Transform Your Shame into Comedy

[Music]

i’m barefoot

walking the hospital corridors but i

stop

because suddenly i’m overwhelmed by this

awesome feeling of love it’s like

light is pouring through me in waves of

pure joy

filling the space around me and beyond

endless

and infinite

this love is going to change the world

and my mind trying to make sense of this

experience

tells me you’re jesus

reincarnated

okay that experience

let’s have some context yes i was a

patient in a psychiatric ward at the

time

and yes it was a lot like christmas

thank you for asking

that experience happened 21 years ago

today i’m a professional comedian a

registered trans personal counsellor

and i’m a comedy therapist

and don’t worry i know i’m not jesus

reincarnated

because i refuse to wear birkenstocks

plus i still walk away from people while

they’re talking

if they’re boring would jesus do that

maybe but that’s another ted talk

so why am i telling you all of this well

i’d like to share with you

how comedy can change the world

if you make friends with your shame

as a child my world felt unstable

broken home both parents struggling with

life

but we had humor and i remember this

amazing

feeling of relief when everyone was

laughing

because it meant for a minute everything

was okay my mum wasn’t having a

breakdown

my dad wasn’t depressed my sister wasn’t

crying

so i became the clown in my family

that was my attempt to bring light to

the very

serious business of being alive

nobody escapes trauma being alive is the

definition

of traumatic it starts with being born

okay the ultimate separation

and it pretty much carries on till we

die

when i was eight years old i saw

a comedy sketch show on tv and i

remember thinking

going to work with my friends and making

each other laugh i

must have this job

but as a teenager i was struggling

with the mounting weight of our families

undealt with

trauma and loss humor was my mask

i developed this unconscious belief in

childhood

that my worth and value came when i was

funny

so i hacked off everything else

in my effort to belong

like my parents addiction issues

caught hold and by the age of 19 i was

so unwell that i was sectioned under the

mental health act and put into

psychiatric care

against my will

and when i recovered my sanity and i say

that

very loosely when i recovered my sanity

i was deeply ashamed

mental illness carries a terrifying

stigma

and the shame of it pushed me into

isolation

and depression and life got even more

dark

but don’t worry friends i’m a resilient

fellow

i put my mask back on i buried

my past and i went back out into the

world

now in my mid-20s i tried stand-up

comedy

but my creativity was strangled by fear

and the comedy scene felt toxic and

lonely

but more to the point i sucked

so i quit but isn’t it the way

that our dreams erupt inside us like

volcanoes and eventually

i had no choice but to follow this

calling

and see where it took me i stopped

running from myself

and i started my healing journey and

this took me to university where i

studied comedy writing and performance

and it was there that i did a research

project that changed everything

i wanted to know could i use comedy as a

therapeutic tool to shine a light on my

own self-stigma and shame

short answer is yes obviously but before

i could even

begin to find the funny i had to revisit

my experiences of mental illness or

madness as we like to say in our family

i had to come to terms with the big

juicy

fullness of being human

perhaps we’re not meant to be perfect

perhaps life gets dark and messy

and awful for everyone

sometimes maybe i’m not the only one

and all that suppressed emotion and

shame

it needed to come out so i used a

creative tool

called stream of consciousness writing

and this allowed me to write without

censorship

i free-flowed that shame up out of the

darkness

and onto the page and my soul knew what

needed to be said

and for the first time in many years i

cried

and then i did something that i’ve never

done before

i began to share vulnerably with

other people and it was terrifying

to admit how broken

i thought i was

but something unexpected happened

something beautiful

instead of the rejection and abandonment

i had spent

a lifetime running from

i found love and understanding

and it was from this place of connection

and acceptance that i was truly ready

to pan for comedy gold

life is full of absurdities

believe in your jesus reincarnated that

has comedy mileage

a joke works because the punchline

provides a release from tension just

like healing

brings relief from pain

and when it became performance night

i needed to create a safe space to share

this comedy

so i invited people from my healing

community

because i knew that they could identify

with my story

because it was also theirs well maybe

not the jesus part

although you’d be surprised how many

people are walking around the earth

right now believing they are jesus

reincarnated

god knows there’s enough of him to go

round that’s a terrible joke

and the normal people or i should say

the people who are good at

pretending to be normal they also

laughed

because humor promotes empathy

it tears down barriers and creates

sameness

humor encourages us to be open-minded

and forgiving whether our stories are

the same or not

we’re all human although some of us

could be aliens

but again another ted talk

throughout the entire process of writing

sharing practicing and performing

i had to be with my shame

but i found it was a necessary descent

into darkness

because what i discovered was that

making friends with my shame

dissolved it this process

allowed me to reframe and celebrate

my experiences of madness

as valid human experiences that have

made

my life richer i want to repeat that

this process allowed me to celebrate

my experiences as valid

human experiences that have made my life

richer

and when i got off stage that night

grinning my friends and family

surrounding me the weight lifted

a classmate approached me and with tears

in her eyes said

thank you i have bipolar and i never

tell anyone

a psychiatrist saw it on youtube

and requested a performance to educate

his staff

and bring hope to his service users

my comedy was becoming a tool for change

and then i realized well this can work

for anyone with any story

so i began teaching other people how to

heal with humor

and over the last few years i’ve

witnessed hundreds of people get

vulnerable

open their hearts to each other

and then go on to share their truth

through comedy

and the response is always the same the

audience

cares they are inspired delighted

and empowered i call this model

hilaripy yes it’s a made-up word

three things that make hillary work

a supportive community to give us

courage

and to catch us when we stumble therapy

to face the darkness and comedy writing

and performance techniques to share

our humanity i want to share a story

with you

a student of mine mary is performing

comedy about what it’s like

living with social anxiety everybody’s

laughing

mary is beaming confidently clearly

enjoying

being herself after the show

anna a successful businesswoman

approaches me

excited and outpours her story

she tells me she’s partially deaf

and never tells anyone because she’s

ashamed

then with this huge grin on her face she

says

people think i’m aloof because i ignore

them but i can’t hear them

that’s funny i want to share myself

through comedy

you see mary’s comedy had changed anna’s

world and it could be anna’s turn

to change yours

it’s my vision to live in a world where

we’re free to own

our stories without need for sympathy or

approval if you’ve ever been through the

messy process

of facing your shame you will know it is

far

from funny but i promise you

when it comes to performing

world-changing comedy

making friends with your shame will

allow you to confidently

express the authentic fullness

of who you really are on the stage

and off your comedy

will change the world if you make

friends with your shame

thank you

you