How does it make you feel when you hear the words shame or ashamed? Or how about being rejected, abandoned or alone? These are all very powerful words that usually elicit strong emotional responses from people, and they all have their roots in that first word: shame.

Shame also has ties to one of the greatest fears we humans have, not of death or serious injury, but the fear of public speaking. Within public speaking lies the possibilities that you could screw up, be ridiculed, rejected, abandoned, and left feeling alone with the weight of shame bearing down on you.

It is important to understand where these deeply painful emotional experiences originate, because in the acknowledgement of their roots we find opportunities for recovery and healing. What we’re realizing in the fields of neuroscience and evolutionary psychology is that when we feel shame it is because our brain is saying, “I just need to stay alive.”

So, what if we look at shame in another way? Imagine that shame was some counterintuitive way that our mind and body is keeping us safe. Imagine that shame has some inherent properties that are self-compassionate and self-loving. No need to imagine because within shame lies both of these things, and we humans are hard-wired to feel shame, even though it is an indescribably awful feeling when we are being shamed by others or, worse, are shaming ourselves.

Staying alive is all our survival brain cares about and shame helps us stay that way because one of the ways we humans stay alive is by relying on community. In Yuval Noah Harari’s book, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, the Cognitive Revolution, the historian and philosopher explains that this revolution began about 70,000 years ago, and fundamentally changed where humans are placed in the food chain of mammals. 

The cause of this revolution? Our human relationships and the ability of humans to gossip. Not totally kidding here, because the ability we developed to chat about our peers gave us a way to assess which tribe members were on our side and which ones weren’t. From these interactions we learned where we placed our trust and loyalty, and where we didn’t, so we could lessen the chances of being rejected and abandoned.

Shame is a very painful neurobiological process that our minds and our bodies manifest as a way to ensure that we stay “small” and therefore safe. Shame is all about staying alive and it is the way our brains and bodies both protect us and love us.

This gives us the opportunity to flip the script on shame and take our power back. The next time you feel shame, give yourself a pat on the back for being survival-focused. When you find yourself in those situations, ask yourself:

Is this appropriate? Have I done something that truly puts me at risk for rejection or being removed from a village of people that matters to me? Am I bringing an experience from my past into the present moment?

Source:

Stop Shame and Take Your Power Back

It is important for us to understand where the deeply painful emotional experiences of shame originate, because in the acknowledgement of their roots we find opportunities for recovery and healing.

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