Hello,
I'm Alison.
If you're feeling overwhelmed by shame at the moment,
I'm going to offer you a practice to soften or even delete that shame and begin to replace it with something much better,
Healthier and healing for you.
I want to say first of all that when we feel shame we often feel quite isolated.
We feel that everyone else is better than we are,
We're doing things in a better way,
We examine all the things inside ourselves that we find fault with and it makes us feel somehow intrinsically damaged.
But the important thing to understand is that shame is a universal human emotion.
There is not a human being on this planet who won't experience the feeling of shame and it's really important therefore to meet shame with compassion and with a desire to change it,
To change it into another emotion,
To bring another emotion to it and the best emotion for neutralizing shame is self-compassion or self-kindness both and that's what we're going to practice here.
It's really important as humans instead of beating ourselves up about our suffering to acknowledge that there is suffering in our lives and to feel for ourselves and be kind to that suffering.
Providing ourselves with self-kindness is such an important component of self-compassion.
Unfortunately shame often keeps us away from being kind to ourselves or even liking ourselves.
We might not believe we deserve to be treated with kindness,
Patience or comfort or support but once some of the shame dissipates we become more open to deserving these things or to believing that we deserve these things.
So even if you come to this thinking I don't really know how to treat myself with loving-kindness you can still come to believe you deserve it and that's really the first step.
How do you do that?
You can learn how to practice it.
So I'm offering a practice here.
There's no getting this right or wrong and it is something where the word practice is important.
You give yourself time and space to practice this more than once maybe over and over again until you get that feeling that shame is more in the background,
Kindness and fairness are more in the foreground and then you'll begin to believe actually these things are for me,
These good things.
So let's begin now.
Ideally sit in a comfortable chair.
Find a way to be comfortable where you're relaxed but also alert so being upright helps with that and then take a deep breath and place your right hand on your heart.
Just breathe and feel that hand supporting and making contact connection with your heart,
Your feelings.
Steady your breath if you can.
Taking longer slower breaths and as you do so begin to think about some of the things you've been through that caused you pain and suffering and then as you feel again,
Sense again those things,
Keep in touch with that hand on your heart as a signal of support,
Of caring.
That gesture is actually signaling to your nervous system,
Your deep inner system that there is support and caring for this suffering and pain.
Soften the edges of your body,
The muscles on your face,
Your lips.
Soften through your shoulders,
Chest and belly and keep your breath soft,
Slow,
Steady and now say to yourself either out loud or silently some words that will be most healing,
The ones you most long to hear.
Are any words coming to you?
If this is difficult for you it might help if you imagine someone who is a kind and loving person saying the words.
They may be things like you didn't deserve to be treated so poorly,
You deserve to be treated with respect and kindness or I'm sending you love to heal your wounded heart or I'm sorry you had to go through this,
I'm sorry you had to go through this alone.
Now invite yourself to put your arms around yourself,
Maybe around your shoulders or across your tummy as if giving yourself a hug.
Let yourself soften into that hug and begin to feel comforted.
Let your emotions come and let it all sink in knowing that you deserve to be treated kindly,
Fairly and to be respected and loved.
Knowing that it is not okay when things are otherwise for you.
Turn towards that knowing as a light,
Even if it's a distant light,
Guiding you home to feeling your own goodness again,
Your humanity,
Your wholeness,
No blame or shame.
You are a human doing their best and you have endured things that are tough and even unfair.
Here you are,
Safe and wonderful and meant to be yourself.
Just take two or three more lovely breaths here for you.
And now as we get ready to leave this practice,
Thank yourself for showing up in this way to dissolve shame and replace it with kindness.
Sometimes that's a very brave act that we avoid and you showed up.
And then think about something really good you can do for yourself next,
Even if it's pouring yourself a hot drink,
Going for a walk,
Doing something you love,
Taking a nap,
Moving towards goodness,
All the goodness that is there for you.
Thank you for practicing with me,
My friend.
And until next time,
Bye for now.
