I was reading a book about relationships, and a thought struck me. Are all of our relationships glued together by guilt? Let’s think about it. Many conventional relationships feature two individuals connected by something. One would say that love is the currency in the exchange between two individuals, but is that always the case? What if it’s rare?

The glue that connects two people tends to exhibit reciprocity and loyalty, but these actions occur only when we feel obligated to do so. Obligation tends to occur through guilt. If you do something for me, then I must do something for you. This is the relationship. It’s the type of relationship that holds families, societies, and friendships together through unspoken debt and a fear of moral failure. If the glue of our relationships is indeed guilt, it is built out of fear rather than the love and unity we think it’s built on.

How Does Guilt Occur?

We are said to be social creatures, but with this comes the possibility of harming others. In a world where it is possible to build relationships, there is also the opposite: losing relationships. Our ego’s mistaken belief in this instance is the belief that we can lose people due to emotional or proximate separation. When we think we might lose people we care about, we act in ways that minimize wrongdoing because any negative action creates debt we believe we must pay off to keep the relationship. In the face of the fear of losing a person, we see guilt as a real entity that keeps us accountable to each other, rather than an internal fear of losing the people we relate to.

The thing about guilt is that if it does exist, then innocence must exist as well. A quick examination can show that these are two temporary states as actions occur. When we do something good for a person, we see ourselves as innocent. When we do something wrong, we are guilty. The mistake is treating these two options as permanent characteristics of your essence. You’re neither of these, even though the actions we take may be perceived as both. We might not get caught up in the idea of guilt if we saw these two seeming opposites as nothing more than two expressions of our being.

A Family of Guilt

A common relationship built on guilt is the very first relationship most children have with their parents. I’d like to think familial relationships are built on love. Still, in many cases, the sacred bond of the “family tie” is used to enforce a perpetual state of obligation that stifles growth and genuine connection. Because the baby was carried for 9th months and taken care of for 18 years, the parent often frames their sacrifice as a debt owed by the child.

The parent believes that, because of their success in raising a child, something is owed to them. It’s almost as if the child were an investment and the parent is looking for a return on their work. The return might be material as the child gets older, but typically, the parents’ happiness seems tied to the child’s performance. With the belief that it is a separate entity from the parent, the child sees the parent as the only option for survival. To survive, the child must ensure their parents’ happiness as their freedom is intrinsically tied to it. Suppose this is the belief of both the child and the parent. In that case, the relationship isn’t built on unity between the two but on repaying the parents’ sacrifice with loyalty, obligation, and reciprocity.

Power Dynamics

This is typically how the power dynamics occur between parent and child. The parent is positioned as the giver, while the child is the indebted receiver. The more the parent gives, the more the child is indebted to their parent. The responsibility of the child might not look as great in youth, but as they grow older, this might look like being forced to choose between personal needs such as career, partner, and location, based on the obligation to an aging parent. The mistake is that this obligation obstructs the realization that true freedom and obligation flow from the same source. In unity, the child wants to take care of their parent. Not because they are indebted to it, but because they see each other as nondifferent. Taking care of the child is taking care of the parent, and taking care of the parent is taking care of the child.

Suppose the parent and child can’t recognize their unity. In that case, the relationship will feel more like a painful coexistence of two individuals, defined by a contract created from historical debt. In this relationship, there are only two options a child can choose to resolve the conflict. They can submit to their parents will, thereby cementing their parents’ reality as the ultimate authority, or rebel, further cementing their separation. In both cases, the child tends to lose as the subordinate in this relationship. For a child, it’s hard to navigate a relationship when it depends on their parents’ subjective emotional state. So in both cases, the child forms guilt. Guilt because if they conform, they lose themselves in the process, but if they rebel, they lose their parent.

Conditional Value

In this example, the parents’ love toward the child is conditional. Even as an adult, love is dependent upon the performance of the dutiful offspring. The child’s goodness is earned by showing up, calling frequently, and taking on specific responsibilities. The failure to meet parents’ expectations leads to guilt. As the child grows up, they are taught that their value is an asset that must be earned through compliance and can be taken away with failure.

The long-term effects are that these power dynamics seep into every aspect of our lives, whether it be work relationships, romantic relationships, friendships, or, of course, the next generation of family. Most adult children find themselves on a path to recognizing their worth, their freedom, and their ability to love, which isn’t granted by their parents and can therefore be revoked by disappointment and guilt. This is the only way to transform a relationship of obligation to one of unconditional choice and authentic love. A lot of us don’t make it this far, but cycle back into the path of obligation.

The True Foundation of Relationship

The feeling of guilt has little to do with our actions; rather, it stems from the sense of having lost or damaged something valuable. This could be the loss of friendship, a loss of someone’s respect, or the loss of moral standing. Consequently, value is something that can only be earned through loyalty, obligation, and reciprocity. This can’t be true love; it is unconditional and never lost. This means your actions, nor the actions of others, should change the love you have for them if the relationship is based on true love. If the love is unconditional, then there’s no guilt. The debt is void. There’s nothing to earn back, and nothing was truly ever damaged. This removal of guilt is not something that can be earned; it is recognized through a shift away from the internal error we hold around guilt.

The foundation of our relationships shouldn’t be based on external contracts, emotional exchange, or the transactional currency of guilt and obligation. These external mechanisms are accompanied by the internal belief that value can be gained and lost. The alternative is knowing that our worth is unconditional and never changes based on our actions. We take the importance out of doing and put more emphasis on who we are.

Nothing is Earned or Taken Away

Guilt and fear only work if we believe that value is conditional and that our worth can be earned and taken away. This only occurs if we place value in things that are temporary, such as achievements, loyalty, and sacrifices. One mistake can diminish any achievement. Ask a canceled celebrity. If we think of our worth as an asset, then our relationships will look like an exchange of needs. Instead of simply saying I love you, we say I love you because you meet my needs, and you must remain loyal for all that I’ve done for you. The glue isn’t love, but the constant maintenance of this contract.

Instead of our worth being an asset, we should see it as substance. My worth is fundamentally who I am, and it never diminishes. This means my actions never change this fundamental truth, nor do yours. True love can occur only when those participating know that they are love, not the things that they do. Our actions are merely expressions of who we are. Because this value of love can’t be lost or earned, there is no need for debt. We stop looking back at what was done and connect to what is happening now.

Freedom and Choice

The most enduring relationships are those that come with freedom and choice. This is ironic because we fear the loss of a relationship, and consequently, we use control to keep it. A true relationship cannot be forced. If someone chooses to spend time with you, it’s because they recognize their joy in your presence, not because they fear the consequence of being absent and your disappointment. We also have to remember that relationships, by definition, are temporary. The absence of guilt allows relationships to dissolve without psychological damage if the form no longer serves the individuals. The underlying unity between the two remains.

Questions and Responses