confession

(open) confession is good for the soul

proverb The act of confessing one's misdeeds alleviates stress and guilt. You'll feel better if you just tell mom that you broke the vase. Open confession is good for the soul, after all.
See also: confession, good, soul
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

(Open) confession is good for the soul.

Prov. If you have done something wrong, you will feel better if you confess that you did it. You ought to tell Dad that you broke his radio. Open confession is good for the soul. Sue: I've been so upset about cheating on the exam that I haven't been sleeping nights. Sam: You can do something about it; confession is good for the soul.
See also: confession, good, soul
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs.
See also:
  • (open) confession is good for the soul
  • confession is good for the soul
  • teach a man to fish
  • village
  • it takes a village
  • a guilty conscience needs no accuser
  • life hack
  • be what you appear to be
  • a good example is the best sermon
  • best defense is a good offense
References in classic literature
The explanation has been written already in the three words that were many enough, and plain enough, for my confession. I loved her.
It was then that he sent for the Catholic priest, Father Peter Durban, and to him made confession. So important did it seem to the priest, that he had the confession taken down in writing and sworn to.
Even though the Pervaise confession had never come to light, no reasonable doubt could obtain; for the act in question, that sent fifty-two Congressmen to prison, was on a par with countless other acts committed by the oligarchs, and, before them, by the capitalists.
But, unlike Pervaise the confession of Romaines was made public in his own time.
There was the false hope of making the inevitable atonement by some other means than by the confession of the fraud.
Emil Gluck's confession, six years later, cleared the unfortunate policeman of disgrace, and he is alive to-day and in good health, the recipient of a handsome pension from the city.
In his confession he spoke of it as a little experiment--he was merely trying his hand.
The great Boston fire was started by him--quite by accident, however, as he stated in his confession, adding that it was a pleasing accident and that he had never had any reason to regret it.
A squeaky voice screamed, "Confession or no confession, you are a police spy!"
Dounia remembered her brother's telling her that her mother had overheard her talking in her sleep on the night after her interview with Svidrigailov and before the fatal day of the confession: had not she made out something from that?
Five months after Raskolnikov's confession, he was sentenced.
There was no need for the old gentleman to make his little confession. Women, children, and dogs proverbially know by instinct who the people are who really like them.
Such confessions as I intend to make are never printed nor given to other people to read.
He considers that Rousseau certainly told lies about himself in his confessions, and even intentionally lied, out of vanity.
And assuredly, the secret man heareth many confessions. For who will open himself, to a blab or a babbler?