Self-Punishment, Self-Punishing Behavior

This topic comes from a reader, thank you. Without her prompting I would have never looked there. It would have been a big missing.

I am going to share only what I really know, from my experience, not some theories of some big names, like Freud… I am giving you only Tree of Life.

In my experience, most people have self-punishment to some degree.

There are quite a few ways to get to guilt and shame, which is at the root of this behavior.

Self-punishment for doing something wrong, lack of self-discipline

One way is to do things that we know are wrong. We want it, desire it fervently, and then we do it. If the environment is unforgiving or we have even seen anyone punished, verbally or physically, we expect to be punished.

Desire for pleasure is like a two-sided coin (do you know a coin that is not two sided? lol). One side is the fulfillment of the want or desire for pleasure, the other side is always misery. Why? Because pleasure is momentary. It comes with a downside, and the downside is either guilt, or more desire plus guilt.

The dog in this video clip had an “irrepressible” desire to chew on the roll of tape. There is a lie there, it is not irrepressible. Puppies chew and there is no guilt…