Freedom From Shame

Shame is a form of internal poison that needs an antidote. So, as you change your internal messages, with consistency and determination, you can reprogram your subconscious mind to automatically remind you of what you love about yourself. You can rebuild your confidence, and restore your sense of self, allowing you to step forward with dignity and hold your head high.

In this meditation, you will learn how to see what you are most ashamed of, and install a healing antidote into your subconscious mind so that you can just be with yourself with kindness. You do not have to continuously show others how you deserve to be loved and belong. You can love and belong to yourself first.

Transcript

Before we begin this meditation on freeing yourself from shame,

I'd like you to close your eyes and imagine yourself soaking in a lovely warm bath full of bubbles and feel the warmth of the water caressing your body,

Easing away any tensions,

Relaxing you and soothing you gently all over.

And you begin to feel heavy and comfortable,

Enjoying the luxury of having absolutely nothing to do but relax and let go,

And feel the warmth and the heaviness spreading up over your body,

Starting with your toes and your feet and gradually working its way up into your legs.

And now feel that warmth flowing into your pelvis,

Your stomach breathing calmly as you relax your chest and your shoulders feel loose and limp and so very relaxed.

And just let your arms relax as they float in the water as the warmth and comfort flows down from your shoulders and just let go,

Just enjoy this wonderful feeling and as your neck and your throat relax so do all of the little facial muscles and your eyes become heavy,

Almost closed but not quite because from your almost closed eyelids you notice a bubble in your bath,

Just one particular bubble that reflects the beautiful colors from the glint of sunlight that is streaming through a nearby window and this bubble contains all the colors of the rainbow and as you keep your mind focused on this ever-changing array of colors I invite you to imagine your bubble expanding,

Growing bigger and even more delicate than before and as you imagine this notice how the heaviness of your body has gone and just imagine yourself leaving your body for a moment through the crown of your head and floating up and over the bath and you are weightless now inside of your big bubble just pure energy looking down at yourself in the tub feeling for yourself,

For your life,

For what you have experienced in the past and getting ready to find freedom from shame and the higher you go the more deeply and comfortably relaxed you become you feel completely safe and protected within your bubble and in this higher bubble you are seeing your potential to let go of the shame that you have carried in your body and your mind for so so long and it's a wonderful feeling to be so relaxed it's quite perfect to be here right now contemplating that one day you will be completely free from shame and I'm going to be quiet for a few moments now to allow you to absorb the peace and the beauty of this heightened awareness feeling the potential to view all of your life's experiences with kindness,

Compassion and forgiveness and when you next hear my voice it will seem to you as though it's coming from outside your bubble and your subconscious mind will be open and receptive to this healing meditation that will support you to find freedom from shame so just take another few moments to enjoy and benefit from this truly profound state of relaxation as you find yourself searching within to discover what it is that you would most like to achieve from this meditation session you might ask yourself what you most wish to experience or you might want to feel what freedom from shame would be like ask yourself who would notice first if you were entirely free from shame perhaps you might wonder what might be the signs that this person would detect in you if you were entirely free from shame would this freedom show in your face in your demeanor in the way you carry yourself or the way that you walk into a room maybe it would be something about your joyful and confident smile or a twinkle in your eyes and then you might wonder what they might tell you when they notice the change would they comment how would the signs be evident in their surprised expression surprised because you look and act so differently now that you are free from shame and perhaps you are wondering what it might feel like to observe their positive reaction their approval however small or subtle as they notice how confident and joyful and free from shame that you are and through these nuanced imaginings you can show your subconscious mind the direction in which you want to travel using images like signposts to your desire to be completely free from shame and it is important to know that perfectionism is a common way to hide from feeling ashamed and shame is a social emotion because somewhere in time in some way someone did something to you or said something to you that made you feel ashamed that made you feel like you had to keep some part of you a secret or else you would not belong with others in some way and perfectionists are constantly doing and while this isn't all bad in that perfectionists tend to accomplish a lot it is important when you are healing shame to counteract that constant state of doing with periods of simply being being with yourself being with your shame with self-compassion belonging with all parts of yourself even the parts of you that have been rejected by others or rejected by yourself so ask yourself when was the last time you took time to stop everything just to be with yourself with kindness with self-compassion you do not have to continuously show others how you deserve to be loved and how you deserve to belong you can love and belong to yourself first to simply lay down or sit to be still and quiet it's no tv no phone just you quiet contemplation of your goodness of your beauty of your wholeness being especially kind to the parts of you that feel rejected telling them that you love them and that they belong to you and so here and now in this very moment and while you are sitting or lying down quietly just listening to the sound of my voice perhaps you can become more aware of your breathing as it deepens and slows in tempo and if you are feeling vulnerable ashamed or embarrassed in this quietude just turn toward that feeling of shame with kindness and say you are welcome here and so here and now you are truly practicing the art of just being and allowing yourself to be accepting of all of you every part of you even the parts of you that you feel embarrassed about and beginning to recognize that this very process of compassionately welcoming all parts of you into your quiet time is much needed and deserved by you if you are to be completely free of shame and in the here and now no one wants anything of you there's nobody to impress you do not have to prove anything nothing is expected of you and all you need to do is just focus on my voice and continue to embrace the peacefulness that comes from this shift and focus as you drift deeper and deeper still and engaging in this simple practice of self-compassion and welcoming all of your rejected parts of self into your quiet time for just a few moments every day goes a long long way toward counteracting the effects of unconscious self-shaming and repressing the parts of you that fear not belonging with other people and if you experience some negative thoughts and emotions connected to the feelings of shame such as fear of rejection repression secrecy vulnerability or embarrassment i'd like to talk to your subconscious mind that deeper inner part of your brain that listens even when your conscious mind has wandered and in this wonderful relaxed state of meditation the critical control faculty of your conscious mind is bypassed ensuring that what i am sharing with you can be more deeply accepted and so in this state of relaxation my words can sink more deeply into your subconscious mind and begin the process of rewiring those unwanted experiences of shame and replacing them instead with how you would like to feel and how you would like to think and so to begin the process of rewiring it is important to understand two things firstly the subconscious mind responds to habit that is your habits of thinking and feeling and secondly your subconscious mind will work towards whatever you are focusing on and repeating the most and because shame can be such a dark painful and unpleasant mix of regret embarrassment self-hate dishonor and inadequacy if on a regular basis you are repeatedly visualizing something that shamed you in the past then your subconscious mind automatically responds to this programming and adopts those emotions and thoughts as facts and furthermore your subconscious mind starts to feed those mortifying painful and confidence sapping thoughts and so all those emotions that those thoughts create repeat right back to you in a loop and so uninvited shameful thoughts might pop up into your mind at random as though some outside entity deity or the universe is judging you harshly when really it is just your subconscious programming arising and repeating like the unconscious habit it has become and so these beliefs from your deeper subconscious mind are simply the learned results of your own habitual thoughts and the wonderful news is they can be changed so as you continue to breathe notice the sound of the slow intake of your breath through your nose in two three four and out two three four and perhaps you feel ready now to take the reins and regain control of this habitual self-shaming process and this like any new skill takes practice and constant daily repetition but you can learn any new habit any habit of thought or feeling very easy if you constantly repeat it in just a few so as you change your internal messages with consistency and determination you can reprogram your subconscious mind to automatically remind you of what you love about yourself you can rebuild your confidence and restore your sense of self allowing you to step forward with dignity and hold your head high and making time each day for moments of compassionate presence for every part of your being also promotes this rewiring process as well as counteracts the negative impact of social shaming and self-shaming from the past so let us explore this new neural pathway now and just make yourself even more relaxed more comfortable scanning your body for any areas of tension which usually indicates where shame is stored and using your imagination create an image of a screen in your mind perhaps it is a cinema screen a movie screen expansive and blank an empty space upon which to build up your new neural networks and now on this screen i invite you to first project what you feel the most ashamed of this will likely be something about yourself that you feel embarrassed about because you were hurt or shamed in the past and just take as long as you need quiet down in a moment to allow you the time and space to focus on allowing this self-shaming statement to arise so that you can see it honestly so that you can face what has been making you feel so diminished and so withdrawn so afraid and so vulnerable inside of yourself and with others and with the kindest of eyes see that self-shaming statement up on that screen perhaps it says i am ashamed of and then just fill in what you feel the most ashamed about today and now just face it just see what you are ashamed of with self-compassion just keep your heart open even if you feel scared or vulnerable kindness kindness kindness for whatever you feel the most ashamed about now see the words on the screen as this old habit of feeling ashamed slowly slowly fades away and it is already fading now and you are noticing that this is a negative message that you got from your past and it's already fading into black and white smaller and smaller and then into nothingness and now you have already started out on your journey toward positive change positive affirmation and self-love and so as your shame statement is fading off the screen off the screen ask your heart for an encouraging antidotal self-affirming statement to appear on the screen and just watch it as it comes forward into your field of vision in brilliant living color larger than life and if you have made mistakes in your past that you regret you might affirm something like it is okay to learn from my mistakes if you are not loving a part of yourself that has been hurt ridiculed or harmed you might affirm to this part of you that it is beautiful worthwhile whole or innocent we all make mistakes and misjudgments and we get things wrong and we all get hurt shamed shunned excluded or laughed at at some point in our lives and so the idea here is not to deny or overlook the hurt the hurt and the embarrassment but instead seek to remedy it with a powerful antidotal healing statement and you can tell your subconscious mind that you care for and about yourself profoundly so let's go back to that screen now and bring your antidotal statement to the forefront of your mind for shame is a form of poison that needs an antidote so take a look at your shame healing affirmation on the screen and picture it again remember it amplify it with light and color and when you finish this meditation you might want to write this antidotal statement down at least 10 times in your journal you might want to write it out with deep feeling feeling better and better with every repetition or you might want to draw out your antidotal statement embellishing it with pictures and colors and doodles and details as you contemplate it and take it into your body and into your mind in a deeper and deeper way but for now just stare at the screen in your mind's eye and imagine yourself imprinting this kind and loving antidotal statement into every cell in your body and breathing it in with every breath that you take just imagining that this loving statement is taking up full residence in your heart and your mind and let it become you for love is stronger than fear self-compassion is more powerful than shame and kindness is more mighty than the self-criticism that arises from shame well done and now continue to exercise your wonderful creative powers and see if you can project forward in time just a little way into the future when you have moved closer to being free from shame imagining yourself embodying this powerful antidotal shame healing statement you might just picture yourself going about your life in an ordinary day except that nothing is ordinary because you are different now you have started to believe in your goodness your dignity your beauty and your uniqueness you have started to accept yourself from the inside and the changes in how you behave are showing up on the outside and see yourself holding your head high and stepping out into the world after choosing to create a new reality of internal self-acceptance embodying your shame healing statement feeling this simple change in your thoughts this healing statement fully installed in your mind and instead of those old heavy feelings of shame you feel a sense of love and deep compassion for yourself a sense of quiet inner confidence that shines out from your eyes and from your every expression and your every movement and see how others are drawn to how you have chosen to love and accept yourself because as you draw others toward you you are telling them on a subliminal level that they are worth loving they are worth forgiving and they are worth valuing themselves and you are building a solid core of self-belief self-love and self-compassion that exists independently of other people's approval for you can love yourself just as you are from the inside out and be completely free from shame so take a few moments now to absorb these positive changes that are already taking place at a subconscious level and anchor into this solid core of self-love self-approval and self-compassion and in a moment I'm going to count the numbers from one to five and when I reach five you will return to a normal state of awareness feeling somehow different more confident more optimistic happier and much freer from the shame that is hidden underneath your life until now so start coming back to the ordinary everyday world bringing back with you all of these kind compassionate self-accepting feelings one two three four and five eyes open wide awake mind and body returning to conscious awareness welcome to freedom from shame

Reviews

Excellent

Thanks Shelley 🧸

Incredible

✨💛Thank you! This helped me through a difficult time tonight. I really appreciate your work. 💛✨

All your meditations are SO incredible and healing. I am so grateful for them! Please make more ❤️Thank you 🌷

This is one of the best meditations (not only here on IT) I‘ve ever heard; more than 30 years of depression, 2 years of hard pain - both, professionals just called them „chronical“- but nobody of them was ever able to pick up the trail of the main reason for all that: shame. With the support of very few, but real closed friends AND this meditation app I got an idea of what I had tried already 12 years before to give doctors and therapists an idea of my suffering for more than 50 years of my inner fights - without success ….
So the rest of hundreds of sessions of outpatient and inpatient therapies could at least come to an end finally beginning in Dec of 2023.
Now I am „allowed“ on my own as a biological 100 % heterosexual man to live my female side, what was telling my mother in the age from 0 to ten me and everybody that I should have been a girl much more than lovin’ me as a boy ….
Both, man AND woman what I now can truly stay to be proud of and with 🍀🍀🍀
Thank you, Shelley, from the Inner of my heart for this extraordinary meditation with your calm voice, great deepgoin‘ words and an empathy I never came in contact with a professional before. Today it was the fourth time of listening to you and I will repeat and repeat 🙏🙏🙏♥️