5 Tips To Deal With Shame

Welcome to Shrink for the shy Guy. This is the show for you. If you are sick and tired of being held back by fear, self doubt, social anxiety, shyness, anything that's stopping you from you being you. I'm going to share the most powerful tools and resources that I've been discovering over the last 15 years on my journey to eradicate social anxiety and instill confidence, first in myself and then in every single person that I meet on my journey. You're going to learn these tools and how to apply them in your life now so that you can become the most free, powerful, bold, authentic version of you. Hey, welcome to today's episode of the show. Today, we're going to be talking about everyone's favorite topic, Shame. Hooray. It's actually a really important topic to talk about, though, because it profoundly affects us in our lives in so many ways that we might not even be conscious of and really guides our behavior, the actions we take or don't take, how we feel. And it also can manifest as strong, kind of like shame storms or what I would call the shame pit. And as I describe it, you'll know what I'm talking about if you don't already. I'm sure you've taken some trips down into the shame pit. I know I have. And it can be really debilitating, really painful. And here's the thing about shame and the shame pit is once you go in there and feel so awful, you kind of don't want to go back. But the problem is we have so many pathways down to the shame pit that we end up going back a lot or just trying to totally restrict our lives so we don't have any risk or any setback or any discomfort. And then we end up going down to the shame pit anyway or just living a really restricted life. So let's change all that. Yeah. Sound good? You ready? Are you excited? Are you excited to talk about shame? Okay, well, let's get excited. Why don't you shake your body out? I know maybe you're sitting, maybe you're moving around, maybe not, but just literally shake your body out a little bit. Take a full, deep breath. Because this could be a heavy topic, and so we could approach it with a lot of seriousness. This is a very serious, terrible topic. Or we could bring a little bit of energy, a little bit of lightness to it and actually maybe feel some positive anticipation because you might be free. You might be able to liberate yourself from something that doesn't have to exist in the way that it does doesn't have to control you in the way that it does. Does that sound good? All right, so let's break it down. Five tips for dealing with shame. And ooh, I do want to mention, I'll mention again at the end of the episode, but tomorrow, the tickets for my next event, which is going to be online. Eh, eh, Online live event, the ultimate confidence breakthrough, which is going to be July 24 through 26, 2020. You will want to be there. And here's the beautiful thing. You can join from anywhere in the world. All you need is an Internet connection, which you obvious probably have if you're listening to this, and zoom, Boom. You can join on your phone, you can join on your tablet, you could join on your laptop, you could join on your desktop, you could join on a scroll that has zoom. In any case, it's going to be a powerful three day experience where we're going to help you eliminate. Here's the key outcome of that event. It's to eliminate that power that fear has to stop you from being who you want to be. Fear of rejection, fear of embarrassment, fear of what they will think. That's the biggest force that stops us from being ourselves, from being our most confident, bold, free, authentic selves. And we're not going to completely. It's not going to be like you're not going to feel anything about rejection ever again. But that fear of rejection, well, no luck. We're gonna break through that over the three days in some fun, interesting, powerful ways. So you're able to do what you want to do. Even if you feel a little nervous, even if you feel a little scared, boom, you can break through. So you're gonna elevate your own sense of strength, power, confidence, capability. You're gonna move differently, walk differently, talk differently and just think about what's that gonna do in your life after that weekend when you show up at work and you are taller, able to sit taller, whether it's in a zoom meeting or in person, who knows what's going on at that point in time. Showing up fully, you boldly, you. How would you speak up differently? What kinds of opportunities would that lead to in your workplace? If you could speak up more freely, more directly, more boldly, what kind of leadership might open up? What's that going to do in your social life to be able to connect more freely, to not go to shame so easily, not go to this fear of they're going to judge me. And so you hold back. What if you didn't hold back? What if you could easily approach people because you were not scared of being rejected. And what if another key outcome from the weekend is what if you were you didn't care about being embarrassed? That's one of my goals for you, is to eradicate your embarrassment circuit. We're going to practice some fun things that are going to have you do that. And yes, we can practice that online. Yes you will. Yes, it ports over very well to an online experience so I could go on and on about it. It's one of my favorite events. I cannot wait to experience those three days with you. And if you want to sign up for that, go to draziz.coM-R-A z I z.com and go to the Events tab and click on the Ultimate Confidence Breakthrough. You could also go to this episode Shrink for the shy guy@shrinkforthshyguy.com and click on this episode and there'll be a link down below. So let's talk about shame. How to deal with it. Here are five tips before I share them. What do you normally do? Are you aware of when shame strikes for you and what happens when it does? That's an important part of working with it, is knowing how it shows up for you. What do you say to yourself? How do you feel? How much control does it have over you? So often the experience of shame, just to give a little bit of definition, Brene Brown would define it as a full body experience of feeling and believing that you are unworthy of love and belonging. And you might experience that as this tightness or achy or empty feeling in your chest or stomach. There could be this kind of rounding of your shoulders. Your head might want to come down. There might be this urge to flee or to hide. There might be a lot of fear associated with it, about people being upset with you, angry at you, rejecting you, being hostile with you. There might be a heavy or a hopeless or a yeah, of course no one would want to be with me. No one would. Of course I'm going to be undesired here. That might be a part of it as well. And that can occur, well, anywhere, anytime, because there's something called shame triggers. And I talk about this in my newest book on my own side, which if you haven't got a copy yet, I highly recommend you do. You can get it from omosbook.com o m o s book.com and we also have a free 10 day video training series that goes with that book. So you can just sign up for free@almostbooked.com I want you to get this, this is the most important confidence building skill is how to get on your own. Other stuff is valuable, but this one hands down, because it doesn't matter how successful you get, how much external results you get, if you're not on your own side, you're going to just, it's going to turn to ash in your mouth and you're not going to feel fulfilled, you're not going to feel good about yourself. Nothing is enough, it never is enough if you're not on your own side. So this truly is one of the master skills for confidence. So get yourself a copy and dive into it. But inside that book I talk about shame triggers. And a shame trigger is just anything that happens in your life, in your world and your environment and what someone says and what someone does, a result, you get anything that triggers this sense of shame in you. And we can have a shit ton of shame triggers. For me, one point in my life, walking by a mirror was a shame trigger. You know, maybe looking at yourself topless or shirtless or naked as you get out of the shower and the mirror is a shame trigger for you. Maybe eating is a shame trigger for you. Maybe someone's saying something negative to you. Maybe getting a negative review or a negative comment or negative feedback is a shame trigger. Maybe getting rejected as a shame trigger. Those are common ones. So there's a trigger and then boom, we off to the races. And typically we'll just spiral down, we're going to this spiral down into what I call the shame pit, which is where you feel awful, you feel like I'm nobody, I'm nothing, I'm not worthy, I'm not lovable, I'm not likable. No one's gonna want to be with me. Of course that person rejected me. I'm a bad, I'm unlovable. And then, you know, it could be really dependent upon the context of that trigger. So maybe something happened at work and you're like, oh, I'm incompetent, I'm a loser, I'm awful. Maybe something happened in your love life and you're like, of course no one would want to be right. So it kind of spirals down into that area of your life. But it might start to generalize into your general awfulness will not only occur in your love life, but also everywhere else because you are totally sucky and undeserving of love and happiness. And like any good pit, the walls are slippery so you can't really get out. You try to climb out of the Shame pit, and you fall back in. Okay, so. But that's how it's been. Now let's talk about how to get out of that sucker and have a much better experience of life. Well, there's two things we gotta be able to do. One, you gotta learn how to get out of the shame pit, and two, you gotta learn how to not go back in there so much. Right? So that's when we talk about those triggers. Think of those as, like, paths that go straight down to the chain pit. Okay, so how do we do that? Tip number one. First things first. Slow down. Slow way down and notice this storm inside. I'm describing all the potential pathways, the potential things that could happen when you're in the shame pit. You gotta get intimately familiar with what's the pit like. So step one is to slow down and become aware and just identify like, okay, all right. I think, yep, I'm in the shame pit right now. And use that term because it's kind of silly and it's an unusual term. So you get to start to label it now. Like, okay, I'm in the shame pit, I think. Yep, yep. Definitely in the shame pit. What's it like in here? How am I doing this? A great question when you're slowing down is to say, how am I creating this? Because, yes, you are creating it. It might seem like it happened to you or is happening to you, or it has to occur because someone said that you were stupid, and now you have to feel awful or you made a mist. So of course you got to feel awful and go to the shame pit. But no, you're creating that. And so how am I doing it? What am I saying to myself? What stories am I believing? Just get really curious. And again, also, not just with your head, but slow down and feel what's going on in your body. What's going on with your breathing? Are you wanting to collapse inward? Can you roll your shoulders and stand more or sit more upright? What happens when you try to do that? What's going on? That's step number one. Tip number one. Tip number two is you gotta talk to your inner critic when the shame storm is happening. When the shame pit. When you're in the shame pit, the reason you can't get out is because your critic is standing on the edge just pushing you down with its foot berating you. Yeah, of course you should feel awful because you made a mistake and you suck. Yeah, of course no one's gonna like you to think because you're not good enough and you never Will be. And you're awful and you're letting everyone down. You're terrible. Come on. Keeps kicking you down there. So you gotta learn how to talk to your critic. You have to. You have to, have to, have to. Such an essential life skill. Most people will defer automatically to the critic inside, as if it's an authority, as if it's a trusted advisor, as if it's the parent. Fuck that. It is not. It is not a power. It is not an authority. It is a voice in your head. And it is actually a terrified, very young protective strategy that you learned when you were a child and they got developed over the course of the next 10, 15 years in a teenage and just kept on building and building. It has a personality of its own. And it's designed to keep you 100% safe from rejection, from dislike, from disapproval, from others, from failure, from any pain. And its strategy is to keep you basically from living your life. Because if you avoid all risk, avoid all putting yourself out there, avoid everything, then at least you'll avoid those painful things. Now you won't live. You'll just survive until you die. And you'll probably die with a shit ton of regret. But the critic's not focused on that critic is a protective strategy. It's like, I can't feel pain. We're not going to feel that again. And if you're. I'm going through this kind of quickly. But if you really want a deep study of this, then again, read Omos on my own side. Available. Available now at retailers. Go to omosbook.com, that's O M O S book dot com. Okay, so there's a ton of strategies in that book. There's a whole chapter dedicated to this. But I'm gonna give you a simple one right now, which is like, so the critic is telling you you're awful. Here's what you want to do. You want to start to. Just as if it's an angry person coming at you, start to talk to it, say, okay, whoa, whoa, whoa. All right, all right. You're upset with me. I get it. You're pissed. You think I'm awful. You think that nothing's gonna work out. Okay, all right, so you're kind of hearing it. And then you want to get. Start talking and say, okay, okay, wait, wait, wait, wait. So you're upset with me because. Are you upset because I got rejected from that person? That person didn't want to date me? This is just an example, right? But maybe it's someone in a meeting said, that you didn't know what you're talking about or something, whatever it is. Okay, so you're upset with me because that person didn't want to date me. Is that right? So notice how I'm, like, talking to this critic as if I'm talking to an upset person, but I'm not like, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. Please don't bat at me. I'm so sorry. You know, just as if someone was coming at me, I'd say, well, hold on a second. Okay, okay, okay. You're upset. You're upset. I hear you. I hear you. And let me just understand the situation here. So you're upset because. Is that right? And you could do this on paper. That's what I encourage in the book. You could do it. And I'm going to say on paper. It could be literally in a journal. It could be typing on a phone or on a computer or something. And you're just, like, talking to this part of you, and then have that part respond be like, yeah, I'm pissed at you because you got rejected again. It's awful. All right? It's awful. You think it's really awful that I got rejected again. Why is that so awful? Why is that so awful? I'll tell you why it's so awful, and then your critic will happily tell you why it's so awful. And then it's like, okay, all right. So you're upset because it's so awful because I messed up. I'm not attractive enough. I don't know what I'm doing. Okay, so you're upset with me because I talked to that person. I didn't know enough about how to flirt or how to connect, and I don't know what I'm doing. Is that right? Do you see what I'm doing? This is exactly what you want to do, by the way, when someone's upset with you in your life, and they're like, blah, blah, blah, criticism, criticism, blah, blah, judgment. And you might say, okay, all right, hold on. I can see that you're upset with me. All right, all right, tell me more. And then they tell you more, and you say, okay, so you're upset with me because blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Is that right? And you're trying to get. What exactly are they upset about? They might not even know. Your critic is just, like, freaking out inside. So you're gonna uncover more of that. Then you're gonna be able to align with that critic. And I can't get into all this in this episode, because this is about just five tips for dealing with shame. But again, check out almostbook.com to go real deep in that. Okay, number three. Tip number three is get curious. Ask yourself this. What rule or rules did I break? Because when you are feeling shame, you've always broken a rule. A rule or rules. There could be multiple ones, but at least one rule that you broke that you agree with. That's right. And you might not even know that you have this rule. And you might not even know that you agree with it. You might think, I don't agree with that. That's what my parents thought. But I don't think that. But if you're feeling shame. Yeah, you do. Some part of you does, at least. So in the dating example, I just used the person. Maybe you talked to them or tried to create some connection, see if they wanted to go out with you, and then they said no in some way, shape or form, directly or indirectly, and you feel awful. What is the rule there? I don't know. That's for you to discover. Different for everyone. One common rule and rule that I had in my mind still comes up here and there. I should never get rejected. Yeah. How reasonable is that? What kind of setup for a life of fulfillment is that one? I know, but it's in there. I should never. I mean, because how do you know that that's the rule? Well, because every time someone would say no to me, I would feel absolutely awful. And the idea is, well, you know, you shouldn't feel that way. So that might be the rule. Another rule is, you know, you shouldn't ever have anyone not like you. And maybe it feels like, well, when they said no to me, it wasn't just that they said no to me. It was that they didn't seem to like me. So then the rule is, everybody should like me. Here's the thing. The rules that you're going to uncover are often pretty extreme. Like that. For shame. And then you want to start asking yourself, is that a reasonable rule? Probably not. All right, tip number four. Now, let's just say that the rule that was broken was legit. You know, maybe it was something that you maybe did make a mistake. You know, for example, I have a rule in my mind that I want to always treat my kids with respect. And sometimes if I'm upset, and usually it's not the environment, it's how I'm relating to the environment, there's certain things they might do that if I'm in a more resourceful, loving state, I Can handle them with resourcefulness. So maybe it's a challenging behavior. They're fighting or something is happening or whatever. And then I'm able to handle that resourcefully. But let's say I'm less resourceful. I'm stressed. And for me, it's, you know, I might be avoiding feelings that I don't want to feel, right? So I'm kind of tense. And then something happens, and then they're fighting and then knock something over and they break something. And then some part of me is like, you know, and that's okay. It's okay for me to feel angry or get what we call red zone in the house. But I have a rule that says, okay, I can get red zone and I can even say, like, I'm angry right now. But my rule is that I narrate what I'm feeling instead of like spitting it out acidically with aggression, like, what the hell's wrong with you? Blah, blah, blah, which is what parents often do. And I'm like, I don't want to do that. I have a standard. My standard is, I'm going to say, I could say I'm angry right now. I'm feeling frustrated. I'm feeling red zone. I don't like that this is happening. But do you see how that's me taking ownership and treating them with respect rather than some way, either directly or indirectly communicating, what the hell is wrong with you? You're bad. I don't want to communicate. Even if they do something that I quote is a bad behavior, undesirable behavior, My goal is to say, to be able to talk about it with them. Like, hey, whoa, whoa. When you do that, here's what the results are. Here's the consequences. Here's how I feel about it. Here's the effect it has on your brother. Like, let's explore how we can solve this problem in a better way. It's called collaborative problem solving. So these are the standards that I have for myself as a parent. Now, given that I'm not perfect yet, I will fall short of that sometimes and I'll yell or I'll say something that's like blaming. Now, you might have other rules that come up for you that are reasonable. Now, this is a slippery slope here because some of your rules that you think are reasonable are not. They're crazy. Check out not nice if you want to get a list of all the crazy rules people have for themselves, myself included, that are coming from excessive niceness programming, again, deep study can't get into that in this episode. Check out the book not nice if you haven't already. Okay. If you did break a rule that felt real to you that you do actually want to consciously live by, then tip number four is reclaim your integrity. Reclaim your integrity. The best way to do that is a phrase that I like to say, which is when I make a mistake or when I act out of line with someone I love, I clean it up. Then I learn something. This is extremely powerful, by the way. Just try that on next time you make a mistake and you're going on the shame pit or whatever. It's like, hey, when I make a mistake, I clean it up and I learn something. To me, this is about reclaiming. This is reclaiming your integrity. And so I'll do that. I'll do that with my kids. If I felt like I was blaming in some way later that day or the next morning or something, I'll say, hey, you know yesterday when you made that mess and I was all upset about it, I said some things that were sort of blaming you, as if you shouldn't do that. And you know what? That's not about you. You're trying to learn how to make this smoothie or whatever, and you're gonna make some messes. It's no big deal at all. And we'll just clean up. If you make a mess, we just clean it up. It's no big deal. And what was going on for me is I had some feelings that I wasn't feeling and I vented as an outlet with you. And I'm sorry. Yeah, I'll say that to my 4 year old and my 6 year old, and I'll communicate in ways that they can understand. And that's me reclaiming integrity. And so you can do that with anyone, anyone, any age, any setting. Okay? Tip number five, complete and move on. Once you've done these, you just gotta complete and move on. And so if the voice wants to come back and say, yo, but you're such a bad person for doing that. You're so awful. You're just so bad, say, okay, all right, all right. You know what? I hear you. And that's where you talk to the critic and you challenge. Okay, well, you're upset about what or this. You go back through any of those tips, any of those steps, and then you say, okay, you know what? I just do this gesture. I kind of brush my hands like, okay, I'm done, I'm done here. We're not gonna keep doing this. Because here's the thing, you don't like, how long are you supposed to punish yourself? This is this weird mentality that we have is like, well, I made a mistake, so I have to punish myself for how long? Well, it depends upon the mistake, right? You know, is it three hours? Is it three days? Is it three weeks? Is it three years? Is it 30 years? How long is the sentence? And what if you just got curious, found out where a rule is you broke? Maybe if it's a BS rule you don't actually really want to believe in, then you can just let it go right now. And if it's something that you need to reclaim integrity around, go do could take five minutes and then boom, you can actually feel fine afterwards. You don't have to drag yourself through the mud feeling awful for months. Just let it go. You're going to learn much better without doing that. By the way, that's the illusion the critic will say, this is for your own good. This is so you'll learn. And it is not. It is not about learning. That's complete and total bullshit. The truth is, it's about making you shut down from life so you never put yourself out there again. You never speak up again. You never take risks again. It's not about making you a better person. That's the false. That's the illusion it will create to continue to berate you and try to maintain control over you. Okay, I feel like this episode could have been nine hours, but there's lots of different pathways I gave you different options with books and of course, highly recommend if you want to go further with this. We are going to be doing more shame busting stuff and ultimately to be free from your fear of rejection and the power that rejection has over you and to eradicate your embarrassment Circuit and cool stuff that we're going to be doing at the ultimate confidence breakthrough online is about shame. Shame isn't sexy. So in the marketing of it, I'm not like, let's all talk about shame, everybody. It's gonna be great. But, you know, hey, you and I, we hang out. So I'm gonna give you the real deal. We're gonna be healing some shame stuff at this event because you can't do the rejection proof stuff without the shame stuff. Otherwise it's just bravado and temporary and not real. We want to heal this shit at the root cause. We're about lasting deep liberation here. So speaking of that, let's do some action. Yeah. Time for action. Action, action. Your action step for today is going to be to apply one of these tips in your life. Think about the last think. What's a shame trigger for you? Run it through this. Some of these tips. At least one. Maybe. Maybe all five. I don't know. How ambitious are you? How free do you want to be? Quick reminder, the tips were Number one, slow down. Notice a storm inside. Tip number two talk to your inner critic. You could practice that one. That was an extremely valuable one. Tip number three get curious. What rule did I break? Do I even believe that rule? Is that something that I consciously want to live by? Number four, reclaim your integrity if needed. Sometimes the rule is bs. You don't even need to do that. Nothing to apologize for. You don't believe in that. And number five, Complete and move on. Those are the tips. So pick one, practice one. Do it. Do it and know that you're awesome. Right? Is that how I end? That's how I end. Alright, until we speak again. May have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you're awesome. I'll talk to you soon. Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know anyone who can benefit from what you've just heard, please let them know and send them a link to shrinkforthyguy.com for free blogs, e books and training videos related to overcoming shyness and increasing confidence, go to social confidencecenter.com it.