Shame Clues From Embarrassment To Breakthrough
[Applause]
what if your shame
could work for you instead of getting
in your way shame is very complicated
and i am the black sheep of the black
sheep
of the black sheep of my family growing
up
a long time ago so i learned from the
beginning
about all of the different levels of
shame
and i’ve been studying it for many years
and shame is amazing it’s important to
understand about it and it can also
bite you in the butt that is not a
clinical term
that is something my client told me she
came to me because
um she needed therapy she was 15.
and so in the first session she was too
embarrassed to speak
she looked down to one side and i looked
at her with
kindness and interest and she looked
down again in the way that
teenagers just have that way of you know
they’re not going to show
anything and they’re just not going to
let you in i said to her
you know i really like your lipstick
where do you choose
that particular shade and she’s like you
do
oh and we were off my curiosity about
her lipstick
lit a fire under her and she started
telling me that she had all these
different shades
one for each day of the week depending
what class she was in
and she was using the lipstick to deal
with her
embarrassment and embarrassing things
that boys might
ask her so in my working with her
i just said i see how beautiful you are
and and you’re so clever to figure out
how to use lipstick as battle paint and
we had a good laugh about that
and then i told her about the shame
map and i explained to her
there’s this whole thing this invisible
emotion
called shame and it would be helpful for
her to understand a little bit more so i
explained to her that
we balance in any moment between
shame and pride in any moment there’s
this
continuum and one side can be up
and somebody can say something really
positive and that’s up but then oh they
say something negative and that’s up and
and we’re just balancing and balancing
and balancing on this
shame pride continuum it goes between
yourself at best
and yourself at worst shame is so
complicated the reason it’s difficult
to teach about shame is if you start
talking about shame
people go right into shame
so i want everybody’s agreement here
i’m going to talk about shame i’m going
to give you some clues
i’m going to give you some shame tips
even the same map
i want to know girl scouts honor
don’t go into shame we’re doing research
so i’m giving you
all this information about shame so that
you don’t have to
dive into it okay are you willing you
willing to not go into the shame we’re
just going to talk about it
and this is called doing research the
talking about it
without going into it a lot of people
come
to study with me about how to work with
their clients with shamans there’s three
questions and if you can ask even one of
these questions you can begin
the conversation to see if your client
has
any hidden shame these are
our clues for how to how to get at that
and the first one
is how do you handle
a compliment no kidding i want you guys
to think about that right now
how do you handle a compliment does it
land in you
do you kind of go oh thank you
or maybe you push it away
or you hide it behind you or maybe you
turn it around and you just
ignore it and compliment the person who
just complimented you
and as if they’d never said it
there’s many different ways to handle a
compliment
and that is the first way to figure out
if somebody has hidden shame
the next question question number two
remember we’re doing research here just
ask yourself that question
how do you handle it if you make a
mistake you make a mistake
some people might say oh
i’m sorry let me do that again or
they might say nothing
and they might just look down and
pretend
it didn’t happen or they might
start blaming themselves and saying oh
wow
i can’t get anything right and if they
start putting themselves down when they
make a mistake
maybe to stop somebody else
from making fun of them or noticing that
they weren’t perfect or something like
that
some people hide some people just stop
talking some people
freeze up during the headlights some
people were starting to share something
and
they just zip up all their feelings and
they just kind of
stop sharing so they think they’ve done
something wrong okay third question
third question is
what if somebody puts you down
in fact what if somebody says something
mean or what if somebody
criticizes you yeah it happens
how do you handle it often if somebody
feels they’re criticized or put down for
something
they go into a deer and headlights
reaction
or they you know just look down or away
or just stop look down or look away
or feel shy or like
you know like there’s something wrong
with them
so those are the three questions
those questions help i’ve been
researching this
for many many years and what i find out
it’s not the shame it’s what happens
right before the shame
so i’ll ask somebody what happened
before they started shouting at their
kid or what happened
before they clammed up and pulled away
and so
some of the clues about shame i’m going
to talk about clues that are
mental clues that are uh
physiological in the body and then clues
that our behavior
actions that somebody might do remember
this is research here
so i’m going to talk about the shame and
please
don’t go into it we’re just learning
a little bit about it so the first thing
is
some clues that somebody might be going
into shame
these are some thoughts and i’m gonna
step over here kind of
in the shame box okay so in the shame
box
the shame map clues that somebody
might have shame going on are basic
things they might be thinking like
something’s wrong with me
nothing’s right with me i can’t get it
right
i am a mistake i blew it
remember those are the cognitive
reactions to shame um i
actually had a lot of experience with
that years ago when i was writing my
thesis
i was having writer’s block i just
was stuck and i couldn’t write very much
and so i just kept thinking
you know there must be something wrong
with me you know boy i’m not a writer i
just you know and it just kept
going round and round and round and the
inner critic was
just attacking me and it took me a long
time
to figure out how to do the writing for
my thesis
because i actually went into a brain
phrase where i couldn’t think
straight and once that happened i
couldn’t write
this happens to so many people not just
writers it happens to kids
it happens to people that are just kind
of like trying to get
something done and they
make a little mistake or something
happens
and when that inner shame happens
and starts putting them down and then
the bravery say
brain freeze happens and they can’t
think straight
it’s really difficult the way to get out
of it
is step out of it
leave the shame okay there leave those
negative voices
over there say that’s not me i want to
write or i want to take a break from
writing or leave me alone that’s not me
and then do something kind
like put your hand on your heart or say
you’re gonna be fine or just take a
break and come back to it
or call a friend or whatever you need to
do
to stay out of that negative
voice because that is shame and the
physiology of shame is it can
freeze your nervous system people think
that they can’t think
but it’s just shame okay i’m gonna go
back in and again
i’m gonna talk about uh emotions
that happen in shame the emotions for
shame
might be uh like um
the face turning red or the throat
just um you know person can’t get their
words at
or the chest kind of pulls in or the
person starts to actually
collapse um one of my clients
had this his throat would close and it
didn’t matter if he was asking his
girlfriend
you know when are we gonna have dinner
when are we gonna have sex
it didn’t matter his throat would close
up and he would just
go into this inner physical
collapse and so i had to teach him how
to talk to his girlfriend that
explained that he was going to shame and
why
he sometimes clammed up and third thing
way to work understand shame we’re going
back in the shame box just for a minute
this is actions that somebody might do
when
they’re in a state of shame and these
actions
might be putting somebody down
criticizing
yelling somebody blaming somebody
criticizing somebody something like this
you know i’m going to step out of this
box
and look at it over there i had a client
who found himself just yelling and
screaming at his son i asked him in a
therapy
session what was going on for you i
heard you yelled at your son but i
didn’t understand what happened just
before that
and he said oh he never cleans his room
and i’m like okay he’s a kid but
why were you yelling this time and he’s
like well
uh and he couldn’t even remember and i’m
like think back
why were you yelling this time and he’s
like oh yeah
he asked me to go on this um trip with
his friends and it was really an
expensive trip
and i couldn’t really afford it um
so i guess i was um yeah i guess
i guess you know that’s what was going
on for me and so i was able to talk to
him and explain
that the embarrassment and the shame
of not being able to tell a son that he
couldn’t afford the trip for him
instead of feeling that and speaking
about the shame
he went into the reaction to shame and
was
just yelling at the kid so
that was a clue shame
is so important shame helps us
understand where our boundaries are
shame lowers the affect
on anger and on emotions
it’s wired in our nervous system to
actually help us survive as a species
shame has a developmental purpose
and so it’s important to understand
you in relation to your shame and
what it’s maybe trying to tell you
for the kid that i worked with who was
in high school
her shame was telling her that she
needed to have a boundary with some kids
at school
you know for a couple that i was working
with recently
they came to me and they said they
stopped having sex five years ago and i
he said well we can’t figure it out all
i remember
is you know we were very sexual and then
she asked me
you know to touch her in a certain way
or in certain ways and i just felt like
well i’ll never be able to do that
you know what’s wrong with me and i’m
like oh you started to feel like
something
was wrong with you and he’s like yeah
and i’m like well what happened then
and he’s like well i realized i was
never going to be able to be good enough
for her
so i just pulled away she said well
i didn’t understand why he was pulling
away so i pulled away too
so i’m sitting there with the both of
them and i say
when you feel like you’re not good
enough when you feel like there’s
something wrong with you that you can’t
do anything right
that’s actually the emotion of shame
in understanding that shames there and
be able to share it with your partner
and with yourself in a kind way
you can begin to heal the shame they
manage
to not stay out of the shame box but
they managed to be able to go into it
figure out what am i thinking what am i
feeling what is shame telling me
okay do i you know this isn’t real i’m
just this
is shame this is the emotion of shame
i’m gonna step
over here and i’m gonna look at it okay
the thoughts the feelings the actions
is there anything i can learn from this
is there anything i need or do i just
kind of put it in a box or put it in a
pocket or
you know kick it off the stage
get rid of the shame and be kind to
yourself
so the trick of all of this is being
kind to yourself finding new ways
to be in relationship with your shame
it doesn’t have to be an enemy it can
actually be a friend and so really being
able to be
in relation with your shame i forgot to
tell you
the secret of healing shame shame just
kind of
can take our life force energy so the
way
through shame is really to have
love and support for yourself putting
your hand
on your heart giving yourself a hug
calling a friend
all of those things can be kind ways
to counter the shame so as you start
to understand about shame just be
very kind to yourself very very kind to
yourself
it’s an honor to talk with you about
shame the shame is over
there and i’m scrunching it down into a
little ball
and kicking it off the stage
so thank you for listening
[Applause]