Shame is your enemy

I don’t remember when I first read “shame based personnality”, but I recognized it instantly: hell, it was me.

Shame was my constant companion. I was always feeling it, about one thing or the other. Being late brought shame. Being early triggered shame as well. Doing something badly brought shame (you cannot get anything right type of shame), doing it well brought shame (who do you think your are type of shame). Wanting attention brought shame, but acting withdrawn as well. My desires and wants were shameful by definition. Even falling in love triggered shame.

Oh God it was endless, the whole day, every day, for years. I was convinced that I was the most innapropriate and bad person on earth, and that everything I did was innapropriate and bad. Nothing seemed to change the way I felt about myself: no love and appreciation from others, no achievement however remarkable, nothing.

It was really terrible. Shame is a sure way of feeling miserable, of not enjoying life, of avoiding contacts – even the ones who could be nurturing – of not getting our needs met, of being depressed, of seing no future and no hope.

Shame is our ennemy.

I don’t know if it is a feeling, but if it is, forget about what you hear about feelings never being wrong . This one is always wrong. Something (or someone) telling you that you are innapropriate or bad as a person cannot be right.

Now, it happens to all of us to feel guilt over our mistakes. We all did things we are not very proud of. It shows that we are human and we sometimes screw up, like, well, the rest of humankind. And if we are able to feel guilty it simply shows that we are no psychopath or narcissits – which is, believe me, a very good news. But as you know, guilt is not the same as shame. Shame is feeling we are a mistake. There is no possible escape from this. It breeds helplessness.

How did we end up feeling so ashamed? Basically, shame was transferred onto us by shameful adults when we were little. It is really as simple as that. Physical, emotional, or sexual abuse create shame. Family secrets do. Alcoholism or other addictions. Being scapegoated – which is a form of abuse. Being abandonned, neglected, or ignored.

All of this is about an adult, or several, not behaving appropriately and who should feel guilty but decide not to. Instead of feeling this guilt, which would sure be inconvenient, they simply transferred it as shame onto us. It is not that I am abusive, the problem is you provoking me, type of thing. I am not neglecting you, it’s just that you are so dependent and immature.  Sometimes, the words are not even said out loud. But they think it so loudly that we get it perfectly.

And we believe this nonsense. That’s one of the problems of a traumatic childhood: we believe nonsense, and it takes years and sometimes a lot of therapy to get rid of it (but it can be done. Believe me. I cannot even remember the last time I had a shame attack). Shame is the ennemy: it is not even yours! Stop feeling ashamed on someone else’s behalf. Stop believing nonsense: you are perfectly ok as you are. You always have been.

Tags: Emotions, Our past, Shame