Wednesday, May 11, 2016

Shame is A Worthless Emotion

“Shame is a worthless emotion"

I was having coffee a few weeks ago with a friend at a local diner (way too early in the morning I might add) and we were talking about all sorts of struggles that people go through in life when he said to me “Shame is a worthless emotion”.

He went on to talk about how the very emotion/feeling of shame, as he has seen it work in himself and others, only ever does 2 things to people. From his perspective shame either makes people overly dependent on "getting it right" and being (or at least appearing) perfect, sometimes through the vehicle of religion, or it makes people go the opposite way and give up trying entirely because they could never achieve being the person they want to be.

Both, he said, were unhealthy extremes.

I can safely say throughout my life I’ve seen this play out for myself. I’m far from perfect, in fact I’m a very messed up person. Shame seems like its always been right by my side, in fact, I can’t remember what it’s like to feel no shame, to feel free, confident, like I don’t have to prove myself to anyone or try to earn love.

Shame has at times caused me to gravitate to both extremes. I’ve found myself doing everything possible to “get it right” and follow the rules so that the shame would go away. I’ve also had plenty of times in my life where “getting it right” felt so impossible that I just gave up entirely and acted a fool.

When I talk about shame, I’m talking about this deep, internal feeling that I don’t measure up. Sometimes its a feeling caused by mistakes I make or times when I fail to do what is right, but for me, shame mostly feels like this dark passenger (to steal a term from “Dexter”) that is always by my side, always whispering in my ear.

“You don’t measure up as a husband"

“You fail as a friend"

“God wants nothing to do with you"

“No matter how hard you try, you will always fail"

“Your life is destined to always be messed up"

Boy, shame sure sounds an awful lot like self-pity as well.

But thats what shame does. It creates a story, a narrative in our heads that plays over and over like a broken record.

What’s the story playing on repeat for you? What are the lies that exist in your narrative?

You know, the real tricky thing about life is that it can often feel like even when we try to create a new, more truthful story about ourselves, it always seems like there’s a situation or conversation or mistake we make waiting right around the corner that feeds into the lies we tell ourselves.

I agree with my friend, shame is a worthless emotion, especially in light of how I believe God sees us.

Part of the sneaky work of shame is to make us feel alone, isolated, like we are the only ones experiencing the pain we feel. It’s just not true. One of the best things people in my life have done for me lately is to remind me that I’m not alone and my story is not unique in that I’m broken and I have dozens of lies I believe about myself.

I’m not the only one who’s ever experienced death, or painful relationships, or who's felt like they don’t measure up as a spouse, or who is constantly trying to prove their value and worth to people.

Shame tells us we’re alone and that it’s important we keep up appearances and not let anyone in.

Forget that. No one was meant to walk through this life alone.

I’m not going to start preaching to you, because I have yet to work this out fully on my own and I don’t believe me proposing that I have all the answers will do anything but add to my already deep need to prove my worth to people.

Rather, here are the perspective shifts I’m attempting in key relationships, and maybe it can give you some help or insight too.

1. God

It’s hard for me to look at myself in the mirror most days. So if I can’t even look at myself with love & confidence, I can’t imagine God would look on me with love.

BUT HE DOES.

That’s why God is God, because he doesn’t think like us. He sees us, he sees our whole self, our true self. I love author Brennan Manning, and one of the things he says is “God doesn’t accept us in spite of our sin, he accepts us with it because that is true acceptance.” Meaning, God doesn’t think “Well, if they could just get their crap together then I would love them”.

God sees us for who we truly are, he sees our true self even when we don’t or we try to hide it. The greatest tool of shame is to get us to hide. So it’s understandably scary to try and approach a God who sees us, but I also think it’s incredibly freeing as well.

I think God wants my heart. I think God wants to see me free of shame. I think God knows shame is a worthless emotion. I think God actually does accept me and approve of me. I think he actually loves me because I was created in his image and he sees me as such.

So, I’m done with shame and I’m all in on Gods acceptance of me. I’m all in that I don’t have to prove myself with God. I’m all in that God is both just and merciful. I’m all in that I’ve messed up but that because Jesus stands in my place he sees me as a new creation, not all my failures.

2. Spouse

I’ve been married less than two years, but I’ve already noticed a pattern in me. When I have a hard time looking at myself in the mirror, I project that onto my wife and assume she wants nothing to do with me as well (sounds pretty similar to how I treat God)

As I’m constantly reminded by my beautiful wife, she wouldn’t have said “yes” if she wasn’t truly committed to me through the good and bad, through the times when I feel like “Husband of the Year” and the times when I know for a fact I’m not.

The trick here is not to let shame do it’s work. When I hear “You don’t measure up” I need reminded that because of Christ living in me, I do measure up and am in fact worthy of my wife and can confidently stand up as a man and love her like the daughter of the living God that she is.

3. Community

Maybe you aren’t married, maybe you are. Either way, hopefully we all have people in our lives that we would consider a friend. Shame likes to tell us what others see when they look at us, and it’s always negative.

When we come to a more full understanding of our identity and value because we were created in the image of God and are beloved by him, it feels like a fog lifts and we can see our relationships with more clarity.

Comparison games disappear as we are injected with a greater sense of identity and value. I no longer have to look at what’s happening in other peoples lives as a value statement about me. I can cheer someone on when they succeed, and when I feel hurt I can remind myself to give people the benefit of the doubt instead of immediately assuming cruel intentions.

I can let people in more and learn to trust when shame disappears. I can see them as being created in God’s image and treat them how God would treat them. I can fight for the highest good of someone else because I’m no longer only concerned with whats best for me or how they view me. I can SEE people as their true self and see past the walls and barriers they may put up.

I can feel secure in my relationships, experience human intimacy, be vulnerable, and not always fight so hard to be and feel worthy or valuable or respected, because I know I already am all those things in Christ.

I challenge you to look at yourself with less and less shame, and start to attempt to see yourself as God does. One of the things I want to try and do soon is write a letter from God to myself. I heard of someone else doing that recently, and I think it would be a great way to shift perspective and try to begin to see myself as God sees me.

I can’t take credit for most of the wisdom in this post. It’s only been through God and the community of people he has put in my life that I’ve even begun to see through the fog of shame and understand what it means that I am beloved by God and created in his image.

May you realize shame is a worthless emotion. May you change the narrative in your head from lies to truth. May you see yourself how God sees you. May you know you don’t have to compare yourself to others. May you understand that you are beloved and accepted by God, whether you “get it right” or not. Because thats the gospel, thats what we have access to now through what Christ did and who He is. None of us have to feel alone ever again.

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