Before becoming a therapist, I went to therapy. Shocker, right? (Sarcasm implied because so many counsellors’ origin stories involve being a client). Actually, since becoming a therapist, I still go to therapy. I remember my dentist being surprised to learn that therapists go to therapy, and I was like “don’t you go to the dentist?”. Anyway, I digress.
In therapy, as a client, I found it powerful to learn about shame. I struggled with shame. Shame was one of those emotions that I didn’t even know I was having. When it struck, or rather when it slowly, insidiously crept into my experience, I felt small. I felt like I was alone in a deep dark hole where all I could do was ruminate about how worthless I was, how not-[fill in the blank]-enough I was, what a failure I was, how unlovable I would always be. While in this state, no one can logic you out of it. No one can reassure you enough to make you feel better. Shame leads us humans to retreat, to isolate, to push people away so that we can suffer alone, as we believe we deserve. This makes it so much harder to get out of.
In my relational life, I would shut down and numb out. People close to me would ask me if I was okay, and I, irritated, would say “yeah, I’m fine,” because honestly, I thought I was. I didn’t have the language or the awareness at that time to know what I was feeling. I’ve since learned that while many people of all genders experience this, men specifically tend to have a hard time with shame. I was certainly not alone. Men have been socialized with one main expectation “do not be perceived as weak,” at all costs. Shame, sadness, fear—these are often seen as weakness. And so, we have implicitly learned to turn off our awareness to these more vulnerable emotions. Instead of feeling them, we tend to shut down, get angry, or engage in behaviour that will help us feel a distinctly different feeling quickly (e.g. risky behaviour to feel adrenaline, task-oriented behaviour to feel accomplished). We do whatever it takes to not feel the feelings, because feeling the feelings equals intolerable masculine inadequacy.
Anyway, it was a revelation to me to learn and come to believe that shame is an emotion that we feel because we are human. Not because we are bad, not because we are weak or defective, but because we are human. It was also powerful to learn that emotions are things we feel, not truth about our lives. (Notice the difference between “I feel worthless” vs. “I am worthless”).
I practiced getting to know my own experience of shame—befriending it if you will. When do I feel it? What happens in my body when I feel it? What self-critical thoughts typically go along with it? What behaviours go along with it? For me, I can notice that I’m avoiding eye contact or that everything in me wants to pull away or withdraw, or even the thought “you’ll never be enough” before I can have the cognitive thought that “I am feeling shame right now”.
So whoopdeedoo, I can feel my shame more…now what? I needed a tool to help me move through it.
Brené Brown’s work on shame led me to learn more about Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer’s work on Mindful Self-Compassion (see recommendations at the end of this article for links to relevant TED Talks and books).
Neff and Germer talk about self-compassion as an antidote to shame. If shame disconnects and leaves us feeling unworthy, self-compassion connects us to ourselves and to others while helping us feel more human. While shame injects us with cortisol and adrenaline and leaves us stuck in a threat-response, self-compassion decreases cortisol and releases dopamine and oxytocin to help our body feel more relaxed and open.
So what is Mindful Self-Compassion exactly? It is essentially talking with ourselves and being with ourselves as we would be with a good friend who is having a hard time—with warmth, understanding, and kindness. Neff explains that Mindful Self-Compassion involves three things.
- Mindfulness – i.e. acknowledge the feelings/suffering as it is.
- Common Humanity – i.e. you are not alone in your suffering, other people have felt this way before too.
- Kindness Towards Yourself – i.e. you’re doing the best you can, it’s okay.
Just like shame or other difficult emotions, you must notice it when it happens non-judgmentally before you can do anything about it—that’s the mindfulness part. Take a moment to notice the suffering instead of just pushing through pretending it’s not there.
Next is to find a way to connect your experience the experience of human others. Self-criticism wants us to believe that we are the only ones experiencing this specific suffering, but the truth is that it is human to feel this way and that there are others out there that get it. This might be saying something to yourself like “This is what it feels like for a human to feel shame” or “other people have been in this exact position before, I am not the only one”.
And the last part is being kind to yourself. This can be hard for a lot of people and will take practice. For now, just try being “less hard on yourself”. The word “kindness” can have too much baggage, especially for those who are used to kindness being weakness or softness.
If you’re open to mindfulness meditation, you can go through an exercise to walk you through the steps here, it’s called General Self-Compassion Break:
https://self-compassion.org/self-compassion-practices/#guided-practices.
It is hard to practice being less hard on yourself because it goes against so much of how we have learned to get things done. If you are like most people (and sorry to burst your bubble, but you are) then some misgivings probably come up when you read about self-compassion. Wouldn’t self-compassion make me lazy? You’re not alone in thinking that and research has demonstrated that those who are more self-compassionate engage in healthier behaviours and are more inclined towards long-term health rather than short-term pleasure. I need my self-criticism to drive me to succeed! You’re not alone in thinking that either, and research has shown that those who are more self-compassionate are less afraid of failure because they don’t beat themselves up when they fail and they are thus more likely to get back up again and persist towards success. Self-compassion is just selfish, I care too much about other people to be self-compassionate. Again, you’re certainly not the first person to have this thought. However, research on self-compassion shows that the more compassionate people are towards themselves, the more capacity they have to show compassion to others. (See chapter 2 of The Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook referenced below for more on this).
Here are a few bite-sized things you can try out this week to practice Mindful Self-Compassion:
1. Look out for common humanity around you. Try to pay attention to when someone else has a feeling that you have had before, bonus points if you let them know that they’re not alone. For example, your colleague walks into a meeting late and rushed. They apologize and you say “It happens, I have definitely been late before. Glad you’re here.” Or, someone else’s kid is having a tantrum at the grocery store and you can tell they feel embarrassed. You might say, “it’s okay, I’ve been there, it happens to everyone no matter how good you parent”.
2. Try on a couple self-kindness phrases. The key to effective self-compassion is finding words and phrases that actually work for you. You can try different ones out as an experiment to see how they land. Some examples to try: “It’s okay,” “You’re trying your best,” or “You’ll get it next time”
3. When you are feeling stressed out, put one hand over your heart or squeeze your own shoulder and take a deep breath. Now try one of those self-kindness phrases you have been working on.
Recommendations and References for further reading:
Handouts:
How to Transform Shame with Self-Compassion from National Institute for the Clinical Application of Behavioral Medicine (NICABM)
Books:
Daring Greatly: How the Courage to be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead by Brené Brown
The Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook: A Proven Way to Accept Yourself, Build Inner Strength, and Thrive by Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer
Self-Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself by Kristin Neff
The Mindful Path to Self-Compassion by Christopher Germer
Self-Compassion for Parents: by Susan M. Pollack
Videos:
TED Talk: Listening to Shame by Brené Brown
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psN1DORYYV0
TEDX Talk: The Space Between Self-Esteem and Self-Compassion by Kristin Neff
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvtZBUSplr4&t=468s
Kristin Neff describing what Mindful Self-Compassion is:
https://self-compassion.org/videos-featuring-dr-kristin-neff
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