Why I Specialize in Shame

Or, ‘Why I Chose to Kill My Career by Talking About Shame’

Frankly, few people can admit that they have shame due to a phenomenon called meta-shame, which is the shame of shame. To be fair, most aren’t even aware that they have it, but that’s because people don’t talk about shame. Even now I’m still warned away from it, advised that if I was just a bit more subtle about how I talk about that dirty word shame then I’d have a more profitable practice. Is this correct? 100%. Will I stop talking about shame? No. Will I be more subtle about how I do it? Also no. Will I ever have a full caseload unless I back off shame? Probably not. Still, if I could go back in time, I would choose to dedicate my career to healing Toxic Shame again and again.

Into the Underworld We Go

I can imagine no greater disservice to my clients, to people who have been without adequate support, who have been through hell and back, and, honestly, to myself than to cower in the presence of shame. Because that is what shame demands of us. Total compliance. I couldn’t look my clients in the eye when I tell them I’ll walk beside them through the underworld as they confront their shame if I can’t face that particular demon myself. So, allow me to explain why I’m taking the path less travelled…

Shame is the Master Emotion

Master Emotions can’t be reduced any further. Say a client said they were feeling “frustrated” - I might encourage them to excavate this frustration. Underneath the surface might be disappointment, and under that disappointment might be sadness, and under that sadness might be grief. It won’t get any further than grief because grief is also a Master Emotion. Master Emotions are the primary numbers of the human psyche. In fact, I’m only aware of two Master Emotions: grief and shame.

There is another reason shame is a Master Emotion, and that is its ability to bind with other emotions and interfere with how we experience them. Because of this, shame is often at the root of issues that clients present with, i.e. the reasons they enter therapy in the first place which are called presenting issues. For example, a client may present with a mother wound but they simply cannot express their anger because they instantly feel ashamed when doing so. This is an anger-shame bind and results from being shamed at a young age for expressing one’s anger. Too often therapy will focus on the anger, the guilt, the compulsion, the trauma, and whatever else the presenting issue is and overlook the shame or the grief entirely. To me, that’s ineffectual. I wouldn’t be very useful as a healer if I only treated the symptoms, now would I?

People Turn a Blind Eye to Shame

Let me set the scene: London, 2011, a cinema where Steve McQueen’s dark film entitled, Shame (watch the trailer here), was projected onto the screen. Pardon my hubris, but after watching that film about a sex-addict and his sister who is prone to self-harm, both of whom grew up in a household of abuse, I felt like I was the only person who got it. Everyone seemed to focus on the tawdry portrayal of raw, impersonal sex, not understanding why a man, played brilliantly by Michael Fassbender, could be so miserable when he has a successful career and a never ending stream of casual sex partners. I remember imploring everyone I spoke to about the film to understand, ‘It’s called Shame for a reason. The fact that the word is never once mentioned in the script should be an even bigger clue to what this piece is actually about!”

Audiences seemed to bypass this entirely, literally blind to the word (classic meta-shame). Think I’m exaggerating? I invite you to read this oblivious film review by a highly respected source, NPR. The critic actually ends his review with this sentence (I swear): “Shame is a parable of martyrdom… Fassbender plays a man who suffers for no known cause. If a movie is going to make lust look this miserable, it should at least explain why.” The movie is called Shame and the critic still can’t figure it out. Most people didn’t figure it out, to be fair. I, on the other hand, started seeing shame everywhere. I won’t stop studying and talking about it until more people also see it everywhere.

Because that’s where shame lurks. Everywhere.

Shame Kept Confronting Me

Before becoming a healer, I had three confrontations with shame which shaped my worldview. Okay, four, but we already covered my brush with Steve McQueen’s film in the section above… Of course, now I see that I had thousands of confrontations with shame because I know how prevalent it is, but it’s fair to say that there were a few distinct life experiences which put Me and Shame in the ring together.

THE PRISON YEARS

First, from 2007-2009 I spent quite a bit of my time around the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections in three capacities - as a university student; a member of a prison reform think tank; and a member of the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program which created large-scale public murals around the theme of restorative justice. I was mainly in and out of SCI Graterford, a maximum-security men’s prison in rural Pennsylvania and one of the largest in the United States. I could write a memoir about my experience but suffice it to say that what I encountered was a group of profoundly intelligent individuals who cared deeply about transcending their physical confines through mind and spirit. I also encountered men and women dealing with a lot of Toxic Shame. Although at that time I couldn’t yet spot the signs of shame in a person, it was clear to even me that shame cladded the core of these individuals. Not just because of the actions which landed them in prison, but shame that didn’t belong to them. Shame that was planted within them which caused them to do the things they did. Shame in the form of believing that they were somehow born flawed, devious, and inadequate. Not just shame but trauma too. Abuse that could curl your toes; violence; addiction; poverty; and rejection from society. This was the first time in my life I saw the harm that shame causes and it never left me.

THE SHAME-BASED SOCIETY

Between 2014 and 2018 I worked on a project that saw me splitting my weeks between London where I mainly lived, and a wonderful island nation which I’ve elected not to name, because I love this little island dearly so I don’t want to risk offending it. During the time I spent there I got to know its history, culture, and essence very well. The one thing I couldn’t wrap my head around was why there was so much shame around. At this time I knew very little about shame, but thanks to the men at SCI Graterford I knew it when I saw it. The country’s legacy of religious and cultural persecution, historic poverty, and the imprint left by religion clearly hadn’t dissipated despite the modern wealth and warmth that also permeated its society. The cultural shame was palpable. Where others saw humorous self-deprecation, I saw the mark of shame. Where others saw reclamation and rejection of religious dogma, I saw shame and rage. Where others saw charming shyness, I saw shame. I hated seeing this country that welcomed me so hospitably still shrouded in shame. I know understand that this period was my first introduction to shame-based societies.

THE SHAME THAT BROKE MY HEART

For more than a decade I had an on-again-off-again romance with a man who I cared for very much. Our relationship wasn’t founded on physical chemistry but the kind of emotional intimacy that develops slowly over years, not weeks. Like every off-again relationship, something kept getting in the way. One day it dawned on me - it was actually like a light switch had been turned on and suddenly I saw what was in front of me. Shame. Despite the love between us, shame was also between us. I won’t go into details about where it came from because it’s not my story to tell, but I will say that the shame belonged to neither of us. Yes, he carried it, but it wasn’t his. Toxic shame is never ours. It’s put on upon us to keep us in line. To watch someone be brought to their knees by shame, unable to face it and choose the life they want, is agonizing. Whether we love someone in the throes of addiction; paralyzed by the shame of trauma; bound to marriages, structures, or communities that stifle them; or who simply cannot see their own worth, it’s an extraordinarily painful experience. No one who encounters shame walks aways unscathed, not even me.

Shame and Trauma Go Hand-in-Hand

When I started the journey to become a healer, I was certain that my specialism would be in treating trauma. Acute Trauma specifically, which are the types of experiences we tend to think of when we hear the word trauma. Usually single events which grossly threaten the life of an individual or expose them to levels of terror beyond what the nervous system can handle constitute Acute Trauma. These experiences often involve shame for one reason or another, but not always.

Except what I tended to attract in the early days were clients who had experienced a different kind of trauma known as Complex Trauma.

Complex Trauma results from experiencing multiple events when one is unsafe, their sense of reality is distorted, or they experience profound emotional neglect persistently over a long period of time. Abuse; exploitation; growing up around addiction, mental illness, suicide threats, medical crises, incarceration, caring for a chronically ill relative, violence, poverty, neglect, or domestic abuse; bullying; religious fundamentalism; regular occurrences of homophobia, sexism, or racism; and living in a shame-based society; et cetera are all examples of Complex Trauma. I soon realized that to experience Complex Trauma inherently means experiencing shame. Not just the emotion of shame, which is ashamed, but internalized Toxic Shame which is not an emotion; it’s a core identity. What makes the experiences of Complex Trauma most traumatic is the whittling down of one’s sense of worth, autonomy, and ultimately, their humanity. This is what Toxic Shame is - the questioning of one’s intrinsic worth.

Those of Us Who Can, Should

I have a somewhat flawed belief that when we’re able to handle things that most others cannot, we have the moral obligation to do so. I said it’s flawed, and it is, because why should those of us who are resilient and battle-weary carry any more weight than we already do? I can’t offer any answer to that other than, “because with strength comes the responsibility to protect each other.”

Not many people can work with the darkness of trauma and listen to stories of indescribable events. Those of us who can become healers. Not many can sit beside the dying and make the experience about those who are dying, not those grieving. Those of us who can are often drawn to practicing as Death Doulas or grief counsellors. Those few of us who can look shame in the eye and say, “I see you” become Shameworkers.

Working with shame is like being an exorcist. It requires one to roll up their sleeves and take on a truly insidious demon. Facing shame usually means facing the voice of an abuser, a parent, others who were shamed and made to suffer in their own right, so it requires compassion as well as grit. Let me tell you something - shame is a demon that spits in your face. It doesn’t like to be called out and it will not go down without a fight. I won’t cower in the face of shame, even when it makes clients disappear after only a couple of sessions or makes them lash out. I won’t stop until we can all see shame for what it is.

Next Steps

If you feel called to unlearn Toxic Shame, feel free to book a no-commitment 20-minute Discovery Session to discuss how Shamework can serve you.