The Leftovers clearly refers in some sense to the emotionally broken loved ones who remain on earth, in a permanent state of guilt and befuddlement.
The law that emerges from the father's murder ritualizes and enforces his edicts, forbidding murder and incest in the public realm, and takes hold internally in the superegoic 'no' of prohibition, producing a permanent sense of guilt that drives civilization and renders it a perpetual source of discontent.
He walked the corridors of Westminster wearing a permanent hangdog expression of sheepish guilt, as if expecting retribution for some piece of mischief, but in reality he was an introspective man, a humanist who loved Mozart, Beethoven and Brahms and, according to Dennis Skinner, what many interpreted as arrogance was actually shyness.
The numb survivors in small-town Mapleton try to maintain the facade of a normal life while being tormented by the presence of the mute, white-clad, chain-smoking cult the Guilty Remnant, who aspire to a permanent state of grieving and guilt.
Let's make Eat What You Want Day the beginning of a healthier approach to eating year-round, one that gives you a permanent break from diet rules and guilt.
I thought that my emotions were going to stay in a permanent state and I instantly felt the guilt rush in as a new mom.
Those trials will determine their innocence or guilt and whether the temporary residences will become permanent.
The mark of "evil" demands permanent banishment or death, and we call perpetrators "evil" to relieve the guilt we might feel in applying such sanctions.
Quirke's own clan is a feuding mass of pain and guilt; his daughter, Phoebe, is an anxious, "nun-like" girl who dresses as if she were in permanent mourning.
