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Hello, hello, hello. Welcome back to YNA Mental Health. My name is Tina Belucci. I'm the host of YNA Mental Health. There's an emotion that sits underneath so many mental health struggles. Underneath anxiety, underneath addiction, and underneath perfectionism. And we don't talk about it enough. Today, we're unpacking shame. Shame is one of the most powerful emotions we experience, and also one of the quietest. It doesn't usually show up loudly, it shows up in the background, in our thoughts, in our bodies, in the way we pull back from ourselves and from other people. Shame convinces us that there's something wrong with who we are.
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Not what we did, but who we are. And yet, as Brene Brown says, we have to talk about shame.
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Because when we don't, it runs everything. Now before we go deeper into shame, we need to talk about vulnerability. Brene Brown says, vulnerability is not a weakness. Vulnerability is an emotional risk, exposure, and it's the most accurate measurement of courage.
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Now I want to ask you, when was the last time you were vulnerable?
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When was the last time you felt like vulnerability was something that you couldn't speak up about?
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And what was the reaction? Here's the thing. Shame shows up the moment we step into vulnerability.
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Brene Brown describes shame as the gremlin that pokes its head up when you want to do something that's vulnerable. The second you put yourself out there, the second you create something, speak up.
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Try again. That voice whispers, Who do you think you are? Why do you think you can do this? You're not good enough. You'll never be good enough. And those tapes, those voices, they play back on repeat.
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And it's so difficult to fight those voices. I always say that sometimes it's not the people around us that hurt them hurt us the most, it's us who hurt ourselves the most.
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We put ourselves in positions where it becomes really difficult to fight back.
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With vulnerability, you're fighting back. And I want to remind you that vulnerability is not a weakness, it's a strength.
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You can use these moments to fight back. Now, what is shame? David R.
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Hawkins described shame as a state of extreme self-loathing, unworthiness, and humiliation that heavily restricts energy and makes one feel stuck. Shame is a self-conscious emotion. It happens when we turn inward and judge ourselves harshly. It's that intense feeling of being exposed as flawed.
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Shame focuses on identity. Now, there's shame and there's guilt. What's the difference?
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And a lot of people make this mistake of thinking that shame and guilt are the same thing. But rather, shame is a focus on self while guilt is a focus on behavior. Shame says, I'm bad, while guilt says I've done something bad. Shame is not just emotional, it's physiological. It activates brain regions involved in self-evaluation and social judgment. It activates the nervous system, your heart rate rises, and your cortisol increases. If shame becomes chronic, the system can shut down. You freeze, you become numb, and you disconnect. Dr. Frank Anderson describes shame as often rooted in relational trauma, moments where we needed connection, but felt rejected instead.
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Which explains why shame feels so isolating. You can't allow shame to isolate you. That's how you beat shame.
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When you're isolated and you feel all of this heavy emotion, it hurts you. It puts you in a position where you feel weak, where you feel like nothing you're doing is good enough. You feel like no matter how hard you try, you're not trying hard enough.
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But how does shame show up?
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Shame doesn't always look like sadness. Sometimes it looks like silence.
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You withdraw, you say nothing.
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Sometimes it can look like aggression, deflection, criticizing someone else to avoid being seen. Sometimes it looks like overcompensating, proving, performing, but underneath all of that is the same exact message.
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I'm not enough.
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Now, when you feel like you're not enough, it feels like you can't do anything right.
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It feels like everything that you've done will never reach the expectations that you've set for yourself. You can't give up when shame takes over. You know, I know when the voices get loud, you feel trapped, you feel stuck, you feel as if no one's there for you.
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And when you're in those moments, you need to find ways to look for empathy.
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Brene Brown said, empathy is the antidote to shame. Now, how can empathy help us reconnect to who we are?
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If you had a voice in your head that's saying that you're not good enough, but another voice that says, Hey, I did everything I could.
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I tried my best. I gave it my all.
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When it comes back to self-compassion, the goal of self-compassion is not to kill the critic, but it's to create a voice that's kinder, a voice that reminds you that you are good enough. If you're ever stuck in a moment where you feel as if the voices are hurting you, I always recommend try the flip method. The flip method is pretty simple. What would you say to a friend? Would you tell your friend that they're not good enough, that they're not doing their best, even though that you can see within them that they're trying, that they're giving it their all? I get that when you try to fight back, the voices can find a way to get louder and find new ways to hurt you.
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But when someone responds to your story with understanding instead of judgment, shame can't survive. You have to be able to share your story. And I know that if you share your story with your friends or whoever you have, they'll listen to you.
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And that is one of the biggest ways to fight shame is to be able to express what you're feeling and to be able to hear that you're not alone. That you know, I've struggled with this as well. You can't allow shame to do what shame does best, and that is to isolate you. Now, with shame, I know it can feel like you just can't go and tell everybody what you're feeling, right? You can't, it it's it's it's a feeling that pushes people away from you. It tells you that, hey, you can't talk to that person. They're gonna judge you. And judgment is what we're all scared of. I think that's one of the biggest ways that shame continues to live on within ourselves, is that we're afraid of being judged by the people we love. And I know it can be scary, right? I know how scary it could be to uh talk about something that's so distressing, yet it's so heavy. And if you could just let go of that weight, then you're taking the right step forward.
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You're taking that battle to shame. Now, let's move through shame. Healing shame begins with awareness, recognizing when it shows up, where it shows up, and how it showed up.
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Speaking it instead of hiding it is one of the best ways to really move through shame. Shame survives with secrecy. When we're secret like that, when we're not able to talk and hide, and we instead hide our problems, we continue to punish ourselves. As Eric Christopher explains, shame cannot be easily released from the logical mind. It has to be seen through a higher level of awareness. And it begins with compassion. Compassion for ourselves and for what we're dealing with is one of the best ways to continue to show up and fight.
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You know, you can look at it like a boxing arena. Putting on the gloves, getting into the arena, giving it your best shot is all that matters.
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It's not about the critic or the judge that tells you if you win or lose. It's not about the person in the corner screaming at you. It's about getting back up and fighting on.
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And that isn't easy at all.
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A lot of us would rather just sit and get beat than be able to fight back.
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And that's not fair.
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It's not a fair fight. It's not fair to allow an emotion hurt us so badly that we can't even continue our day. We can't continue to be with the people around us. We can't continue to show love and compassion to ourselves.
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When those inner voices hurt us and make us feel like we're just not good enough, then we get stuck.
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We get stuck in a place that's dark, lonely, and that's what shame wants. Shame wants you to be by yourself. Shame wants you to continue life in an isolated place, to be reminded that you aren't good enough, that you can't do it, that you'll never be able to do it.
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You can do it. You are enough. You've always been enough.
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I've had some difficult relationships, you know, and I always felt like I was never enough. And in those moments, it wasn't that my partner was making me not feel enough, but it was myself telling myself that I'm not enough, that I am too much. We can be our own best friend and our own worst enemy. But if you can reframe your mindset, if you can feel your emotions, but not allow them to take control, then you can be the best version of yourself. Now, shame tells us that we're fundamentally flawed. But you and I both know that story is not true. Shame is learned, it's reinforced with silence and isolation.
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And it can dissolve with empathy, connection, and self-awareness. The next time, shame whispers, who do you think you are? Let's make the response simple. I'm someone who's trying, I'm someone who's growing, and I'm someone who's worthy of being here. And maybe, just maybe, we'll be able to throw that punch a little bit harder and knock shame to the ground where it belongs. You don't have to fight alone anymore. You've got yourself, you've got your self-awareness, and you've got connection. And one of the most important things to beating shame is you've got empathy.
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And with all of that, you're going to be able to get through this difficult emotion. And I just want to remind you, please, please, please remember that you're not alone. And I'll catch you on the next episode. Bye.
