I Feel Guilty When I Am Happy

I was shocked when a friend I'll call Mark, said this to me, and it took me some while to come to grips with what he’d said. For I realized, on thinking about the incident, that he’d been utterly serious. He really meant what he’d said in that wistful tone of voice he uses when he’s being completely serious. He really did feel guilty when he was happy.

Initially, I dismissed his remark as something he’d uttered impulsively on the spur of the moment, something that I wasn’t expected to take seriously. Then, as I thought about it, I began to take Mark’s remark at face value. It began to make sense.

You see, Mark is a dedicated sort of person. By that, I mean that he takes life seriously. He takes life very seriously, he works hard, he plays hard. He is highly competitive. Naturally enough, he’s pretty successful in everything he does. He holds down an executive position in the firm he works for with apparent ease. He has a devastating serve in tennis, he plays chess like someone possessed.

Then doesn’t he enjoy his success? Of course, he does. He enjoys it immensely.

But it’s not success that he’s talking about. That wasn’t what he meant when he said he felt guilty when he was happy. Success, as far as Mark is concerned, is richly deserved. He strives for it, both at work and at play. He’s a winner by nature. Success is his by right.

Then what makes him feel guilty?

Exactly what he said: being happy.

But isn’t that a nonsense? Aren't we going round in small circles? Happiness is a simple state of mind. It’s certainly not something to feel guilty about.

On the surface, that’s perfectly true, but where human emotions are concerned, they are seldom that simple. They are most certainly not switched on and off without other thoughts lurking in the background to color and control them. In Mark’s case, he was brought up by serious-minded parents. There’s nothing wrong with that. They instilled in him a laudable work ethic, they imposed solid family values, they insisted on truthfulness and honesty at all times. In fact, Mark grew up to be a pretty impressive sort of guy.

Yet he feels guilty when he’s happy. Why?

“It’s something to do,” he explained to me when I pressed him hard, “with that sense I have that things should be done properly, if they are to be done at all.”

Fine. We all agree with that. We all hate slipshod work. Then why doesn’t he derive a sense of achievement from work well done?

But he does. He derives a considerable sense of achievement when he has accomplished something to be proud of. But the inner glow that results from a sense of achievement, and simple happiness, are quite different things. And when he lets himself feel happy, he immediately starts to feel guilty.

Why? Because, somewhere along the line, he’s decided that he has no business being happy. Being happy is for lazy people. Being happy is for careless people. Being happy is for layabouts, bums and assorted loafers. Being happy just isn’t for him. He’s on tramlines to success. Being happy is for characters in stories. It’s for his friends. But not for Mark. He, you see, is programmed to strive hard and take things seriously. Happiness just doesn’t happen to be a byproduct of that. Carefree laughter is for the lighthearted, not for serious types like Mark.

For, liberally mixed in with the striving ethic in Mark’s case, is what I tend to refer to as the ‘puritan ethic’. The one which gave rise to the old saying “all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy”. Jack had no time for play, for lighthearted activities. He was, as I said previously, a pretty serious guy. He had no time to be carefree. And, I wouldn’t mind betting, on the rare occasions when he did manage it, he immediately began to feel guilty. What a bummer!

When I started to probe Mark, he immediately became defensive. And Mark in the defensive mode is a pretty impregnable opponent. He clammed up on me and angrily muttered that he didn’t want to talk about it.

I chose to confront him obliquely. Confronting someone head-on when they are in that sort of mood is a total waste of time. I knew that from past experience of dealing with Mark when he didn’t want to discuss something. I asked him what made him happy.

“Success,” was the immediate reply.

“But if you work hard for it,” I persisted, “aren’t you entitled to it?”

“I guess.” He correctly sensed that there was more to come.

“And that success makes you happy?”

“Of course. It’s a rightful reward.”

“But you immediately start to feel guilty. Why?”

He glowered at me from under those bushy black brows of his. “Because I then begin to realize how much I enjoyed the striving.” He fastened a particularly baleful glare on me. “I enjoy my work. I enjoy every moment of it. I enjoy the striving. I enjoy the successes…particularly the successes…I even enjoy failures because I look upon them as learning experiences. It’s then that I pick myself up and start over. I start climbing that hill again. I enjoy it all. I’m lucky, I guess,” he added as an afterthought. “I simply enjoy my work. I go to work each morning, looking forward to the day ahead. I don’t find it a drudge, like some of my coworkers do. I am not a clock-watcher. I dare say you would be right if you said that I chose my career well.”

“Sounds good to me,” I muttered. “Sounds just about ideal, in fact. Then why do you feel guilty?”

Mark sighed. He was clearly at a loss as to why I didn’t understand something that was perfectly simple to him. “Because I enjoy it all,” he snapped back. “Because I enjoy every damned moment of it.”

“And you feel you shouldn’t?” I challenged.

“That’s about it,” he replied. “I watch all the other guys as they plow dejectedly through the day, hating every moment of it, living for the time when the clock finally releases them, and I compare that with how I feel…enjoying every moment of it. Of course, I feel guilty. Wouldn’t you?”

I shook my head. “Not for a moment! I wouldn’t consider I have anything to feel guilty about.”

“No, you wouldn’t. But you’d like to be in my shoes.”

I shook my head again. More vigorously this time. “That’s where you are wrong, Mark,” I countered. “I would hate to be in your shoes. I would hate the job you do. It wouldn’t suit me at all. Any more that it appears to suit many of your coworkers. As I see it,” I added, “they have chosen the wrong career path, and they are reaping the rewards, just as you are reaping the rewards for choosing the correct one.”

“Yeah…I guess…”

“I don’t see why you should feel guilty because you have made the right choice, do you?”

Mark just looked at me. “But the other guys…”

“But we’re not talking about the other guys, Mark,” I persisted. “We are talking about you. You have made the right choice. You enjoy your work. You have absolutely no need to feel guilty. In any case," I added, going for the punch line, “it could be that your quite unnecessary guilt feelings are spoiling the atmosphere in the office.”

He chose to ignore that. “But the other guys…”

“The other guys can either consider a career change, or come to terms with their present one,” I pointed out firmly. “And learn to make the best of it whilst they are about it. Either way, it’s not for you to think for them. Or to feel guilty because you are the only happy guy around.”

“Yeah…I guess.”

“And who knows,” I added brightly, “if you approach your work without those mind-numbing guilt feelings lurking away in the background, your uninhibited happiness might rub off onto the others. And they might start enjoying their work too. Remember, only when truly happy does a person operate at his full potential.”

Mark nodded thoughtfully. “That’s very true. And, I dare say,” he added roguishly, “that if I got everyone nice and happy, they would then start feeling guilty because they were experiencing enjoyment in their work.”

“You never know,” I agreed with a smile.

- Warren Roff-Marsh