You can often hear the expression “No shame, no conscience!” And even more often, people confuse the feeling of Guilt (I wrote about it earlier), the feeling of Shame, and also drag in Conscience. Let’s start right away with the latter, and give it a clear definition, straight from S.I. Ozhegov’s dictionary: “Conscience is a feeling moral responsibility for one’s behavior to other people and society.” Please note - a sense of moral responsibility. Otherwise - responsibility for compliance with moral standards. Not a word about the painful feeling of Guilt, Shame, or other painful and self-destructive feelings. What is Shame? Shame is a deeply internal experience of the discrepancy between oneself in the moment and the image of how one should be. This feeling is painful, painful, it can be formulated something like this: “I'm not who I should be. I'm not fine. As I am, I am not loved, unpleasant, wrong, I shouldn’t be like this.” A person experiencing shame feels a gap between reality and expectations. At the same time, the expectations themselves (the image of “ideal” behavior, “how it should be”) are often inspired from the outside. Significant people put pressure on us - for example, parents in childhood, or a teacher, boss; social groups - a group of friends, a cultural group, colleagues; partner - especially toxic individuals with a tendency to manipulate (abuse, gaslighting and all the buzzwords about codependent relationships fall into this category). Such a feeling ultimately limits a person’s free will. After all, in order to be loved, accepted, needed, he always has to limit himself. A chronic feeling of shame becomes a person’s companion, and sometimes, if it was formed very early, the foundation on which a personality is built. Now we see that the feeling of Shame arises as a result of the inadequacy of one’s “ “I” to certain external guidelines. Such a discrepancy can be either real or imaginary. At the same time, the person himself is little able to critically assess how real his “otherness” is. After all, it can simply be a consequence of suggestion. For example, a child could be told “You stupid thing!” Why (WHAT!!!!) you’re always climbing! We’ll figure it out without your advice!” And now, as an adult, every time a person will suffer from shame, having expressed his opinion - sometimes absolutely appropriate, or even saved the situation. Due to the fact that a person in a state of Shame is incapable of assessing the situation and himself in it, Shame is often (very often!) is a tool for manipulation. What is manipulation? Manipulation is a type of interaction, an activity that covertly, deceitfully and/or forcibly encourages another person to experience certain states, make decisions and perform actions necessary for the manipulator to achieve his own goals. Thus, instilling shame or other toxic feelings is simple a way to force a person to do what you want. And the person will do everything just to stop experiencing this difficult, destructive feeling. An important feature of permanent shame is that it cannot be transformed into something constructive: “I am ashamed that I am like this (and not the way I should be), and it’s a shame that I’m ashamed.” A person becomes ashamed to be, and as if, in order to get rid of shame, you need to become someone else, not yourself - to give up your personality. And giving up your formed personality is akin to experiencing death. Therefore, unlike the feeling of Guilt, Shame is a very clumsy feeling that is difficult to treat. It requires long and painstaking work with a specialist. But it happens that it is impossible to completely remove this toxic feeling - sometimes it almost becomes a load-bearing structure. And yet, at least reducing chronic shame, and learning to live consciously, to stop being a victim of manipulation and programming - it is possible. Thank you for reading to end:) Take care of yourself! Make an appointment on WhatsApp +79255346134 or Telegram @DenisHipnosisIntroductory consultation online - free.