Guilt during wartime is, first and foremost, aggression directed towards oneself. This feeling is rooted in a whole range of psychological factors: grief for those who have suffered, a sense of solidarity, and empathy. Unfortunately, however, it can leave us depleted, leading to apathy and despair.

If you chose this workshop, you most likely feel guilty yourself or encounter this feeling in your work with clients. You are not alone in this. It speaks to our humanity and shows that we understand and feel the gravity of the situation. We may also feel powerless to affect the suffering around us. This is a normal response for someone capable of empathising with others. Unfortunately, experiencing guilt tends to drain us rather than help us actively influence the situation. There is, then, both normal guilt and toxic guilt. Healthy guilt encourages a dialogue with our conscience and our moral principles, helping us consider whether the way we think and act is right. It is an emotion that helps us remain human and live in accordance with our values.

Healthy guilt leads to awareness and remorse, and to an apology that releases us from guilt and opens up access to inner resources for changing the situation. How can I make amends for what I have done? In a crisis or a traumatic situation, this feeling can become toxic. For example, we may feel that we are not suffering enough compared with others and that we ought to suffer more. This experience paralyses and exhausts us, preventing us from taking action.

We can identify the following sources of toxic guilt and ways of working with these experiences.

1. We may notice that guilt arises when a person loses their own boundaries and experiences confluence (guilt as a marker of confluence). They lose the sense of where their responsibility begins and ends, and of what they can and cannot do. In this case, we can try inviting the client to move from guilt to responsibility. What am I actually responsible for in my life?

2. Guilt can arise from particular beliefs, or introjects. We can recognise these introjects in phrases such as ‘I must’ or ‘I should’. We can work with these introjects.

3. Guilt often arises when the energy of aggression is directed towards oneself. We may notice a split: two parts emerge within the person, one accusing and the other feeling guilty. Today we will explore this process in an exercise.

4. In some clients, we may notice projective mechanisms: those on the battlefield must be having a very hard time, and so on. We can explore this process and try to help the client recognise these experiences as their own. I would feel terrible on the battlefield, but that does not necessarily mean the soldiers there feel bad. I would feel terrible in a city under shelling, but that does not necessarily mean those people feel worse at home than they would abroad.

5. Toxic guilt often arises from an inability to assimilate certain understandings of oneself. For example: I am not prepared to fight on the front line; I am not prepared to die for my homeland; I am not brave enough to remain in Ukraine; and so on. This awareness may be accompanied by various intense feelings, such as shame, anger, and sadness.

To sum up: You are already doing enough. If you do not need to be evacuated, rescued, or taken to hospital, you have already helped; you are already doing enough. If you have managed to support someone close to you, or you are caring for children, parents, or animals, you are already doing enough. If you send money to support the army, that is enough. If you have savings that allow you not to ask for help, you are doing enough. It is important for each of us to find our own battlefield and make our contribution. Do what you can, where you are. What is your superpower? It is the small acts: together, they add up to victory.

The practical exercise aimed to explore the participants’ feelings of guilt.

Imagine there is a chair opposite you. Place your feeling of guilt on it. Look at it. What does it look like? What does it resemble? Perhaps it looks like jelly or a heavy stone, or perhaps the image of a person appears there. It might be a character from a fairy tale or a film, or perhaps you as a child. Your feeling of guilt is not an enemy; it wants to communicate something to you. Our task is to relate that intention to reality and help this feeling interact with us in the best possible way. Imagine that your feeling of guilt has eyes and is looking at you. Think about what your feeling of guilt wants to tell you.

Notice the first thing that comes to mind. Now imagine that you are your feeling of guilt. You are sitting on the chair, looking at yourself through guilt’s eyes. Answer this question: what do you need from this person? What do you want from them? The first thing that comes to mind is the most accurate answer. It may resemble an introject or a belief.

Now return to yourself and reconnect with how you feel. What would you like to do with this belief? Are you comfortable with it? Does it fit you? Is this belief relevant to your actual everyday life? Perhaps you would like to change it so that it helps you act in accordance with the real situation.

Now address your feeling of guilt and write it a letter. Tell it everything you think about it. Various feelings may arise: anger, sadness, and so on. You may even be able to feel grateful to your feeling of guilt.