Shame is a core feeling of being defective, which leads to social fear. A fear of rejection, of being ostracized. It is a social and self-conscious emotion resulting from feelings of personal inadequacy, humiliation, defeat, rejection, dishonor and disgrace.

Behind perfectionism, narcissism, procrastination, judgment, embarrassment, self-depreciation, low self-esteem, fear of making mistakes or fear of defeat lays shame.

Shame affects all areas of our lives.

It is one of the oldest known English words that originally meant to “hide or cover up.” We hide shame in fear of being wounded because shame is a very painful emotion. As such, shame is the hardest thing to deal with since it tends to be hidden and never addressed.

Trauma studies show that people feel shame for feeling shame.

Often people are not aware of their shame, but they experience it when they feel inferior, unimportant and impotent. When they disproportionately and inadequately devalue themselves. When they feel low self-worth or lose self-esteem. Shame harbors an enormous amount of anger and hate towards self and requires reclaiming and healing of identity.

Shame is a reason:

1. Why we do not allow other people to get too close to us
2. Why we are not very good on physical intimacy
3. Why we do not like parties
4. Why we have a lot of secrets
5. Why we have addictive behaviors

Often people mix up feelings of shame and feelings of guilt. Guilt focuses on what one has done. Shame focuses on who one is.

According to Greeks shame is a good tool to use to control low class people and guilt to control high class people.

Society and culture creates different ways of feeling shame by what is perceived as Ok/not OK. For example, body size, sexuality, type of work some do or affiliation with a particular culture.

The antidote to shame is dignity and self-respect. Dignity and self-respect is not about how I am better than others. It is about: I am valuable and you are valuable. The position: I am not better and not worse than you. It is about empathy, compassion and love of self. It is about personal responsibility for your feelings and about healthy boundaries. It is about responsibility to draw on your own strengths, find ways to use them and ways to further develop them.