Read on Twitter
So if you have ever been trapped in a shame/embarrassment spiral remembering Things That You Did, I have TIPS.
One thing to note is that, while everyone feels embarrassed or ashamed about things from time to time, having a debilitating experience of being trapped in intrusive thoughts about it is not universal and it doesn’t have to be your experience.
For me, a lot of that was anxiety/self-esteem issues. I’ve come a long way with that, and I basically don’t have shame spirals anymore!
One of the best things I have taught myself to do when I am reliving something awful and embarrassing is to depersonalize the situation. This helps to step back from the immediate feelings that you get while stuck in that shame spiral.
Basically, try to imagine that it is happening to someone ELSE (someone you respect ideally, NOT someone you dislike or have complicated feelings about). You are only observing or hearing about it after the fact.
Then try to gauge how you would feel about it if it happened to someone else. Like, if my friend told me that, as a kid, they fell down at a classmate’s birthday party at an ice rink and lost control of their bladder and wet themself (which definitely did happen to me)
I’m going to feel really bad FOR my friend that they had to go through that. I’m going to comfort them and say, “You were just a child and that’s okay; lots of children have accidents.” I’m definitely not going to think less of them.
And here’s the whole thing
I can apply that same compassion to MYSELF.
I can apply that same compassion to MYSELF.
Or if it’s something more recent. Like I said something in a meeting and realized I misspoke or said something ridiculous on accident.
If it happened to someone ELSE, I probably wouldn’t be thinking about it for more than ten seconds. I have way more other things on my mind.
If it happened to someone ELSE, I probably wouldn’t be thinking about it for more than ten seconds. I have way more other things on my mind.
And everyone around me is the same. They are thinking about way more things than whether I fucked something up in a meeting or a presentation. Depersonalization helps me get perspective on whether I should honestly be embarrassed or concerned about my flub.
This may not work brilliantly the FIRST time you try it. This is something you’ve probably been experiencing for a very long time, and your inner self is going to be naturally skeptical that you don’t have to ruminate endlessly over something.
Early on, I literally imagined a squeegee clearing images of something I am reliving from my mindscreen when they wouldn’t go away. It is important to stick with it.
But another thing that I realized in the not-too-distant past, because I DO have things in my past that I still feel legitimate shame about. Things that I wouldn’t wave away if a friend told me; things that wouldn’t be friendship ending but that I would have to admit were wrong.
What I realized is that it is actually a good thing that I was experiencing shame over a few (not most, but a few) things. I’m mainly a good person but I have done a few shit things 
And the fact that I FEEL BAD ABOUT IT is fucking NORMAL AND HEALTHY. Like, I can FEEL GOOD about myself for feeling bad about something that I shouldn’t have done!
Like wow, that was a shitty thing that I did, but the fact that I am sat here feeling bad about it means that I’m not a bad person intrinsically 
so I am just gonna sit with that and use it to become an even better person going forward.
so I am just gonna sit with that and use it to become an even better person going forward.
Generally building on your self-esteem can help, too. This (waves hand generally at thread) has gotten much easier since I became my own best friend*
*except for my actual best friend but we haven’t figured out a way to literally live in each other’s heads yet
*except for my actual best friend but we haven’t figured out a way to literally live in each other’s heads yet
I think really often, those of us who have especially been through trauma tend to be our own harshest critics. We never developed that self esteem resilience, so we tend to magnify every mistake as being so awful and shameful because we did it.
And many of us have our parents’ voices in our heads amplifying this message.
This is why I strongly suggest depersonalization—we will very often cut another person way more slack than we do for ourselves.
This is why I strongly suggest depersonalization—we will very often cut another person way more slack than we do for ourselves.
But we also deserve that same compassion. And we can change our internal scripts over time, with practice, to include it.
