Shame

“I’m disappointingly human”

Back in September, I wrote a blog post about Belonging versus Fitting In, the difference between the two and where I feel like I belong and where I don’t belong.  As I noted in the blog post, my therapist Hailey really helped me understand the difference between the two, and she used a quote from Brene Brown to highlight it.  Belonging is us being ourselves while fitting in means we have to become something else.  I think, or hope,  most of us would prefer belonging.

Since then I’ve been reading Brene Brown’s “Daring Greatly”, which has been one of the most powerful books I’ve read in a long time.  The main premise of the book is that we need to have the courage to be vulnerable to “live, love, parent and lead.”  As I’ve noted to some people, what’s great is I read it after Laurel, so it had all of the important parts underlined and highlighted, so I could know what to focus on. 

In this book, Ms. Brown draws the distinction between Guilt and Shame.  Guilt is “I did something bad”.  Shame  is “I am bad”.  Quite literally, the heart of the matter for me, and I’ve run through this so many times with Hailey, and while my head understands the problem, my heart still won’t.  Does God forgive you?  Yes, of course, God forgives everyone.  Does Laurel or whomever forgive you?  Yes, Laurel and most people are kind enough to grant forgiveness.  Do you forgive others?  Of course, everyone deserves forgiveness.  Can you forgive yourself?  No.

While this was yet another exercise in my seeing the various ways I have failed in my life, the whole discussion on shame was eye-opening and incredibly painful.  Shame is what we do, who we are, how we treat each other to get what we want.  Ms. Brown told so many stories, so many anecdotes of people expressing how they had been shamed.  Spouses, children, parents, co-workers describing instances when they had been shamed.  The stories were devastating, mostly because I had seen them, experienced them, felt them, and most painfully, used them.  I thought of the words from the Bob Seger song, “Night Moves”, but with a slight twist:

“I shamed you, you shamed me, but neither one cared.  We were getting our share”

For me, the easiest or most painful ones were the times I had shamed Laurel or my children.  I’m not sure who gets shamed more, women or children, but it’s probably a close race, and frankly, doesn’t matter.

I read some of those stories, and I could go through and check the box.  As noted, Laurel had already read it, and marked specific areas, and while it wasn’t meant to be a “wake up call” for me, it was.

• Shaming for sex.  Laurel told me the one story,  and I can’t even remember if it’s in the book or maybe in another book she read, but as she stated it, after working all day, feeding the kids, getting them bathed, getting them in bed, and all you want to do is curl up on the end of the couch and eat some ice cream.  But your husband wants to have sex.  Check.
• Shaming by comparing her to other wives and finding her lacking.  Check.
• Shaming by thinking I could run our household like a business, and not realizing she was really good at running the house.  Check and mate.

Now, the good news is that after some rocky early years, I grew to love Laurel more and more each day.  More importantly, I grew to value and appreciate her and the gifts she has.  She is amazing with the kids, much better at it than me, and she runs our house impeccably, she is really good at it.  I really don’t believe I could have a better partner or spouse, she is truly amazing.  If there is anyone lacking in this relationship, it’s me.

When it comes to our children, I found many of those examples and stories coming way too close to home also.  While unfortunately I could probably come up with hundreds, some brief examples:

• I  remember when Kelly was a pre-teen and playing soccer, I would always say to her, "Where does it come from Kelly?" and she was supposed to answer back, "It comes from the heart sir!"  (I think I read too many motivational books).  You know, it really seemed kind of funny at the time, but maybe not so much for Kelly...
• I remember drawing up a contract with our daughter Megan.  With signatures.  As Megan noted, “you always try to treat us like one of your employees.” 
• I remember being embarrassed at times with Sean and Patrick when they were in middle school. The most odd and ill-fitting kids seemed to always gravitate to our sons.  That seemed to continue into high school and even college.  As I look back, they were doing what we all encourage people to do, be kind to those who need kindness.  What did Jesus say?  Something like, “what you have done for the least of these, you did for me”.  I’m incredibly proud of them now for doing this, and my embarrassment has shifted to me.

Probably the most telling to me was an example from the book.  Ms. Brown described a time Toni Morrison was on the Oprah Winfrey show.  Ms. Morrison said that whenever your child walks into the room, your face should light up.  She said, “let your face speak what’s in your heart.”  Ah, not quite what I did.  My kids used to talk about my “mean face”.  I’d ask, “what do you mean, my mean face?”  They’d say, you had your mean face on, you looked at us with your mean face.  I’d tell that that was just my regular face.

I recently shared this story with Nancy Cox-Lupori, who used to work for me.  I knew how much she would appreciate it.  Nancy and I had a great working relationship, and she would call me out when I needed calling out.  When I had “that face”, she would say, “Stop with the Snoopy face.  Quit scowling at us.”  If I could only have had Nancy around when I was doing that to my children….

As I reflected on all of this, I could come up with so many ways I shamed Laurel and our children, but I couldn’t think of times I shamed people at work (I’m sure Nancy could give several examples).  As I thought about it, I did remember a situation where I shamed someone at work, and I really did it well.  I was teaching a training class on written communication at Touche Ross, and for the most part, accountants weren’t very good at written communication.  There was one young man, Scott Soutar, who had written a memo that had many misspellings, poor grammar, etc.  I used it as an example for a group of employees, with Scott in the audience.  Yes, I was that insensitive.  Until the scenario played out completely,  I didn’t realize how insensitive I was.  Scott was devastated, and I was devastated once I saw what I did.

As Laurel has told me, and I do agree with her, we can’t focus on all the areas we have failed when we read this book.  I do agree with that.  Part of what hurts is realizing how much I have used shame to hurt those I love.  Part of what hurts is realizing that I’ve had it done to me too.  What hurts so badly though is to realize it is who we are, how we treat each other, how we control each other.  It has become such a natural part of our lives. 

“Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good”

OK, I've given you how I've embraced some of the negatives I've found about me reading this book.  But, my God, the positives.  Ms. Brown gives us so many ideas and examples of how we can have the courage to be vulnerable and be better leaders, better parents, and most importantly, better human beings.  Let me highlight some positives I’ve gleaned, which is why it was so critical for me to read this book:

• It got me writing again.  One of the sections of the book discusses that trying to be perfect is the enemy of creativity and art.  Art is never perfect, it’s expression, and it’s who we are or what we’re feeling at the time.  I quit writing because I was striving so much for perfection.  I need to realize, my writing has never been perfect, it never will be, and that’s OK.
• I don’t care about proving myself anymore.  That really has evolved over the past several years, but this book reinforced it for me.  I will do the best I can do, and if that’s not good enough, so be it.  I won’t be shamed into doing what someone else would want me to do or be.
• I am working on my facial expressions, I’ve thought about anyone I meet, waiters, store clerks, co-workers, my family, a smile can change so much.  Especially with our loved ones, let them see how they light up our world, but do it with those people you meet along the way.
• I have given away at least five copies of this book to people who mean something to me, and I will continue to give this book to people who can gain from it.  I really believe this book is that life-changing. 
• I am encouraging colleagues to avoid this type of behavior (shaming) and to do the same with their colleagues.  It just doesn’t belong in any setting.  We can and should be better than this.
• I am doing my best to have the courage to embrace the vulnerable.  I’ve written and re-written this blog post over the last few weeks and debated posting it.  I’ll admit I’m scared of what people will think of me for some of the ways I have used shame in my life to get what I want.  But, I’m hopeful, just like one of my favorite lines from a TV show, “Last Tango in Halifax”, you all will realize that I’m simply disappointingly human.