The Hard Thing About Shame

In 2019, my life would have looked amazing to the people who followed me on Instagram:

👉 I had just got a new job, with a 25% salary increase
👉 I could suddenly afford a better lifestyle and travel to Peru (something I had wanted to do for years!)
👉I was in a shiny new (outwardly) happy relationship

What you didn’t see on Instagram was that I was the unhappiest I had ever been. Obsessive travel meant that I saved LESS than I ever had before. My ‘boyfriend’ was an emotionally unavailable commitment-phobe and the fancy new job completely eroded my confidence because I was working on a project with a manager for whom it seemed I could do nothing right.

What did I do when faced with everything that wasn’t working? I denied it of course. I just fought harder. Travelled more. Posted more photos.

What happened next? Things got worse — they always do when we continue to deny ourselves.

My manager continued to loathe me. The more I tried to impress her the more irate she got. I knew I was creative and that I made excellent slides that would easily summarize complex information. A key skill for a change manager. But I was dyslexic so I would often make little mistakes in the emails or slides — skip words or spell things wrong — this drove her crazy.

Looking back I realize that she must have been under immense pressure. I remember I once skipped a word in an email I sent her — I think it was ‘the’ or ‘an’. She called me over to her desk and made me read the email out loud. Twice. In front of the entire team. I couldn’t catch the error. She got increasingly more frustrated.

What is Shame?

All of us have shame maybe we were teased for mispronouncing a common word or for how we looked in a bathing suit, or perhaps a loved one witnessed us telling a lie…

Shame is seen as when you look inward with a critical eye and evaluate yourself harshly, especially for things you have little control over. Researchers have found that Shame is very highly correlated with depression and anxiety.

Toxic shame opens the door to anger, self-disgust, and other less-than-desirable feelings. It can make you feel small and worthless. It can trickle into your inner dialogue like a poison, locking you into a painful loop of negative self-talk.

When toxic shame lingers without resolution, the desire to hide from it or escape from yourself can lead to potentially harmful behaviours like substance misuse or self-harm. It can affect all areas of your life and show up in your relationships and affect how you show up at work.

Where does Shame come from?

As human beings, we crave connection and belonging which is why societies use shame and the threat of ostracism in order to gain control over children…

As we grow older, this shame leads us to look at another person that is “further” in life than us and feel like we will never attain what they’ve accomplished.

These learned programs can have huge impacts on us — very often Shame can be a major anger trigger because when we harbor shame, we tend to react defensively when we’re criticized or given even mild feedback.

How can Rapid Transformation Therapy Help with Shame?

Shame plays havoc in our relationships — ironically making us isolate more and feel even more disconnected. The only cure to shame? Vulnerability. Being honest and open about our flaws helps us connect more deeply with other people and helps us realize that we are not alone.

Within 1–3 sessions RTT can help you understand where and how you first started believing that you were unworthy or that there was something wrong with you. This understanding is powerful and will help you to get emotional freedom from learned patterns of behaviour, enabling you to connect more deeply and authentically.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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