Shame seems to be a buzzword these days, isn’t it? And it’s a good thing-- people talking more about the things that hold them back and keep them unhappy.

But, what I see over and over again are women saying, “I get and love when you talk about the inner-critic, perfectionism, and even not feeling good enough...but I don’t get the whole ‘shame’ thing and I don’t think I actually have any”.

And I get it. I think we might think of people walking around with shame that have done unthinkable things. Caught embezzling money from their church and the whole congregation knows. Caught having an affair with their psychiatrist and people are whispering around town about it. Or the kid whose mom is an alcoholic and comes drunk to the school play, things like that. But, what I’ve come to know, is that shame is much more common than we think and most of the time, shame happens in much smaller scenarios. And I hate to break it to those of you that think you’re the exception to shame, but ALL of us have it.

And if we’re not facing and claiming that we have shame, processing it, and learning how to move through it, then shame is owning us and we’re in a constant state of running from it.

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