This morning started slowly. Coffee in hand, the Texas sun is already doing what the Texas sun does, (even though it’s overcast and rainy now) and I find myself thinking about something that comes up repeatedly in conversation lately.
shame
Not loud. Not the obvious kind.
Kind of cool. That kind of slips in early. The kind that engulfs us before we even know what to call it.
The ceremony… or if you want to look at it through the lens of faith, the consciousness of shame. It usually does not enter our lives because someone is trying to harm us. It enters because someone is trying to manage their own emotional world through us.
Often, someone is a parent or caregiver.
not bad not contaminated
But unknowingly.
Because when a parent says, “You hurt my feelings” or “Why would you do this to me?” What is actually happening is subtle, but powerful.
They are handing over their emotional responsibility to the child.
And the child, not having the ability to process it, internalizes it.
Not as information.
as identity.
I am the cause of pain.
I did that wrong.
I am responsible for how others feel.
It is not discipline.
It’s a shame.
And it installs quickly.
It becomes a program.
Or, again, if you want to look at it spiritually, it becomes a spirit that is connected to how we interpret the world.
And once it enters…
It’s not just in childhood.
It follows you into adulthood and starts showing up in a way that, honestly, would almost be funny if they didn’t say so much.
I was talking to someone recently who told me their feelings were hurt because their dog chose to sit with their spouse instead of them.
Oooooookkkkaaaayyyyy….
A dog… being a dog.
Comfort, strength, spot they like better on the couch.
And yet it was interpreted as rejection.
as personal.
As some of them do.
It’s not about dogs.
That’s about the program.
It’s about a nervous system that has been conditioned to interpret neutral behavior as personal injury.
In another conversation, someone shared that a cat had scratched them and it “hurt their heart.”
Again…
a cat
being a cat
There is no agenda. No mental manipulation. No deep meaning.
Just instinct.
But the response?
personal
emotional
internal
And then another one that really brings it home in my opinion.
A parent is sharing that their little one hurt them during a meltdown… and how much it hurt their feelings.
Now let’s read it again…
a child
With an underdeveloped brain.
No mental control.
No ability to process overwhelm.
Doing exactly what kids do when they flood.
And yet the explanation becomes:
“They’re doing this to me.”
That’s where it crosses the line.
Because when we take age-appropriate behavior… instinctive behavior… and we personalize it…
We just don’t get the moment wrong.
We project our own wounds onto it.
And when that projection is said out loud to a child…
“You hurt mom.”
“Why would you do this to me?”
“It saddens me when you act like this.”
What we are doing is training that child to carry something they were never meant to carry.
Your passion.
Your response.
Your inner world.
This is how shame goes away.
quietly
consistently.
Generationally.
Carl Jung put it in a way that leaves little room for argument:
“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will rule your life and you call it fate.”
This is that.
It’s unconscious patterning being played out in real time.
And most people don’t even see it.
They just think they are sensitive. or conscious. or emotionally connected.
There is a difference between mental awareness…
and emotional outsourcing.
One is ownership.
The other is dependency.
Viktor Frankl said, “There is a space between stimulus and response. In that space lies our ability to choose our response.”
That place?
That’s where responsibility lives.
That’s where maturity lies.
That is where the healing lives.
But when the shaming program is underway…
That space disappears.
Everything becomes instant.
Responsive
personal
You feel something… and immediately someone else becomes the cause.
And that is where power is transferred.
The moment someone else is responsible for your feelings…
You are no longer in charge of your life.
You are at the mercy of everyone around you.
their tone their actions. Like them.
Even their pets.
Even their children.
And it’s a fragile way to live.
From a trauma-informed lens, this makes total sense.
When a child grows up in an environment where emotional reactions are unpredictable, overwhelming or projected onto them…
They become hyper-aware.
hyper-vigilant
Constantly scanning how others feel.
Constantly gearing up to handle it.
This is what survival is all about.
But what begins as survival… often becomes identity.
And the identity becomes the pattern.
And the pattern becomes life.
unless it is interrupted.
From a faith perspective, this is where the truth comes in.
Because shame and truth cannot coexist in the same place.
One distorts.
The other clarifies.
Romans 8:1 says, “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
No condemnation.
Condemnation has not subsided.
Not conditional.
None of them.
It leaves no room for shame to lead.
It means responsibility, yes.
Accountability, yes.
But identity is not the root of the problem.
It is a distortion.
Brene Brown, who has done extensive work on shame, says:
“Shame is the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging.”
Not that we did anything wrong.
That we are wrong.
This is the shift.
That’s the damage.
And when we are taught (directly or indirectly) that other people’s mental states are our fault.
So what do we do with this?
We start telling the truth.
Not the soft version.
The original one.
Your feelings are yours.
Not your child.
Not your partner’s.
not your friend
not your dog
yours
And it doesn’t make you wrong for having them.
This makes you responsible for understanding them.
To trace them back.
To ask:
Where did this come from?
Why is this like land?
What is this really about?
Because it’s rarely about the surface.
It’s about the program running down.
And when you start to see it…
You stop taking everything personally.
You stop assigning money where there is none.
You stop projecting intent on behavior that has nothing to do with you.
And you begin to recover something that most people don’t even realize they’ve given up…
Your power.
not loud Not by force.
just fixed
grounded
Clear.
You see a dog choosing someone else and think – makes sense.
You see a cat scratch and think – yes, cats do that.
You see a kid hurt and think — they’re overwhelmed, not malicious.
And in that clarity…
You break the pattern.
Not just for you.
But for whoever comes after you.
Because the shame program only continues when it is invisible.
And once you see…
You don’t have to carry anymore.
Be honest… Have you ever taken something personally in your life that isn’t really about you?
throw it down That’s where the work begins.
And if it hits a nerve… send someone who needs to see it.
Always loving and praying for you and our world,
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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Photo credit: Sergej Shukal at Unsplash
