things are considered wrong. Take for example stealing. It's pretty universal that taking something from another person is wrong and laws are only written in line with what we all know anyway.

So is a conscience something that continually berates and criticises us or is it something that stops us from behaving in ways that society does not accept? If we steal then yes our conscience will tell us we've done wrong and are likely to have sleepness nights and feel guilty. However if we obey our conscience and do not steal, it does not make us feel guilty.

So why do we feel guilty over things that we have not done wrong? Is it conscience or is it PD installed feelings as suggested by the OP? Has our own conscience been trained to register guilt every time we do something the PD in our life would not approve? If so then we should be able to slowly retrain ourselves and certainly many have done that with success. (OK it's a slow process).

The first step is coming Out of the FOG and then there are quite a few techniques that help us to overcome the critical voice inside us. Can I suggest this voice is not our conscience at all but our conditioning.

[Leonor]

Hmm, I am going to respond to St Paul by noting that what is deemed "wrong" from one society to another depends on that society's culture.

If a society places a big emphasis on one person having stuff, taking stuff is called "stealing."

If a society places a big emphasis on community resources, taking stuff is called "sharing."

That's what Escaped Goat means by the superego. It's a "voice" superimposed on us by society that is intended to keep the ego in check (according to Freud.)

There is a superego: it's someone else's voice, literally, telling us that we are bad, and when we want to do something for ourselves or in ourselves or by ourselves, that's just our "ego": we are being ego-tistical, or selfish. And we must be psychologically beaten back into submission.

Of course, Freud also points out that the superego's work is never do because the subconscious, that wonderful, wild thing, keeps misbehaving like the naughty child in the back of the classroom. And poor ego is trapped in the middle: loving the subconscious, but afraid of the superego.

GEE. SOUND FAMILIAR?

The superego is mom and dad teaching us "right from wrong" and "do this not that" and "or else."

The subconscious is our little inner child, whole and curious and open, who wants to experience all but also sees all, hears all, and remembers all. All the things that didn't add up. All the "do as I say not as I do's." All the "let's not tell's" and "don't let on's."

Now we're all so afraid that if we stopped abusing and shaming and guilting ourselves, we'll transform like the Hulk into this enormous angry violent thing. And so we keep doing it and call it "having a conscience."

I don't think that being human means being innately bad or clueless or violent and needing a conscience to keep the damage in check.

What if instead of implanted with a conscience, we were nourished in empathy? There are no rules with empathy. No one has to be good or bad or right or wrong. We could teach children about feelings and how to express them rather than about rules and how to obey them. And we could foster emotional intelligence rather than courtesy and politeness.

[Rose1]

Interesting. Of  course empathy is included in the golden rule. But unfortunately it is often not taught nowadays and in a pd situation I would suspect rarely.

Also I guess empathy would also be cultural, and in fact is. Some cultures are very empathetic, others not so much. But each culture feels comfortable in their own ideas and we are looking at their idea of empathy with our own prejudices.

As far as conscience is concerned, I still say we are not condemned if we follow our conscience.

I've never been too clear on what is meant by ego. To me it's more related to self interest rather than empathy. Not the 51% rule but more "my way or the highway" thinking. Of course dealing with pd means we are exposed to a great deal of self interest and I'm sure it rubs off. Hence fleas.

Getting back to conscience it still prevents a lot of bad behaviour. I agree within social contexts since a conscience is trained but most cultures have taboos against murder, violence etc. Where does that come from?

In the sense that we are all affected by being brought up with pd why are we trying our best to overcome the bad traits and not become what we were modelled? Despite the difficulty of changing and the effort that goes into that. What's driving that? Is it an innate desire to be better than we were shown and not to repeat the past?

From what I read here that is often the motivation, and I have a great deal of admiration for those who are  managing to overcome the hardships caused by long term association with a pd, whether parents or partner. It doesn't come easy.