230: Understanding Shame with Shane Birkel

Welcome back to The Couples Therapist Couch! This podcast is about the practice of Couples Therapy. Each week, Shane Birkel interviews an expert in the field of Couples Therapy to explore all about the world of relationships and how to be an amazing therapist.

In this solo episode, Shane discusses how shame works and how to talk through shame with your clients. Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and your other favorite podcast spots, and watch it on YouTube – follow and leave a 5-star review.

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• Show Notes
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The Couples Therapist Couch 230: Understanding Shame with Shane Birkel

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In this solo episode, Shane discusses how shame works and how to talk through shame with your clients. Hear the definition of shame, toxic shame vs. healthy shame, examples of shame between partners and children, how shame relates to compassion, and how to help your clients slow down and process the shame they’re feeling. Here’s a small sample of what you will hear in this episode:

• The difference between toxic and healthy shame
• How emotionally avoidant adults are made
• How communication turns toxic and how to help your clients fix that
• Helping clients process the shame that gets in the way of intimacy?
• What to do when clients are focused on being defensive?

Check out the episode, show notes, and transcript below: 

 Show Notes

• 230: Understanding Shame with Shane Birkel
• [0:25] Welcome to The Couple's Therapist's Couch
• [1:10] Brené Brown and shame vs. guilt
• [2:40] What is toxic shame?
• [4:14] An example of toxic shame in a relationship
• [6:32] Helping clients process the shame that gets in the way of intimacy?
• [9:18] What to do when clients are focused on being defensive?
• [12:04] Responding with compassion and healthy boundaries
• [14:25] How bad communications turns toxic and how to transition that?
• [16:50] Understanding self-love
• [18:44] An example of healthy shame
• [21:06] Some ways society is set up to foster co-dependence
• [23:21] Should we try to manage other people's perspectives?
• [25:13] An example of a child lacking emotional support
• [27:30] Where is the shame coming into play?
• [30:02] Taking the time to sit with discomfort and hurt to process it properly
• [31:48] Check out The Couple's Therapist Couch Facebook group and website
• [31:52] Leave a review! 

What is The Couples Therapist Couch?

This podcast is about the practice of Couples Therapy. Many of the episodes are interviews with leaders in the field of Relationships. The show is meant to help Therapists and Coaches learn how to help people to deepen their connection, but in the process it explores what is most needed for each of us to love, heal, and grow. Each week, Shane Birkel interviews an expert in the field of Couples Therapy to explore all about the world of relationships and how to be an amazing therapist.

Learn more about the Couples Therapy 101 course: https://www.couplestherapistcouch.com/

Find out more about the Couples Therapist Inner Circle: https://www.couplestherapistcouch.com/inner-circle-new

Transcript

Please note: Transcript is not 100% accurate.

00:00
Shame is about not being able to value yourself or esteem yourself.

00:09
Welcome to The Couples Therapist Couch, the podcast for couples therapists, marriage counselors, and relationship coaches to explore the practice of couples therapy. And now, your host, Shane Birkel.

00:25
Hey everybody. Welcome back to The Couples Therapist Couch. This is Shane Birkel and this is the podcast that's all about the practice of couples therapy. Thank you so much for tuning in. I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist and I try to bring you the best in the world of couples therapy as far as topics and guests. And hopefully you learn a lot about how to practice couples therapy and even about how to have a better relationship.

00:50
I'd be really grateful if you have a moment to go leave a rating or review wherever you listen to the show. It really helps get the word out to other people who have similar interests. And I'd just be really grateful for that. Thank you so much to all of you. Today we're going to be talking about shame. And it's funny, I know Brene Brown has done a lot of writing. I've tried to get her on the podcast. She's obviously at celebrity status at this point.

01:20
but she's done a lot of writing and speaking about shame. And she used to joke about how, you know, when she would say that that was the topic, nobody would want to listen. Like it's kind of a depressing topic to go into a function with. So I just think that shame is at the heart of everything that I do as a therapist or the way that I think about human beings. And so once, you know, I think this is why, one of the reasons she's become so

01:49
famous is because when people really understand how shame works in our lives, it can really change how you see yourself and how you see relationships. So I think it's an incredibly important topic. And I think, you know, starting off just understanding or defining it, you know, one of the things that when we talk about shame and some people use the phrase toxic shame, and I've also been influenced a lot by Pia Melody and Terry Real.

02:18
But the way Brene Brown talks about it is that toxic shame, she refers to as shame, whereas healthy, in a healthy experience of feeling bad about hurting someone, for example, would be guilt. Whereas I think P.M. Melody would say there's healthy shame and toxic shame, and there's also healthy guilt. I don't think the semantics matter that much. What's important to understand when we're talking about

02:48
toxic shame, it's really a feeling of devaluing yourself or someone could be shaming someone else. But it's really sort of going to the core of who you are as a human being and saying that you are not enough, you are not worthy, you are not deserving of love. And a lot of us, we don't even realize it when we're going through the world. Let's say that our partner is mad at us or unhappy with us.

03:17
that we will go into this place of shame feeling so overwhelmed, so unworthy, and there's a lot of fear that comes up about who we are as a human being. And obviously this is going to impact relationships. And so the healthy shame or the healthy guilt is the experience of, okay, I've done something to hurt my partner and I feel bad about that. So it motivates me to be accountable.

03:46
It motivates me to apologize. It motivates me to care about my partner's feelings. That's a healthy experience, right? So, you know, an extreme example would be, let's say that somebody has an affair. They feel really bad about that. They wanna work on it with their partner. They made a big mistake that they can sit in the couple's therapy with their partner and be able.

04:14
to experience the pain of their partner. So obviously that's a huge violation of trust and the partner's going to feel very upset and overwhelmed and sad. And so my healthy shame or guilt about that, now I'm speaking from the first person, I haven't had an affair, but I'm just using that for the sake of the example. If I feel guilty about what I did, it moves me into compassion for my partner.

04:43
I violated their trust, I betrayed them, I did this thing that is making them feel so bad. I feel bad about it. That's a healthy shame or a healthy guilt, right? The important thing is that I'm keeping the energy on the experience of my partner, because sometimes what happens is the person who had the affair will go into a shame spiral and...

05:10
they turn it into being about them and to be instead of being about their partner. So their partner will start to say how sad they are and how hurt they are because the other person had the affair, angry. And the person who had the affair will start saying, well, I'm such a terrible person. I'm so awful. I don't deserve you staying with me. And so that's them going into a shame spiral, which is more of the toxic shame.

05:37
It's not just them feeling bad about what they did. It's them feeling like they are worthless as a human being. It's not just that I made a mistake, it's that I am a mistake. And it's not helpful for the couple's therapy or the relationship because they're turning the attention on themselves, right? And sometimes even the partner who's been betrayed will start to care take for the person who had the affair.

06:05
which there might be a place for that in the course of the work, but at the beginning, one of the things I really try to teach people at the beginning of the affair recovery work, I really want the person who had the affair to be able to move into that compassion and understanding for their partner, that we need to start with that before we talk about their personal experience. So in order, and hopefully,

06:32
There are a lot of situations where there hasn't been an affair. Hopefully that, you know, like I said, that's a pretty extreme example, but there are things all the time that move us into shame that get in the way of intimacy in our relationship, right? And different people have different levels of their ability to value themselves and different ways in which the shame comes up. And there are ways that we're socialized as males and females in society. There are that, that make a difference in that. And then,

07:02
absolutely your experiences in your family growing up and your experiences in your culture and your society have a huge influence on the way you experience shame or the way that you don't feel enough as a human being or as a partner or as a parent. And I'll keep giving more examples of that. So I think a lot about in our culture, in the Western American culture, European culture, you know, there's a huge

07:29
emphasis on performance based esteem, particularly for men. You know, I'm enough and I matter as long as I can perform. I'm valuable as a human being, as long as I can perform in the world, as long as I am good at sports or as long as I'm making enough money or as long as I'm successful in my job or as you know, all these different ways that we measure ourselves against other people.

07:55
You know, if I'm just going through my day-to-day life and my wife comes up to me and she says, hey, I'm really upset that you forgot to take the trash out, that I might, I start feeling the shame of that and I might start protecting myself against feeling the shame. So that's where I'll become very defensive or minimizing of her reality or even try to turn it on her. And

08:21
This is one of the ways in which shame gets in the way of the intimacy and connection and the relationship. If I haven't done my own therapy work, if I haven't done my own emotional work, it's going to be very hard for me to stand in the face of what I perceive as criticism and, you know, try to have compassion for my partner's experience. You know, so a lot of times what I'll see,

08:48
even when somebody is communicating in a very healthy way. So I'll stick with this example where one partner is asking the other about the trash, right? Even if they say it in a really healthy way like, hey, I'm feeling disappointed that we didn't take the trash out this morning. Let's make a plan to try to get better about that. And they're not even blaming their partner.

09:18
I'm trying to say in a way that's non blaming. That is them just talking about their feelings that even then the other partner could take it as a blaming comment and feel like I'm not enough. I'm not enough as a partner. And again, they're not usually not thinking this consciously. They're usually more focused on being defensive, but you know, unconsciously there's this experience of I'm not enough as a partner. Uh, this is one more thing that I did wrong.

09:47
I can never do anything right in my relationship. My partner's always complaining. I'll never live up to what they need. And they start going into this shaming and that feels so uncomfortable that they bounce up into what Terry Real calls grandiosity, which is the flashlight pointed in the other direction. It's not that I'm not enough. It's not that I'm miserable or messing up in the situation.

10:13
It's that the other person is messing up in the situation. What's wrong with them? They're the problem, right? So it's a flashlight pointed in the other direction. So he calls that grandiosity. When I'm going into shame, I'm pointing the flashlight at myself, I'm the problem. If I'm going up into grandiosity, I'm pointing the flashlight out to the other person and I'm thinking you are the problem. Oftentimes there's this dance within ourself.

10:39
which is like, I'm feeling guilty that I didn't take the trash out. I start going into shame about not being enough. And then I bounce up into grandiosity and say, well, you're the one who was supposed to take the trash out today, or why didn't you remind me? Or I don't like the way you're talking to me. Right. And so instead of focusing on my partner's experience of, um, you know, being sad or angry that the trash isn't taken out or set or hurt that I didn't follow through on my commitment.

11:08
there's an opportunity there if I'm healthy to move into compassion for their experience. But if I don't have enough emotional health on board, then I might bounce up into that grandiosity and start pointing the finger at them. Or if I'm more of a shaming, if I feel more shame as a person, I might just feel like, oh, I'm terrible, I'm awful, I know, I forgot again, I'm just.

11:37
such a terrible partner and I can turn it in on myself. The other thing that I wanted to say is even if my partner is not in a healthy place or good at healthy communication, I still have the opportunity to move into compassion for them, right? So they could come at me with what I would say is unhealthy communication by calling me names or telling me that I did it wrong again.

12:04
and say things like, I can't believe you didn't take the trash out. That's so, you're such a jerk that you always forget to do that. You don't care about me. To me, that's very unhealthy communication by the way. But if I'm in a good enough place emotionally on the receiving end of that, I might have the opportunity to use my healthy boundaries. Like if I know, if I know how to value myself, if I know, you know what, I am a pretty good person. I am working really hard.

12:33
in this relationship, in this family, I'm doing my best. And sometimes I make mistakes and that's okay. And my partner's upset. Even if they're coming at me with that unhealthy communication, I still have the opportunity to take a deep breath and say, you know, they're just having a bad day. I don't have to be defensive about this. I know I'm trying my best and I can be accountable. I can say, you know what, you're right. I did forget to take the trash out. I'm really sorry about that.

13:03
I can understand why he feels so upset about that. Now, in the heat of the moment, that's the best move. Like what happens for a lot of couples is there are two people who are not in their functional adult at the same time. So if one person is not in their functional adult, if my partner is so upset and they're calling me names and they're...

13:29
going, you know, in my, my perception is that they're going over the top in the blaming and criticizing. There's an opportunity for me to stay in that healthy functioning and to meet that with, oh my gosh, I'm so sorry. I forgot to take the trash out. I'll take care of it right now. Why don't you go sit down and relax and, uh, you know, I'll bring you something to drink and, uh, you know, we can regroup here.

13:57
Like that's great, that can work well, right? Everybody's gonna have a bad day where they get upset and they make mistakes in their communication. But if both people do that at the same time, that's where it turns into really high conflict situations or really bad communication. And that's where relationships, if that's going on for months or years, relationships can start to feel really toxic. So if I feel blamed and judged,

14:25
then I start getting defensive and overwhelmed and it can really quickly turn into an argument. So that doesn't mean that I have to be a doormat. That doesn't mean that I have to take whatever my partner throws out at me. What I'm doing is I'm focusing on the fact that there is a lot of good things about this relationship. There are a lot of times where my partner shows me they care about me and love me. And so I'm willing to overlook this one situation where they're not at their best.

14:54
I'm willing to be accountable and say, I'm sorry that I forgot to take out the trash. Now, if there is something that's really bothering me about the way that happened, I'm not going to bring it up at that moment. That's not the time to bring it up. What I want to do maybe wait a couple hours or wait till the next day. And here's what I would do. I would bring it up when my partner is feeling more regulated and back to their functional healthy self.

15:21
What I would do at that point would be to come to them and say, honey, you know, I just want to say again, I'm so sorry for forgetting to take the trash out yesterday. And by the way, it was totally valid that you were upset about that because I've been really bad about remembering. But by the way, you know, it didn't feel very good when you called me a jerk. Can we make a commitment to try our best not to call each other names in those situations? Would that work for you?

15:51
And so I'm able to express something that was hurtful to me. I'm able to make a request. But again, if it happens in the heat of the moment, it might not work. If she's coming at, you know, she's upset about the trash and I say, yeah, well, you just called me a jerk. It's probably just going to turn into an argument back and forth, back and forth. So I have to, to recognize the timing of the situation. I have to recognize if my partner is in a situation where they're overwhelmed and upset, they're probably in a place of shame.

16:21
could be other emotions. That's not the time for me to react out of my shame. So let's go back to understanding where this comes from. Okay? Shame is about not being able to value yourself or esteem yourself. We could use the term self-esteem, right? That goes hand in hand with the opposite of shame. Like if I have a healthy self-esteem, I'm able to value myself.

16:50
A lot of people talk about self-love, and I think that's a really important concept to understand. I think people use it in the wrong way, and that might be for another day, but if I have the ability to esteem myself or feel valuable, then I have the ability to be healthy in a relationship, and that goes hand in hand with boundaries. If I feel like when I'm in that situation where my partner's just really upset about the trash,

17:18
It's my healthy boundaries that protect me. If they're saying something that's blaming or criticizing, it's my healthy boundaries that protect me from what they're saying and enable me to stay grounded in myself and stay in connection with them. I have enough boundaries on board that I can move into compassionate understanding for their experience. We have to think about the reasons why people struggle.

17:45
with value in themselves. The reasons why people struggle with boundaries is oftentimes because of what they have gone through in their childhood. And this is why therapists have a reputation for wanting to talk about people's childhoods a lot and some people are kind of resistant to that, which I understand, but it's really, really, in my experience, it's really helpful information to take a look at each partner's experience growing up in their families.

18:15
pick up on a lot of themes and understand, where was there a problem in valuing you as a child? Because the extent to which parents can make their children feel valued, the extent to which their children can grow up and be healthy, emotional human beings. Again, let's take another extreme example of physical abuse. If there's a child who grows up in a physically abusive situation, the parent is literally

18:44
teaching the child that they are not valuable enough to be protected from being harmed. And not just be protected, but the parent themself, the person who's supposed to love the child more than anything, is the one who's perpetrating the abuse onto the child. And so if we look at healthy shame, if a parent were to have appropriate shame, they would feel so bad.

19:11
about physically abusing their child that it would stop them from being physical with their child. So a parent's appropriate shame stops them from harming their child because they would feel so bad about hurting them. Now when that's missing, when a parent is living more in the toxic shame, the parent feels like

19:39
this child is a representation of me and the world. And so I have to control it and make sure that this child is not doing things that are wrong, that would make me look bad as a person. That's coming from a place of toxic shame. It's more important to control this child's behavior than to protect their precious body and their precious being as a person, right? And so if...

20:07
the parent has more of that toxic shame. They're more concerned about their own value. They're more concerned about protecting their own self-esteem than they are about the child. Then they would be acting in a way that is shameless. They don't have enough shame. And so what happens is the child takes on that shame. The child feels like I'm not enough, I'm not deserving, I'm not worthy to not even be abused.

20:37
My body is not deserving of being protected. And so that will start to develop a shame core or toxic shame core inside of the child. So oftentimes children grow up thinking to themselves, if I perform well enough in the world, if I just get good enough grades or if I just behave well enough, then I'll get my parents to love me. Then I'll be deserving of love. Then I'll be worthy in the world.

21:06
Right? And some of this isn't just from our parents. Some of this comes through in our society in the way that our society is set up, right? If you perform well enough, you will be deserving and worthy. And even in relationships, right? This is where a lot of the co-dependence comes from. If I can make my partner happy, then they will give me the love that I always wanted. Right?

21:33
And there's a fine line between something that's healthy about that and something that is codependent, right? Oftentimes we're using our partner's love in order for us to feel a self-esteem. There are ways in which that doesn't feel good because then if my partner's upset about the trash, then all of a sudden I'm going into a shame spiral because I'm not getting the love and approval and appreciation that I'm looking for, and I'm feeling really insecure. Right? So that's where if I feel...

22:02
like I am deserving and valuable and able to be loved, then if my partner's bad day doesn't have to become my bad day, and that's why this is so important for relationships, right, because a lot of people bring so much insecurity that they then try to control their partner's perspective. And they don't do it intentionally, they're not trying to be controlling in their relationship, but it's like, let's just stick with the same example. If my partner's upset about the trash, I might try to...

22:31
control their perspective. No, no, let me tell you why you shouldn't feel that way. Let me tell you why you shouldn't see it that way. And then I become very dismissive and minimizing of their experience because I wanna preserve them seeing me in a positive light.

22:51
But it's a very, I guess I could say selfish thing for me to do that or self-preserving because I'm not giving them the energy. I'm not taking the time to validate their experience and be compassionate of what they're talking about and what they're going through and what they're feeling, which is about them. It's not about me. So that's where some people...

23:21
In some relationships, that's a big deal. And people try to manage each other's perspectives. And it's because they feel insecure. And they have a hard time valuing themselves and esteeming themselves as an individual. Because I think the healthiest relationships are where we can recognize our own shame and learn how to love ourselves and learn how to value ourselves. And we bring that energy to...

23:48
the relational conversation so that I can stay behind my healthy boundaries and communicate from a place of respect. The more I go into the shame, the more I'm coming from a place of fear, the more it's going to feel sideways, it's going to feel blaming, it's going to feel like a right and wrong conversation. One of the things that therapy can be really helpful with is understanding what are the experiences you had as a child that made you...

24:17
have a hard time valuing yourself. The other thing that we can look at is the nature of a child. The nature of a child is very valuable and precious. The nature of a child is very vulnerable. The nature of a child is very dependent. So there are these aspects of a child that we can look at and say, in what ways were these not happening in your family growing up? When we talk about the physical abuse,

24:46
Obviously the vulnerability of a child is a big part of what's being violated in that and the value of the child So that child is gonna have a hard time valuing themselves when they grow up and they're gonna have a hard time being vulnerable with other people They're gonna have a hard time setting healthy boundaries for themselves, you know If we if we look at a situation where there's a lot of emotional neglect, you know, let's say there's a family Where you know the needs of the child to eat?

25:13
and to be clothed and to have a place to live. Those are all being taken care of. Everything looks fine on the outside, but nobody ever talks about emotions. Let's say the child at a very young age gets bullied in school and they come home and they try to tell their parents that they feel sad and their parents just sort of brush it aside and they don't know how to talk about emotions. And they're like, oh no, no, you'll be fine. It's fine, don't worry about it. What they're doing is they're giving a child the message that...

25:42
their experience isn't worthy of coming into the conversation. If you have your own human experience that feels bad to you, then you should just keep it to yourself. Right? And so this develops a different type of shame within children, which is that my feelings, my emotions, my perspective isn't valuable enough for me to bring up into the conversation in my family or with anybody else.

26:09
I've talked about emotionally avoidant adults, and this is one of the ways in which you meet people in the world who aren't even in touch with their emotions anymore. They've been taught from such a young age that their emotions aren't important, and that's like denying a whole aspect of who they are as a human being. Those people will have a very hard time, that goes into dependency.

26:37
Those people have a very hard time communicating what they want and need in a relationship. And their partner, it often drives their partners crazy because they'll be trying to figure out what, why are they so unhappy? And the person who experienced that has a very hard time, even knowing why they're unhappy and they don't have the ability to connect with their own emotions. They don't have the ability to communicate about their emotions. That's just one more example there. You know, we could go through,

27:06
50 different examples of different family dynamics and how that shows up for the person as an adult, how it shows up in their relationships. But to me, at the core of all that, you know, and if you're a therapist who's working with people, one of the ways I ground myself is trying to figure out where is this valuing the self or others coming into play? Where is the shame coming into play?

27:34
And oftentimes that will sort of help me, like a compass, sort of direct me in the right direction of where we need to go with the work. And oftentimes in couples therapy, there's this experience where both people are really overwhelmed and frustrated. And it's like, gosh, we got to start with one or the other. We can't do both at the same time. Sometimes that's just the reality. Oftentimes if I'm

28:00
experiencing that as the therapist, what I want to do is find out where the person who's having a hard time having a voice, that's the person I want to start with. Again, not feeling insecure about having a voice is another example of me not being able to value myself enough to feel like I'm deserving to have a voice in the world. It's just something to look for when you're working with people.

28:30
Where are they having a hard time valuing themselves? Where does the shame exist for each of them? And hopefully, you have enough time in the course of your work. This could take six weeks, eight weeks, 12 weeks, where you're working with people, but hopefully you have enough time over time to go into both people's experiences and to talk about their family of origin. It's not about blaming the parents or criticizing the parents. It's simply about moving into compassion for that little child.

29:00
who was experiencing that, right? Because then we're teaching people how to be comfortable with those emotions. You know, when they think about, like, for example, with the physical abuse, when an adult really slows down and thinks about that little child going through the physical abuse, there will often be a very strong emotional reaction, you can imagine. And that's a really important part of the healing process.

29:30
for them to, and I would say that it's an act of love and compassion for themselves. They're finally giving themselves permission to feel the sadness and the hurt of what happened to that little child. The little child needed the love and compassion to feel the hurt at the time. But as children, we dissociate and

29:57
we don't allow ourselves, if we don't have a healthy adult in the situation, we never actually take the time to sit with the discomfort, sit with the hurt and the pain of the feelings and the fear and allow our body to sort of process it and go through it. And so as adults, when you're working with people in therapy and you're talking about their childhood and that they're having that emotion, you know, I really slow down with that and really give them permission.

30:24
to feel whatever it is that's coming up and really emphasize this is the healing process. You know, and a lot of times it'll feel really uncomfortable, and that's okay. That's part of the healing process to think about what happened, to sit with that experience and even imagine giving that little child the love and compassion that they needed at the time that they didn't get. That's sort of a really brief overview of how to...

30:53
start working with the shame, and you're creating a sense of you valuing that person, but most important that they learn to value themselves through that process, and that the partners can see that vulnerability. That has really opened up a lot of possibilities in my work with couples, that they can really communicate in a different way.

31:19
and be more sensitive with each other and be more compassionate and vulnerable with each other. But it's scary. It's really scary. A lot of times people are waiting for the other person to be vulnerable before they're going to and they're at a stalemate because both people are you know trying to protect themselves and not feeling safe to move into that which is understandable. I hope this was helpful for you. You can definitely let me know if you have any questions. I mean you

31:48
If you haven't joined the Facebook group, the Couples Therapist Couch Facebook group, we can always continue the conversation there. And I'm really grateful for all of you. You can go to The Couples Therapist Couch website. There's some resources there and you can find all the episodes. I hope all of you have a great rest of the week. I'm Shane Birkel. I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist. And this is The Couples Therapist Couch. Thanks, everybody!