FACT: very few of us think we have a problem with shame. But almost all of us do.
Not earning the £ you want or getting paid on time? It could be because of internalised shame.
- Shame will stop freelancers chasing invoices (even if you’re owed £, because you don’t want to have an embarrassing conversation and feel ashamed to be “pushy”).
- It will block you asking for a pay rise because you don’t want to be seen as grasping – or risk anyone telling you that you don’t deserve it (which is what shame makes you believe).
- You won’t ask awkward questions about what others are earning, why your bonus isn’t what you thought it would be, whether the company has a gender pay gap etc, so you’ll have no information to make decisions with.
- You will find it impossible to sell or market effectively without any ick when you have a lot of shame (you’ll feel too forward, too grasping, embarrassed or too crass).
Wish you could do better at work? That might be shame too.
- Shame will stop you risking a creative or innovative suggestion in case it’s not correct, so you’ll only ever be able to be “good” and never your really brilliant self.
- Shame can make you waste time and effort and hours of your life trying to achieve “perfection” that doesn’t exist – when good enough was the real world requirement. You’ll have no boundaries around working hours and a LOT of resentment.
- Shame will make taking feedback feel impossible (because, when you have a lot of shame, you’ll take feedback SO personally) so you never learn or grow. And you’ll never be considered a good leader as a result.
Want better relationships at work? Tackle shame.
- Shame will make networking hard because it will tell you that no one wants to talk to you and (afterwards) that you made a fool of yourself. The physical impact of shame – and how it makes you anticipate rejection – will make you blush, stumble over your words and feel too overwhelmed to form a sentence.
- Shame will make you paranoid about coworkers and tell you that you’re being judged for one weird thing said, or one mistake made.
- Shame will make you isolate yourself and be passive aggressive, so you can reject people before they reject you.
Want to stop hating your job and earn £££ in a way that feels good? It’s time for shame to go.
- Shame loves to tell you what you “should” do. That wanting to do what you love is naive.
- That a truly enjoyable working life is unrealistic, selfish and childish.
- It will stop you finding out what really lights you up by telling you there’s no money in your passions – or thinking you can make enough to live off is unrealistic.
- And it will tell you that you need to be “professional” to be a success – to hide parts of yourself or pretend you conform to certain stereotypes when your true power is authenticity.
- It will say that money doesn’t come easy and work should be hard – which means you’ll never even see the opportunities to make money easily, let alone take them.
Shame has HUGE reach in our professional lives but can be completely hidden. Once you see everywhere that shame hits then you’re also seeing all the problems you can solve when you tackle it. Resilience is an antidote to shame – if you’d like to have more resilience and less fear and shame book a free intro call and let’s chat.
