Dealing with shame...

pain

I suffer from social anxiety and some depression.

I recently came into a realization that I carry a lot of shame in myself. I'm ashamed of all my flaws. My mind is a perfectionist. According to my mind, I will never be "good enough."

I feel that my social anxiety comes from the fact that people can see through me and see all my flaws that I'm ashamed of. I know it's easy to say "just accept yourself the way you are." But, I just can't.

I care so much about what people think. I care so much about being careful to put up this image of perfection. Do Buddhists have a way of dealing with one's shame and flaws?

ShiftPlusOne

For me, personally it came like this.

I cared a lot, like you do. Then when I was with my friends, I didn't care at all. Then I heard a quote "Those who matter, don't mind. Those who mind, don't matter" and it kind of opened my eyes. I don't really have to care about what random people think, because my friends don't judge me.

Many people think they have their own flaws, lots of people are too busy judging themselves (like you are) to judge others. On the other hand, some people judge others to escape judging themselves. I am sure you know that nobody is 'perfect', so the attribute of 'perfect' cannot be applied to any human without correct context.

Personally, I am not ashamed of my flaws or of who I am... I used to be. I don't know why it stopped. I think getting a gf I love a lot had a lot to do with it.

You can't be so vague. What are you imperfect for? What is it you want to achieve?

Every case is different.

username_5

See yourself as you are. I have a practice that I do from time to time. It's not 'officially' buddhist, but I do it because it removes the power of the negative self talk while not resulting in my thinking more highly of myself than I ought.

Typically I do this around bedtime when day is over. What I do is I bring my memory to getting out of bed that morning and I then scan through every part of my day that I can recall. I identify every action, word and thought that I am not proud of. I am alert for any self condemnation that my mind may do while I am recalling these actions, words and thoughts that I am not proud of. If it occurs I just let it pass and then move on.

Once I believe I have been reasonably thorough in identifying everything I am not proud of for that day I once again recall getting out of bed in the morning and now I rescan my day for every action, word and thought that I *am* proud of. Even if I wanted to do a good action, but failed to, I acknowledge that the good thought was present. Here I am alert to any praising my mind might do and just let it pass.

Once done I go to sleep.

It has been my experience that this isn't a process that requires any thinking about the events of the day nor does it call for any self praise or blame. It is enough for me to inform my mind that I am a mix of noble and ignoble, moral and immoral, good and bad. Just like everyone else on the planet. I inform my mind simply by 'bringing to mind' the good and the bad from the day without praise or blame.

It has been my experience that this shuts my mind up with it's silly negative self talk.

TheJourney

If you desire to follow the right path that leads to enlightenment, you must not fear anything. It's easy to say in theory that you don't fear death, but do you fear your peers? The world is largely illusory anyways, and if you knew that things were an illusion why would you fear it?

SherabDorje

In Buddhism shame is particularly useless, except for certain very specific strategies. In many Mahayana and Vajrayana practices it is useful to feel "regret" briefly as a preliminary, but I suspect that this is with the intention of feeling regret, resolving not to do that particular thing again, and then to let go of it. HHDL often says "If there is something you can do about it, do it and then let go of it, and if there's nothing you can do about it, why worry excessively? (loose quotation)"

Some here suggest that I am too quick to recommend professional help, but please don't rule it out. Shame is a nasty nasty emotion and I have no idea why humankind evolved with shame as a component of neurologically based function. Once something is regretted, enough already. To feel excessive shame is to be cruel with yourself. One should practice self-compassion too. Regret, yes. Shame, no.

You can tell this one woke me up. This is the longest reply I've done all day. Please do whatever it takes to rid yourself of this.

Be well.

Cristina

Ah..I know this well. Let me tell you a personal story.

Two months ago I started my first full time job ever, right out of college! 8 hours a day is a lot to be somewhere...for me anyway. One of my biggest issues with it, honestly, was the public restrooms. My stomach gets upset sometimes and I need to poop! So here's what would happen...

My stomach would start to hurt.
"Oh no, oh no, stop it, not now, not now!!"
It would hurt more.
"Stop, stop!! I don't want to go to the bathroom here!"
More pain. I'd be forced to get up and go to the restroom. I'd sit on the toilet, wishing and wishing that nobody would come into the restroom. I got so ashamed of myself. The shame washed over me in waves and increased the pain. I couldn't believe I was out in a public restroom pooping, maybe having diarrhea. And if somebody came in, forget about it! I'd sit there and try to make time go faster, hope they didn't see my shoes and know it was me, wait for them to leave or suck it up and just get up and leave myself, even though my stomach still hurt, maybe try to find a different restroom where people went less frequently.

Do you get the idea?

One of these times, as the shame washed over me in waves, I got an insight. It was this. "When I judge others, I judge myself." I thought of all the times I'd looked down upon people pooping in publish restrooms, thinking "what's their problem, can't they just wait 'til they get home?" Or even at home when I was little, always getting righteous about my family stinking up the bathroom. And here I was, sitting on a public toilet, wanting to completely disappear, enveloped in shame, all because I had to poop.

The way we judge others is the way we judge ourselves. Think about that.

Second thing. You say you have a hard time accepting yourself. I used to do the same thing. "Come on, just accept yourself! Why can't I just love myself!" I used to think it was so important. I still do, in a way...but here's the real solution: know yourself. If you know yourself, then you know that you are loved, and you are accepted, and there is no other option. The universe loves and accepts you, even when you don't.

Anyway, best wishes. I hope anything I've said may be of help.

Cristina

p.s. I don't get so ashamed of pooping anymore.

robot

I have no hesitation to suggest professional help. Anxiety and depression can be a lot worse than you realise it is until its gone. It controlled so much of my behavior. Those problems went a long way toward ruining my relationship with my wife. Strangely, if my relationship hadn't broken down I probably would never have sought help. I'm really not sure what it was about psychotherapy that made the difference for me but the first thing I noticed was that a life long habit of biting my nails stopped. Over a period of months after I left therapy I began to notice that I felt more like an adult. I was in my 40's at the time. Then I knew that I had been feeling like a boy among men up to that point. From then on I became more comfortable with groups of people and I could hold my own among other men. I still feel anxiety in some situations and prefer to be alone or in small groups but I can usually sit tight and see what happens when it come up without some weird reaction. I attribute some of the changes in my behavior to age and experience, but I am grateful to the psychiatrist and the group (90% women) for the help that I got from them. Also my interest in Buddhism increased as my personal problems decreased for what its worth.-P

Theswingisyellow

Focusing on one's negative emotions only serves to drive that emotion, be it depression or shame. Now if one has done something one regrets, it does serve a purpose to acknowlege it, vow to not act in such an unskillful way and let it be. You say you are a perfectionist, this view will always lead to failure. You set up a concept that you try to align yourself with but invariably fail, because you are a person like all of us. No one can live up to perfection. What is perfection? Some concept or idea that has really no basis in reality. You live in dharmakaya my friend, you possess Buddhanature, what you are is already perfect as it is. Don't hate aspects of yourself, they are you. If there are things you need to change, then work on those areas, but by all means have love and compassion for yourself. Meditate, be mindful, practice Bodhicitta and finally see the Buddha I am writing to.
All my best to you,
Todd

fivebells

pain wrote: »

I feel that my social anxiety comes from the fact that people can see through me and see all my flaws that I'm ashamed of. I know it's easy to say "just accept yourself the way you are." But, I just can't.

Try equanimity practice.