Jason McIntosh’s article, Being kinder to my dumbass past self resonated with me strongly as I too, have a dumbass self that likes to periodically remind me of things I’m ashamed of. Like Jason, these are situations where I said something I shouldn’t have, or feel like I’ve done something I shouldn’t. The thoughts in my head are full of blame and fear. If someone turned up wanting to hold me to account then I might not be surprised. No crimes or anything like that; simply situations where I’ve stepped outside my values.
I’m holding an assessment that a standard has been violated and I should be punished. The emotion that manifests is Shame and Sieler (2007), Coaching to the Human Soul, Volume II provides a way to look at these linguistically.
Shame lives in the place of violating community standards and that’s important to remember when the situation being replayed is from the past. I have seen many community standards change over my life, almost always for the better, and I can certainly recognise times where I acted in alignment with what my culture taught me was expected. The linguistic breakdown of shame is:
- I assert that I did (or did not do) x.
- I assess that I should not have (or should have) done x.
- I assess that doing (or not doing) x breaks the standards of the community that I live in.
- I assess that this negatively affects my public identity.
- I declare my willingness to face the community’s judgement to repair any damage to my identity.
That second line is the one I want to look at further. It’s an Assessment that I’ve broken a standard. This is a judgement made by me and therefore it’s my responsibility to make sure it’s grounded. The Grounding Assessments process requires I answer 5 questions, with detailed responses to at least the first 4.
- For the sake of what future action?
- In which particular domain of action?
- According to what standards?
- What true assertions support the assessment?
- What true assertions are there against the assessment?
Recently my wife and I were travelling. We were one of several busses transferring people from the hotel to the airport checkin, and were aware from the driver of more busses arriving at the same time for a flight later than ours. Normally I’m happy to wait my turn and after all, the plane wasn’t going to leave without us. This day was different. Many people meant fewer available seats in the terminal and it was important I take care of my wife and get her a seat “at all costs”. She was unable to stand for any length of time. In short, I pretty much pushed us to the front of the queue. And I feel guilt about it because I violated my standards. At the time, if I’d been challenged I would have apologised and redressed the situation. I wasn’t asked to and in some ways, there is a loop unclosed.
Coming back to grounding the assessment that I’ve broken a standard, the answer is yes. I don’t dispute that as a fact. When asked to ground the Assessment about shame that is making me feel so bad long after the event, I can’t answer the first question. The response to “For the sake of what future action?” is difficult to answer because there is no valid future action at all. Like Jason said, it’s not possible to apologise to the people hurt or seek atonement. It’s certain nobody in the queue that day is going to come up to me now and demand an apology.
The standard I broke was mine. I’m the person that feels bad about it. The only person I can say sorry to is me and as I finish this exploration of those moments when my mind decides I need to be judged, I feel that saying sorry and moving towards Acceptance is the only way to let go.