Have You Ever Felt Guilty?
We all know expressions like: “positive vibes,” “raise your vibration,” or “change your frequency.” They sound modern. Almost trendy. And if you are a rational, high-performing leader, a part of you might roll your eyes because you have built your career on facts, strategy, KPIs and not on “vibes.”
And yet… you’ve probably experienced this without calling it energy.
Think of a moment when you walked into a room and immediately felt tense, even though nobody said anything. Or the moment after a difficult conversation, when you keep replaying the same sentence in your mind, and your body stays on alert as if the meeting is still happening.
That’s not imagination.
That’s frequency. That’s your system responding.
And if you’re already exhausted, these invisible inner states don’t just accompany your work.
They silently fuel the burnout.
We Are All Energy
We find an answer to this in quantum science, which states that every atom and therefore every cell and every body and therefore all of us are 100% energy. Which means: you’re not “either professional or sensitive.”
You are a high-level thinker with a human nervous system.
And your nervous system is always communicating through sensation: the tight chest before presenting, the pressure behind the eyes after another “quick request,” the heaviness that appears on Sunday evening when you open the calendar and see what’s waiting.
This means that we are constantly in a state of oscillation and vibrate at different frequencies. This is not so far-fetched. And we know it only too well, even if we are not so aware of it in the context of energy.
Here’s the simplest way to feel it: compare your body when you are relaxed, present and calm. With your body when you are tense or scared. The “same you” is suddenly a completely different internal experience.
And once you notice that, the next question becomes impossible to ignore:
What is draining you so much, even when you are doing everything right?
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Why Is Guilt An Energy Vampire?
Energetic biology states that people vibrate at different frequencies depending on what affects their personal energy. Based on these findings, Dr. David R. Hawkins, a physician and psychiatrist, developed the Scale of Emotions. This explains the different vibrations of emotions.
Now let’s bring this out of theory and into the life of an ambitious female executive: Guilt is rarely loud.
It’s subtle. It’s polished. It sounds like responsibility.
It shows up as:
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“I should have handled that better.”
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“I can’t disappoint them.”
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“I can’t say no… they need me.”
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“It’s my fault the team is stressed.”
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“If I take a break now, I’m being selfish.”
You can be the most capable person in the room and still feel that internal flinch when expectations rise. Not because you lack skills, but because your system equates performance with safety.
According to Dr. Hawkins, the lower the vibration you vibrate at, the more energy you consume; in contrast, you add energy to the world when you are vibrating at a higher level.
So from an energetic point of view, guilt and self-doubt are two of the biggest energy vampires.
And here’s the part most high performers miss:
You can manage your time perfectly and still be exhausted if guilt and self-doubt are running in the background.
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What Is Personal Energy Management?
The goal is to move from a lower vibration to a higher one. But how can we do that? This is where personal energy management comes into play. Energy work does not focus on improving the symptoms, but on finding the cause and thus dissolving the energy blockage.
That’s a big shift for high performers, because your brain has been trained to fix things by doing more:
< More effort.
< More perfection.
< More control.
< More proving.
But if the root cause is an inner accusation, a fear, a story your nervous system still believes, then “more” becomes the exact thing that keeps you trapped.
So instead of pushing through, we go underneath.
Three Steps To More Energy
1) Admit It – Without Drama, Without Judgment
The first step is to admit to yourself that you are still walking around with guilt or self-doubt. Look honestly and feel inside to find out: Am I carrying guilt? Do I feel guilty?
If you are used to being “the strong one,” this can feel unfamiliar. You might minimize it. Rationalize it. Outperform it.
But here’s what I want you to consider: What if your exhaustion isn’t a capacity issue, but a self-relationship issue?
What if the energy leak is coming from the constant inner pressure to be “good enough” to deserve rest?
Just noticing that is already a shift.
2) Get Specific: What Is The Accusation?
The next step is to look at why you feel guilty in the first place by asking: Did I do something wrong? Should/could I have done something differently? Have I been carrying it around for a while or just recently?
The feeling of guilt is very often connected with an accusation, mostly against oneself. Quite often we are not even aware of it.
This is where the “CEO mind” meets the “inner child nervous system.” Because the accusation is rarely about what happened this week. It’s often older.
It can sound like:
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“I’m only valued when I’m useful.”
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“I’m safe when I deliver.”
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“I must not make mistakes.”
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“I have to hold everything together.”
And if that story is running, your body cannot fully exhale, even on a quiet day.
3) Resolve The Reason And Forgive Yourself For Being Human
The final step is then to resolve the reason for the guilt. In most cases, it is relatively easy to decide to let go of the accusation against oneself and the feelings associated with it. The most important thing is to forgive yourself.
Maybe it wasn’t right what you did or said in that situation but you couldn’t help it at that time. Admitting this to yourself makes it much easier to let go of the guilt.
Let me add something especially for you, if you’re carrying responsibility for many people:
Forgiveness isn’t letting yourself “off the hook.”
Forgiveness is releasing the inner punishment that keeps your nervous system on edge.
Because punishment burns energy.
And you need that energy for leadership, clarity, creativity, and your actual life.
A note on blaming others (and why it still drains you)
You can use the same process when you blame someone else for something. When you have an accusation against someone else, regardless of whether what the person said or did was right, these thoughts keep your body at a low frequency.
And this line is so important for high-performing women who have had to “swallow” a lot over the years:
You are actually harming yourself the most, while the other person may have already forgotten about the incident.
So this work isn’t about being “nice.” It’s about being free.
Use Your Energy
When you have gone through these three steps, you will feel that something has been released in your body and the energy can flow better again. Many also feel lighter and kind of liberated.
Because when the accusation dissolves, the body stops bracing. The shoulders drop. The breath deepens. The nervous system gets the signal:
I am safe even when I’m not overworking.
This is exactly the solution approach of Personal Energy Management: resolving the causes and not treating symptoms. Because when the cause is resolved, the symptoms dissolve by themselves. That is the wonderful thing about it.
Since we are all made of 100% energy, we are all energy beings and can therefore also work with energy. Yes, also YOU.
And if you’re the woman who’s been holding it all together for years, let that land:
< You don’t need to become someone else to finally feel better.
< You don’t need more discipline.
< You don’t need another strategy.
You need your system to stop believing you must earn safety through exhaustion.
If your nervous system is on the edge and you want something practical you can use between meetings (not another “do more” routine):
Download my complimentary workbook:
The 3 Minutes Personal Energy Reset
and discover 4 powerful Energy Rituals for immediate stress relief.
Looking Forward to Your Comments 🙂