Journey Through Shame

This meditation is meant to provide guidance on working through, and releasing yourself from, shameful feelings attached to memories. Please listen with intention and confidence to sit with strong emotions that arise, in order to let them go. My hope is that, by the end of this meditation, you will be able to look back on those memories with a marked decrease or even no longer any shame feelings arising for you. This meditation is part of a new format of trauma informed meditation, which includes a few words of trauma informed instructions/permissions at the start.

Transcript

In terms of psychology and emotions.

Guilt can be described as feeling bad about something you've done or didn't do.

Shame,

Conversely,

Is feeling bad about who you are.

In this meditation,

We will be bringing to mind a memory of a situation that we feel some degree of shame around.

And then,

Use mental dialogue of question and answer to work through the shameful feelings that we've associated with the situation,

The reactions of others,

And our own behavior.

This use of critical inquiry to investigate our mental talk and images will help us to see ourselves as completely acceptable human beings in this situation,

Despite how we were received or responded to or judged by others.

Before we begin this meditation,

Check in with yourself.

Are you feeling grounded,

Emotionally stable,

And ready to face these possibly strong emotions?

In your recent past,

Is the practice of bringing up shame-filled memories quite traumatic for you,

Rather than merely uncomfortable or unpleasant?

If so,

You can always end this recording and return to this meditation when you're ready.

If you begin to feel unsafe,

Despairing,

Or become overwhelmed by strong emotions or sensations during this meditation,

Consider opening your eyes and looking around the room,

Stretching,

Standing,

Or moving your body to an empowered pose,

Or ending the practice to rest and heal first.

Consider this as an act of self-awareness and self-care.

Now,

If we are settled and ready to dive in,

The practice begins.

Bring to mind an image that you do not want to think about because you feel shameful about yourself due to it.

For me,

It is often the image I associate with others judging me negatively,

Frowning at me,

Laughing at me,

Or disregarding me because of something I've done or said.

I know the feeling of shame because I tend to shut down the thoughts that come with it and push them away.

Whatever the thoughts that you have been pushing away lately that feel embarrassing or make you feel bad about yourself,

This is the time and the safe place to face them.

I know that you feel ashamed of yourself because you feel ashamed of yourself.

This is the time and the safe place to face them.

Visualize the memory of the shame-filled event.

If it helps,

Bring the image forward as if you're projecting the picture onto the screen of your mind.

Go ahead and do that now,

Taking note of any shameful feelings that are coming up for you.

The feeling may be overtaking or may be subtle.

Allow the shame to be there.

Try to investigate and note the level of the shame.

You can use the number system.

Zero for no shame and four for very strong feeling of shame.

Zero for no shame and four for very strong feeling of shame.

If words were said that feel shameful for you,

Let yourself hear that feeling.

Feel the same way you feel now.

Feel the same way you feel now.

Feel the same way you feel now.

Feel the same way you feel now.

Do you think it's shameful for you?

Let yourself hear those words in your mind and note the level of shame for those as well.

If you feel the urge to slump down or hang your head,

Go ahead and allow yourself to physically move your body as the shame leads you to.

If the feelings of shame are subtle and hard to feel into,

This movement can encourage the feeling to emerge and you can more easily dive into it if that's something you'd like to do.

Head hanging low.

Head moving down,

Down,

Down.

Stay with that for a while.

Now notice the level of shame that's present.

Give it a number.

Now with the image fresh in your mind,

Let's focus on mental talk,

Which are the words in your head.

Mentally,

Or out loud if you wish,

Label your mental image.

Give the image a caption.

What is happening here?

Now tell a story about what happened.

Type in words what you see in the image,

Or what is happening in that memory.

Do your best to remember the details of what happened in that event.

If some details are hard to remember,

Just do your best to fill in the blanks for now.

What were the people in your memory saying or doing?

Give as much context as you can remember.

Keep writing that description.

Now,

Let go of that for now.

Bring the image back to mind,

And again,

Note the level of shame that comes up with it.

Now while focusing on the memory image,

Compare your caption,

Or the short description that you wrote,

To the image that you see.

Does your caption accurately describe what is happening in the scene?

Is your caption adding any information that is not present in the image you see before you?

For instance,

Your caption may be accounting for certain words or sentiments that were not actually spoken,

Or certain threatening events,

Thoughts,

Or speculations that did not actually occur in this particular scene,

But may be more related to incidents from your past,

Or your worst fears.

Is your caption excluding any information that is present in the picture?

For instance,

Your caption might be excluding certain verbally spoken words,

Or actions,

Or significant events leading up to the particularly shameful outcome that you experienced.

How would you revise your description,

Or caption,

To more accurately describe what happened here?

Bring to mind the caption you wrote previously for this picture.

How would you revise this caption to more accurately describe what happened here?

Who or what is the subject?

And what is the verb?

What is happening?

And who or what is it happening to?

When you think of a new,

More accurate caption based on the image you see,

Including what is observably present and noticing what is observably absent,

Go ahead and say that caption in your mind or out loud.

With this new,

Accurate language you have to describe the event,

Investigate what it means for your sense of self.

Are the actions,

Behaviors,

Or reactions of others towards you truly a measure of your own value or worth?

Are they a measure of your actual impact on the world?

Perhaps,

In situations like these,

We can safely assume that others are reacting in the moment in the same way that we are.

They are reacting more so to the captions that they've created in their minds about the situation at hand,

And not to us in particular.

We are free to not take these reactions personally,

As if they reflect who we are or what our value is to the world.

Let's say you decide to speak your truth in a conversation with a loved one,

And as a result you perceive a look of disgust,

Fear,

Or aversion from her.

If you take that as a measure of your worth or your impact on her,

You may feel like a monster just for being true to yourself.

But you are set free when,

After creating an accurate story of what happened for yourself based on what's observably there and what's observably absent in the picture,

You can come to realize that her reaction was not based on any harm you've done to her by speaking out for yourself,

But more accurately,

Her reaction is one of fear or aversion that is more directed towards the story she's told herself about what's happening,

Or the personal meaning that she's created based on the words you've spoken.

Someone else's personal meaning is not something you can control,

It's ultimately for them to process,

Come to terms with,

And take action on if they so choose.

When we are able to observe these events and create more accurate captions for ourselves,

It removes some of the pressure to force every outcome to serve as a validation for our own healthy sense of self-regard.

We can take a look at the picture on the wall,

Describe,

And take in what is there,

Notice what is not there,

And then we are free to walk away,

As we are not held back by them.

Now let your descriptions go,

Let your captions go.

Bring back to mind the image that you've now created accurate language around.

Go to the level of shame that you feel in your body when you think about this image now,

And go ahead and give that a number.

Notice your posture and see if your head is held a little higher.

If you haven't already,

Stretch up and take a deep breath in and out.

Good work.

The practice concludes here.

Thank you for listening.

If you enjoyed this meditation,

Check out my new website for more of the self-development projects that I'm working on,

Or to give me some direct feedback.

Visit Roswell.

TK.

Thank you so much,

And have an amazing day.

Reviews

Wow! Thank you 🙏🏾

I used this for shame I have around money. Thank you. It was helpful.

I wish I’d found this a few days ago, i could’ve saved myself a lot of suffering. This was so incredibly helpful and healing. Thank you so much 💙

Other-worldly exercise that's LIFE affirming and gently releases shame

Really interesting perspective. Thank you. 🙏🏽🤎

I found it very helpful confronting a shameful incident I had at work a few years back, which had created a sense of a ridiculous me “not fitting in” - I went from total shame surrounding this (with all the low-level repercussions ever since), to only a 2. I’m hopeful this will help bring back confidence to my job performance. Thank you so much! It was very powerful and you have a wonderful, calm voice. Your matter of fact tone helped me feel safe.

Thank you for this meditation. I truly appreciate the boundaries and freedom provided in this prompt - freedom to go at your own pace and clear instructions at each turn. 🙏🏾🙏🏾🙏🏾

I found this practice to be very powerful and healing. Thank you so much.

A beautiful guidance! Loved the thoughtful instructions. If I had one suggestion it would be to stay with the reframing longer so our mind can learn the new thoughts surrounding the shame instead of closing so quickly. I will definitely be bookmarking and using again. 🙏🏽

Powerful Meditation. Thank You For Helping To Free And Release My Shame. 🙏🏽🙏🏽

Well done. Helpful. Clarifying. Thanks.

Thank you for this✨

Thank you so much that really helped🙏🏻☁️🌈🌈

Amazing. It was like getting rid of a very heavy burden I had been carrying for ages. Thank you very much.

Very interesting. I plan to listen to this again.

Thanks Roswell for providing words that invite us into the ashamed parts of our lives. If we never go there, they’ll always be there. It’s hard to go there without outside help.

💖💖💖 Powwful, Rewarding & Amazing Meditation! 🌹🌹🌹 Namasté 🙏🙏🙏💖💖💖

Wow.. the transition I just experienced from a 4 to a 1 for some deep, shameful feelings is incredible. This felt very risky at first, but what a refreshing approach to dealing with emotions we’d rather hide away from. You did a great job at guiding through these very difficult emotions. Thank you for this meditation.

I sat down to write in my journal tonight because I feel like I have some emotions that are stuck in on the top of the page I had the word shame and I did not know where to begin. I procrastinated and scrolled on my phone and found this meditation, perfect timing. The captions on my pictures really helped me change my mindset a bit. Much thanks!