Shame –noun; the painful feeling arising from the consciousness of something dishonorable, improper, ridiculous, etc., done by oneself or another
Shame –verb; to cause to feel shame; make ashamed
How many times have I sat on my couch, staring out into the world through my windows and wished I were out there instead? How many times have I been in bed, at the end of a day, staring up at the ceiling and wishing I had done the day better? How about something so simple as cursing myself for stubbing my toe, for burning myself on the stove, or for not saying something better. These nuggets of shame, for that’s what they are, come in all shapes and sizes and take on all sorts of forms. What they presume to do is to motivate; to do things better. And I say presume because it is a belief, a supposition of mine that shaming myself will motivate me to be better, to do better, whatever better may entail and whatever those things may be. This idea stems from my not being good enough already, but more on that later.
To “beat oneself up” is a common enough saying. It is common because many people, I would venture to say most, if not all, beat themselves up; mentally, emotionally and perhaps even physically. I’m speaking mentally and emotionally here. I personally use those nuggets of shame to remind myself that I could have done better if…, I should have been better if… and, so that I can finish that adage, I would have done better if… I literally hit myself with the consciousness of being dishonorable, improper, ridiculous, etc. in an attempt to motivate myself.
Perhaps it’s easier to use visualization to put this behavior into perspective. I am trying to write this piece; most of the sentences above have been through three edits (or more) and I can’t seem to get them to convey what I want to say. I look back on them, thinking that’s not the correct word, this is not proper grammar. Then I tell myself; I can’t get the feeling right, I don’t have the words I need to use. Next I tell myself I’m incompetent, I shouldn’t even try to write, I don’t have what it takes, I’m not good enough. I should just give up. Notice how the thoughts cumulate around the central idea and snowball into the inevitable end. To just give up. Why bother.
I mentioned above that the idea that I should do better or be better stems from my not being good enough already. In the example above I already started with the feeling that whatever I was going to write wasn’t going to be good enough, no matter what happened.