SHAME CYCLES: 10 WAYS TO WRING THEM OUT OF YOUR LIFE
Healthy shame is the basic boundary, John Bradshaw said in Healing the Shame that Binds You. It tells us that we’re not God, that we’ve made mistakes and will make more. Toxic shame makes us act like we’re more than human and must hide our authentic selves, must guard against exposing ourselves to others and even to ourselves. Shame can be the core of someone’s character, his or her identity. And some of our memories form elaborate collages of shame.
Oftentimes one’s emotions are numbed because of our shame (grief, fear, rage), but renowned author and researcher Brene Brown says that our joy, happiness and purpose in life are then numbed as well. Shame, the belief that I am bad, is at the root of self-destructive behaviors such as eating disorders, addictions, and suicide. Guilt, on the other hand, the belief that I did something bad, does not usually result in self-defeating behavior. During a six-year study of shame, Brown learned that we have to talk about shame, the swampland of the soul. It tells us that we’re not good enough, reminds us of something left undone, a family secret, or a failure.
Psychologist Alice Miller had drawn a similar conclusion years before, stating that childhood traumas don’t make us emotionally ill but our inability to openly express those traumas leads to poor emotional adjustment. Shame thrives in secrecy but when we speak the truth, our sense of shame is diminished. In Ellen Bass and Laura Davis’s The Courage to Heal, Artemis, an incest survivor, said, “I’d worn that cloak of shame and it branded itself into my skin. But I found out that I could take it off.” The most powerful way to overcome shame is to talk about unresolved injuries.
Christopher Cook suggests that the tenacity and determination to break the cycle of shame will be a decision we make every day. Similarly, in the PBS program, “Broken Places: How Trauma in Childhood Shapes a Person,” the narrator claimed that the world breaks everyone and afterward, many are stronger in the broken places.
The following strategies for getting out from underneath shame have been recommended by the aforementioned writers, including Dr. Janina Fisher:
Come out of hiding and into the light of “safe people” in your life. Sit across from them in a non-judgmental setting and honestly share your experiences and feelings. They can help you build a bridge of trust and facilitate the rediscovery of your true identity.
Invite honest feedback from people you trust (about your strengths, habits, and weaknesses); listen to understand, to empathize, and to learn rather than to prepare your next point. Empathy is the antidote to shame.
Be willing to be vulnerable. Present your authentic, imperfect self. Our sense of belonging can never be greater than our level of self-acceptance. True belonging requires sharing pain and being more curious than defensive. Togetherness takes courage, trust (in ourselves and others), and sometimes, discomfort.
Get in touch with the vulnerable child within. Write a letter to the person or persons who did you harm, telling them what you needed and how they kept you from getting it. Write with your non-dominant hand and read it to a support person or group. Ask someone to give you the affirmations corresponding to your unmet needs.
Understand that when we deny our emotions, they “own” us. When we recognize and own them, we can rebuild and find our way through the pain. For example, anger is a life-sucking companion but can be a catalyst; we can transform it into something life-giving: courage, love, change, compassion, or justice.
People who have high levels of shame resilience talk to themselves like they talk to someone they love (not “you idiot; what’s wrong with you?” or “I’m a loser.”) Give yourself encouraging, energizing self-talk (“You can do this; you’re more than halfway finished!” “You played two pages with only one wrong note; way to go!”) Replace shaming voices with nurturing ones.
Disrupt the focus on shame. Does the thought you’re having bring energy or hope, or does it take those elements away? Drop every shaming thought like a hot potato!
Be courageous enough to accept imperfection, and compassionate enough to be kind to yourself and others. Your connection to others will likely deepen noticeably.
When “floating above” rather than living in the moment (usually because of fear), write yourself a permission slip to stop being worried, or being so serious, to be present, to enjoy, to be authentic in the here and now.
Deal assertively with shaming people. When someone does or says something that triggers a shame cycle in you, repeat what they said or did, tell them how it made you feel, and tell them how you would prefer they handle such a situation in the future. Then dismiss the incident from your mind. If you frequently feel badly about yourself in this person’s company, think about limiting or eliminating contact with him or her.
Glennon Doyle Melton, in Love Warrior, wrote: We can choose to be perfect and admired or to be real and loved…If we choose to be perfect and admired, we must send our representatives out to live our lives. If we choose to be real and loved, we must send out our true, tender selves…because to be loved we have to be known…The irony is that our true selves are tougher than our representatives are…Turns out that I never needed to hide. I was a Warrior all along.
