Where do I go from here?

Wow, I just made a really long and detailed post which i didnt manage to post and lost it so this is gonna be a short one. How can i deal with my existential dread as well as remorse for my past behaviour and acts that cause me deep shame that I can never tell people and being aware of all the pain and suffering in the world, not just of the victims but feeling sorry for the people that do terrible things as they must have been hurt in their life too. I also am dealing with the issues like me there could be people who have done remoreful things that i will never know who could be very close to me in my life meaning im worrying if you can truly know a person.

My theory is that i need to surround myself with people that trully care about me and find something in life which makes it worth it. Would love to know what other people would think of these suggestions and also if anyone ever felt the same way about life.

My aim out of this is so I can live in the present again and enjoy life and feel like i deserve happiness as the thing that used to ground me was that I cared about societys and other peoples opinions above my own and had a little bit of anger that had me something to focus on.

Thanks , Rowan

Suffering is a fundamental part of the human/animal condition. It's what ultimately drives us from one moment to the next. Suffering can be as simple as discontentment with one's current state.

When remorse kicks in, it can completely weigh us down with suffering. But we should really be treating this form of suffering like any other - as a catalyst for action.

Ask yourself, what is remorse really there for, on the biological level? Why have humans evolved to experience remorse? The answers to these questions will lead you to what you have to do in order to remove the suffering associated with it.

The utility of remorse is often clouded by feelings of self pity and hopelessness. But this is merely a psychological colouring of what is ultimately a pain response.

If you put your hand over a flame, you feel pain and pull your hand away, hopefully learning not to do it again. Remorse is not much different from this. The pain of remorse, when seen in its rudimentary form, is just a way of protecting you from actions that, at least at one time during our ancestor's existence, would have threatened your survival. This comes in the form of social rejection. If you harm others, you risk being cast from the "tribe" and thus your access to resources and reciprocal benefit is diminished. Therefore, in times when co-operation was essential for survival, those who were more likely to survive were those who offered more benefit than harm to their brothers and sisters.

The point I'm trying to make here is that you should see remorse as a form of protection. Without the pain response that comes with it, it simply wouldn't work. It's no surprise then, that when you take actions that help, rather than harm others, your brain "rewards" you with a dump of chemicals that make you feel good and content. There lies the antidote to the pain of remorse. So blatantly obvious, yet often overlooked because you can't see beyond the complex psychological story you are telling yourself about your past actions.

The way to escape the cycle of suffering from remorse is to take actions that benefit others. Since remorse is the product of harming others, the antidote is to do the complete opposite.

Secondly, nobody "deserves" anything. In this universe, there are actions, and there are consequences. Place your attention less on what you, or others deserve, and more on the specific actions required to make suffering work productively.

In other words, take a more rational view of life - how certain actions lead to certain outcomes. What we "deserve" is not the issue, rather what actions create the best outcomes for everyone. That is the case no matter what happened in the past. It's an equation that is not suspended in time.

You mentioned being in the present moment - this is where all your potential lies. It doesn't matter what happened in the past, now is where actions and consequences are born. Once you fully realise this, you will understand that the value of your actions in this moment are the same no matter what happened in your past. A still leads to B.

You can still do more good than harm in this moment. And the next moment. And the next. The past does not change or diminish this potential.