The grips of shame

And beginning to release them.

On shame.

It’s taken me a long time to begin to understand shame. I remember watching a Brené Brown video during one of my first treatment sessions; an animated one that explains the difference between guilt (“I did something bad”) and shame (“I am bad”). I was petulant and resistant to anything my therapist said, and dismissed this lesson as boring and unimportant. Plus, “bad” was not a word that made me feel anything. The thought of being bad did not cause the shameful sting that I later discovered other words did.

I’ve since talked and read at length about shame, and come to a better understanding of it. Shame is the feeling or belief that there’s something wrong with me. It’s the sense that there’s something about me that makes me unlovable, unworthy, or undeserving. It’s the feeling of inadequacy, of being deficient or fundamentally flawed. Wrongness, rather than badness, makes more sense in my conception of shame. 

I should be different than this. 

Everyone experiences shame: it’s universal and highly personal. It’s tied up in morality and societal norms, and sometimes referred to as a “social emotion.” It depends on how we think others might see us, or how we view ourselves in terms of the broader social or moral order. Our particular shame points are often imprinted when we are very young, based on how we learned to receive love and acceptance.

Some studies find shame to be adaptive, and others find that it’s maladaptive. I agree that it can be both. Since shame works to maintain social norms and hierarchies¹, acquiescing to shame may have once served to make you feel safe. Maybe you were conditioned to believe that you had to agree with everyone around you, and rendering yourself a doormat allowed you to fit (un)comfortably into your group of friends. Maybe you were shamed for the way you looked, and your steadfast commitment to makeup and body hair removal slowed the barrage of their criticism. In this kind of way, shame is adaptive. Bodies are smart and go to great lengths to stay alive.

And, shame remains inherently maladaptive. It degrades your self-worth and fuels self-consciousness. It isn’t conducive to being loved and accepted for who you are, and is unlikely to lead to positive transformation. Ultimately, shame doesn’t heal: it drives us deeper into the pits of conformity and self-loathing, to varying degrees.

From Atlas of the Heart: “shame is not a compass for moral behavior. It’s much more likely to drive destructive, hurtful, immoral, and self-aggrandizing behavior than it is to heal it. Why? Because where shame exists, empathy is almost always absent.”

On empathy.

To counteract shame, we need empathy. As shame researcher Ronda Dearing says, “Shame is an egocentric, self-involved emotion. It draws our focus inward. Our only concern with others when we are feeling shame is to wonder how others are judging us. Shame and empathy are incompatible.”²

While shaming others or ourselves deters the potential of growth or repair, self-compassion and empathy can unlock that potential. Talking about shame neutralizes its impact, and can show us that we are worthy of connection.

The most helpful technique I have found to deal with shame is to be willing to see that the shame isn’t true. “I am open to being shown that…” is a powerful mantra.

You can consider the possibility that your shame is incorrect. You can declare that you are ready to see that this shame does not accurately reflect reality. You can ask to be shown that there’s a chance that your inadequacy is a lie and that actually, you are good enough. Even if you feel unworthy of sharing your pain, you can be open to discovering that there’s someone who is able to hold it with you. 

Shame is not you and you are not shame.

I felt intense, visceral shame a few days ago after being scammed.³ I told my mom afterwards: “I’m a fool, a complete idiot! I’ve never felt more humiliated and ashamed in my life, I’m a hypocrite; a betrayer of my own intuition!” (The drama!)

She told me that she didn’t think I was these things, and as she repeated them back to me I started laughing, much to the dismay of my self-deprecating self. Guess I don’t actually believe the accusations I was hurling — or at least, the part of me that is deep and true and unconditionally loving doesn’t. 

Noticing shame means that you are not it. If you can be aware of when you’re operating from a place of deficiency, then you can see that you are not the shame. You’re only the one experiencing it. 

What if you could set it down?

Once upon a time, you may have needed that shame to feel like you belonged to a group, family, or social order.

What if you don’t anymore? What if sharing your tender shameful parts is the ticket from being free of the damage they will continue to cause on your life and spirit? What if you could set it all down?

What if, we loved ourselves amidst and because of the shame we keep inside?

And maybe, when we are not able to love the parts that we deem unlovable, we can remember that something else is loving them for us. 

Maggie

1. Fessler, D. M. T. (2004). Shame in two cultures: implications for evolutionary approaches. J. Cogn. Cult. 4, 207–262. Found and cited from this excellent review on shame research.

2. From Brené Brown’s Atlas of the Heart. Brené is perhaps the most well-known shame researcher, but by far is not the only one. The above review features countless others.

3. I did end up getting my $300 back, thanks Apple Support.