Learning to Carry Our Shame and What’s At Stake If We Don’t

This is an automated transcript and may contain minor errors.

Hello, everyone. I am Michael Sloyer, and welcome to Upbuilding the Self. And I am here with Rasanath today. Hey, Michael. Hey, Rasanath. So you and I have been in relationship with one another for many years, and we've been in relationship in many different ways over the years.

You serve as my coach, we've coached other people together, we've done workshops together, we work on various upbuild projects and create content together. And in each of those settings, I often hear you share one very profound, what feels like a truth for me. Which is that in order for us to be able to move towards our best self and really reach our potential, one of the things that we all have to work on is to be able to really carry and walk through our shame.

And so I'm really excited to be able to share that with our audience today and to unpack it with you so I can understand it for myself even further, because there's a lot of nuance and subtlety here.

So let us start very foundationally with what is shame and why does it exist?

Rasanath: Thank you, Michael. I mean, first of all, I would. I'd like to say that this is an emotion that has become very familiar in the last 10 15 years. And then, in the recognition that my time, even before that, was significantly affected by this emotion and run by this emotion, shame.

has been personally very eye opening for me. And over the years, I actually only understand that I don't fully understand this emotion as well, that there is so much that I carry. I was just sharing with you how it just lives beneath the skin for me. And in that sense of the term, it's very easily accessible.

If I pay attention to what's happening around me and also the depth of it, it runs so deep and it's rooted in an extreme and sometimes even an unexplained feeling of worthlessness. There is a lot to know about this. So to your point, I'm still in a very much in a discovery phase.

So, to your question about what is shame, shame is the experience of being seen when I don't want to be seen in a particular way. So, the words that come to give us the experience of what shame feels like is feeling exposed.

And what is feeling exposed all about is I want to be seen in a particular way and I'm seeing not that way, but seeing something much less than that, It's a deep seated feeling of, I use the term worthlessness. It can also be experienced as But not being worthy of love, not being worthy of a certain value, it can be experienced in many, multiple different ways.

Michael: And it's really my perception of how I'm being seen, because I actually don't know for sure how I'm being seen.

Rasanath: Yes, this is what makes it very complex. The reason why shame exists is like this, right? We talk about mirroring and the idea of mirroring a lot in coaching, but also in regular relationships. And the idea of a mirror is somebody who reflects back. My experience is that it is impossible to know myself, just like even in the physical world.

I need a mirror to see my face. I cannot see my face in any other way. So the deepest part of my identity, physical identity, which is my face, requires a mirror. So now, coming back to the idea of how I see myself, when the only way to see myself is through a mirror, And when I'm surrounded by people, so as mirrors and are seeing me in a particular way that I don't want to be seen as that that produces the emotion of shame.

So fundamentally, I want to be seen in a certain way.

Michael: I feel like I'm not being seen in a certain way. And that's painful.

Rasanath: And the flip side of that, I don't want to be seen in certain ways. And when I'm seen in those ways, then I feel like, well, if people around me are seeing that, then maybe that could be true. And that is who I am. And I feel. exposed. and then I also feel like I'm fundamentally flawed and I can change it.

Which is why shame is such an acutely painful emotion because the ultimate feeling, just think about you being fundamentally worthless. Fundamentally being unworthy of love. These are very, or almost the feeling around it is this helplessness that I can't change it because it's so fundamental.

This is fundamentally who I am. I'm fundamentally flawed.

Michael: When you said your face is the deepest part of your physical appearance, what you meant is that is the most characteristic part of your physical appearance and your identity, how you see yourself. This is the deepest part of my being.

Rasanath: That's right.

And when that is being reflected back, and I don't look as good as I want to look, then the emotion is one of shame.

Michael: Well, thank you for opening in that way and also sharing your personal relationship to your own shame. I know you said you're still discovering things, but you're discovering things from a very advanced place, so I'm sure that we're all going to be able to benefit from what you shared today.

Rasanath: I think, uh, When you say that, I'm immediately like, I want to be seen as advanced. And I think there are many parts of my life where I actually act on it and I don't feel very advanced and it's very primal, very, very primal. Sometimes it's acted out and, and then the discovery only happens post after you've acted on the emotion.

The shame is

Michael: a

Rasanath: very

Michael: primal

Rasanath: emotion. Yeah.

Michael: Yeah. And I was doing some research for. our conversation today and was checking out what Miriam Webster had to say about this topic. And the first part of the definition was a painful emotion. There is no such thing as a pain free feeling of shame. In the definition is painful.

Rasanath: Absolutely. Which is why it is such a complicated topic to talk about, because we don't know what to do with it. And it exists in every single one of us.

Michael: So when you talk about not knowing what to do with it, most people I assume, are not even aware that this is happening. So what are the coping mechanisms?

What are the ways that people deal with it, whether they're aware of it or not?

Rasanath: there are many external ways of coping with shame from a point of view of like strategies that we employ, but the most fundamental strategy, unknowingly is moving away from our heart. And what I mean by that is the place where shame is felt is the heart.

And it's such an overwhelming emotion that the easiest way is to numb myself to it. And then there are various numbing strategies. Sometimes I use the emotion of shame to fuel myself in the sense I'm going to prove. So I feel very ashamed of having lost a game. And so I'm going to use that shame to come back and be so much better at it.

So there is numbing, there is proving, but all of them, what they do fundamentally is they push us away from our hearts to go outwards or to shut down so that we don't feel the acuteness of the pain.

Michael: Yeah. And actually where I thought you were going was that The proving is the numbing.

I certainly experienced this in myself. The hard work the discipline and the perfectionism. These are all things that are socially acceptable and socially encouraged in many ways. But I can also see how they're a numbing mechanism because, I mean, I'll have a, an argument with my partner and we'll feel some shame, maybe consciously, more likely unconsciously or subconsciously, and I'll go to work.

I'll go and hide in the work. Thank you

Rasanath: for saying that because I've heard many people say this, and they say, well, I don't feel shame, but I feel a lot of anger. And when you prod a little bit, then you actually understand that the anger is a reaction to the deeper pain of shame. The anger is somebody is making me feel ashamed of myself, or I feel so ashamed that I'm not there.

And I feel angry at the fact that I'm not where I need to be. And so The anger then becomes a fuel. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to crush it. I'm going to prove to myself and prove to the rest of the world that I can do that. And that gives a high, it's pretty energizing. And especially when, you know, we see this in, in sports, typically where so many famous sports stars have actually said, well, when I was a child, I was told I couldn't do it.

And so I just took that upon myself and said, I'm going to prove the world wrong. And they get there, they do get there. But it's a shame somehow transforms itself into anger. And it becomes like, it sort of becomes the self righteous anger that then. becomes this prodding force in my life to prove.

Michael: Yeah, and I'm not really tapping into anger again, as you said, that's sort of the surface level, but I'm really tapping into the shame and it's a shame anger cycle here.

Rasanath: Yes, yes, but I wouldn't call it shame because it feels so fundamental. It feels so like shame is an emotion that I feel like I can do anything to change this. But anger is a little different. Anger suddenly gives me, empowers me in a weird way. It empowers me.

Michael: And also shame is so painful and it doesn't come with the energy as you're talking about.

Whereas anger in the beginning is not so painful. It's exciting. It's seductive.

Rasanath: Yes, it fires me up. It fires me up, right? And you think about the energy of anger, too. It's a fiery energy, and that fire acts as a drug, but it wears off with time.

And also, when you think about sustaining the energy of anger, working from that place of, like, real fieriness, it's very tiring. It's very exhausting. And in the process of using that fiery energy, it's possible that the fiery energy comes out on other people in a way that hurts them too.

Michael: And how about the other side of this, where rather than transforming into anger, it transforms into something like procrastination or withdrawal from the world?

What's going on there? So that

Rasanath: is the hopelessness side of it, right? Where I just sink into it. I just sink into the shame and give up. And the energy there is, again, I numb myself to the feeling of shame. I don't do anything about it. I just stop. And sometimes that's not really acceptance. That's just giving up on life.

That feels like quicksand, just like real sinking into the quicksand and not doing anything to get out.

Michael: So there's a listlessness that can develop.

And this is not even It's not like some people do it one way and some people do it the other way. This can often happen in the same human being, even in the course of a single day.

Rasanath: Correct. And you can actually go through those emotions, in the sense that one day you'll get very angry and get riled up and like, I'm going to do this, right?

And fire myself up. I make some progress, but I still don't get to where I think I need to be. And then I come home saying, I should just not be wasting this energy. I just need like, just to give up. I'm just not going to deal with it. Right. So we go through this fluctuation.

Michael: I had a client last week who I think was going through exactly what we're speaking about right now.

And his conclusion was, I just want to travel the world with my wife. That's what I want to do.

Rasanath: Which is why shame is such a complicated emotion, because you don't know. When you are dealing with it, especially when you're dealing with it unconsciously, whether you're giving up or whether you're trying too hard.

Because what you're trying to do in either case is you're trying to solve for the feeling of shame, but you don't know where the, where the truth lies here. And so you can just like go back and forth and feel dissatisfied in either place.

Michael: Okay, Rasanath, now this is profound here.

You're solving a problem, but you don't know that the problem exists. I'm unwilling to actually,

Rasanath: potentially unwilling to see the full depth of the problem. So what I'm solving for is a symptom, the feeling of pain. But I'm not necessarily looking at, well, why does it exist? Why is it happening? And what is the truth about what I'm experiencing right now?

And that means I have to, one, be aware of the feeling. Second, accept that I'm feeling this way. And it's a very uncomfortable feeling. We talked about shame being painful. And so what you're doing at that point in time is accepting and carrying the pain. And the third piece is then requiring, well, what is this actually really trying to tell me?

And to go through that process to have Exploring and seeking what is true about what I'm experiencing right now takes a lot of strength and patience and courage, which we are being so used to quick fixes and quote unquote efficiency that the most efficient way is to not actually look at it, but try to solve for it as quickly as possible.

But it doesn't really solve.

Michael: So be aware of the feeling, number one. Number two, accept that I'm feeling this way. And number three, ask this question. What is the pain trying to tell me exactly? Why is it so hard to talk about shame?

Rasanath: As I said earlier, shame is a very primal emotion in the process of talking about shame.

I actually let myself feel it even more. And I think. It's an overwhelming emotion. It's like it just washes over in such a big way. And when I talk about it, one is I am made to actually experience it and feel it a lot more. The second thing, it's not necessarily received. And so now I feel shame about carrying shame.

And when I'm sharing it and when others don't necessarily receive it, it's seen as weakness. It's an extremely vulnerable emotion. And so I don't want to engage with that kind of vulnerability, which is why it's safer not to talk about it.

Michael: I'm thinking about talking about anger versus shame. I mean, depending on the consequences of your anger, that can also be hard to talk about, but this is true among everyone.

But you know, especially among men, it's not something that we don't know where to put it for ourselves. And if other people came to us and talked about their shame, where do we put it?

Rasanath: And also there is a lot of shaming that happens in the world where it's actually so one experience, one form of experience of abuse is shaming.

And when unwittingly people have made us feel that way, especially people who are close to us, our parents, when we have been repeatedly told, one of my clients actually said this, We are having an extensive conversation about shame now and exploring shame as an emotion. And he said that one of the most distinct moments was coming, scoring 99 in a math math test.

And his dad looked at him and said, what happened? Why not hundred?

Michael: Was that a joke?

Rasanath: No, he smiled afterwards, but he didn't

Michael: say. That I took it so seriously. For a kid, it doesn't matter if it's a joke or not. It's so painful.

Rasanath: Shame is one of the most traumatic emotions.

we feel this from birth.

Michael: I heard Gabor Mate give a talk recently, and he talked about how with shame, when you're looking at a baby, and you have eye contact with the baby, And then you look away and the baby's looking for more eye contact and it doesn't get it, it's an experience of shame.

Rasanath: Yeah, it's so fundamental, right? Even sometimes you look at kids, right, on the train.

On the subway, if you say, oh, that kid is shy, right? Like, but when you're looking at someone in the eye and then someone actually takes away eye contact, what are they experiencing at that time? They're feeling, oh my God, I'm seen. And I don't want, I don't know what this person is seeing in me. And I don't want to be seen that way.

I just take off. I just move my eye. So what I'm saying essentially is if I don't see the person seeing me, I feel safe. You see how complicated this emotion is.

Michael: Unless I want to be seen and then I feel, I feel a lack of connection or I don't feel valuable.

Rasanath: That's the other side. So I want to be seen when I feel ready to be seen in a particular way.

I mean, I'm putting those conditions rarely come together exactly that way. When they don't come together that way, then The experience is acute shame, and it's trauma. It registers as trauma. And think about how many of those moments that are sitting in our system and fueling our existence.

Michael: So if you're listening to this and you're thinking, I don't have a lot of shame, think again.

Rasanath: But it's there. It's there. It takes some work. This is also why we all have memory losses because when something is very painful, and this happens even medically, right? Like when you lose consciousness, when there is extreme pain, why do people lose consciousness when they know they suffer a blow or something like that?

It's the brain is trying to deal with the trauma and the pain of it. It shuts down awareness because if there was awareness, it is just too much for the body to carry. Shame is a very similar emotion. it's too much for the system to carry. So over time, we tend to forget these experiences because at that moment, they're just too much to carry.

So it's a coping mechanism. And many times it's necessary for survival in this world because it's so acute. But when we are in survival mode, our entire life, that's what we do. We just trying to survive. These emotions lodge themselves in different places. especially in our subconscious and unconscious minds and fuel so much of our behavior and our decisions.

Michael: It's like 97 degrees where I am right now. So I'm not sure that I can actually get goosebumps because it's too hot for that. But when you said it shuts down, like it causes us to shut down. I got the metaphorical version of goosebumps because I just got a flash before my eyes of my own life about how that's actually happened for me and What it does to the other emotions And how when we shut down so that we don't have to feel the pain of shame, it also blunts our ability to experience other things like joy and freedom and love and the things that we're all really looking for.

Rasanath: That is also a big reason why even when I cope with my shame, with anger, with fueling myself. And then getting even to a place where I prove that how others see me is wrong or, you know, prove my sense of worth because the heart is blocked. The feeling of joy doesn't go deep. It lives on the surface. And then the next day I have to go back again on the treadmill.

It's very exhausting to live life from that place.

Michael: Yeah, you were saying before we started recording that I require an endless supply of shame in order to keep going if that's my fuel.

Rasanath: But it's bad fuel. It destroys the engine at one point. It's like if your entire life, the only food that you actually eat is caffeine, you can be high performing at some point, but then it has a very drastic toll.

on life.

Michael: So at Uplift we always talk about the ego and moving away from the ego to the self. How does the ego directly fit into this picture of shame? I

Rasanath: think what is important here is to understand that shame is an emotion that's trying to tell us something and my exploration of shame to the extent that I have been able to do it has told me that it's an emotion that is truly trying to help us become our authentic self.

Now, here is where the ego comes into play. The ego, at Upbuild, we define the ego as an identity that I think I should be, rather than who I am. An identity I think I should be, rather than who I am. So when I'm not seen for what I should be, what's the emotion that I experience? So the ego fundamentally is shame producing, which is why it's such a universal emotion and inescapable experience because the ego is the pseudo self.

It's not the real self. It is essentially telling, I should be this and simultaneously also telling, I should be this, but I'm not that. So

Michael: the game is rigged. There is no, I should be this without the, but I'm not that.

Rasanath: Yes. So the game is rigged right from the start. And so the ego lives on the fuel of shame for its existence, which is why when we do the inner critic work and really analyze our, inner critic messages.

The inner critic is the voice of the ego. And when we really decipher our inner critic messages, they are actually messages of shaming. So the existence of the ego is twofold. It's some sort of cover up for shame, but at the same time, the ego also is shaming us because it's, it's always saying, Hey, you're not living up to this.

I'm the person who will get you there. Come on, let's go, right? Really beating us down so that then we will get up and do something.

Michael: And as we talked about in the Inner Critic podcast. that we recorded maybe now a couple of years ago. It's not just beating us down the inner critic, but it's also leaving us breadcrumbs of hope of like, you did it okay last time, so you could probably do it better next time.

You're getting there. See, we have come closer to who we should be. So it's very insidious like this. The other thing I just wanted to share was you mentioned briefly about doing the inner critic work and what you were speaking about was how at our inner critic workshop. We do an exercise where we ask all of the participants to actually write out the messages that their inner critic is giving them.

And the idea is not to then use that against ourselves, but to really be able to understand what are the messages, and to be able to parse out, well, what is the truth within these messages, and then what is the distortion, what is actually not true.

Rasanath: Well, the experience that we have universally seen when we conduct that exercise is people write it, they're actually coming in touch with shame and how their critic has actually shamed them.

And then the outside world invariably feeds into the voice of the inner critic, sometimes knowingly, sometimes unknowingly. So it's pretty intense. The pressure chamber that we are actually living inside of, you know, when we talk about the ego and the true self being covered by the ego, it's a very intense pressure chamber of, uh, repeated experience of shame, you know, from the outside world, then coming through the voice of the inner critic.

Michael: And you just mentioned in that inner critic exercise, coming closer to the shame. And we open this conversation. by talking about this idea of really carrying our shame and needing to walk through our shame. What does that actually mean?

Rasanath: shame is a corrective emotion. There is something in it that is actually telling us that we have moved away from who we are.

And there are many reasons for it, but that is what it's actually trying to say. There is, you have moved away from who you are, and that can happen in two ways. One is, when I have been fundamentally given gifts and I'm not living up to it. There is an experience of shame where that shame is actually saying, hey, come on, so much has been given.

And then there's the other side of it where I have been given a lot of gifts, but I'm looking at somebody else's gifts and saying, I want to be that. I want to become that, because what I have been given is not really worth anything. So I want what somebody else has been given. And the shame there is actually trying to correct us to then fully own the gifts that we have been given.

So in either case, it's actually helping us move closer to the authentic self. That is most fundamental purpose.

And it's very important to make friendship with this emotion because that's the only way we learn how to work through it, how to discover what it's really trying to say. What that means is, and this goes back to what you've said, learning how to carry the shame. Because many times we don't, we act it out.

We act it out in many unhealthy ways.

And so when you think about carrying shame, the idea is that in learning how to carry it, is the first step in transformation, transforming what it's really trying to help us do, right, go in that direction. So carrying shame in a dignified fashion is a very important part of the transformation process.

The second step in the transformation is then understanding what is the truth it's trying to tell us, which is the idea of walking through the shame. And that takes some real parsing work. And I can also say from my own limited experience, that it requires somebody else in the room to help us walk through it.

Because the emotion of shame is so tied to mirroring, it's so tied to being seen, it's In order to really understand what it's trying to say, I need a mirror in my life. I need someone who can walk with me as I walk through it. Um, which is why we also do the work that we do at Upload both for each other, fundamentally for each other as a team, but also what we're trying to do for everybody else.

It is walking with people to get, get closer to what is the emotion really trying to say, the truth. And in the process of continuously unraveling that, you actually start to walk towards your true self, which is actually the fundamental purpose of the emotion itself. So, at that point, then we start to experience freedom from the emotion, because its purpose is being fulfilled.

Michael: I remember I had actually looked at my notes from about six or seven years ago and was recalling this recently in a session that you and I had where you were coaching me on a topic that was directly related to the shame that I was experiencing in my life at the time around not being enough. and a lot of judgments that I had towards other people, which were really just shame feelings that I had about myself that were then being projected and rejected in other people.

And you share this metaphor of how we're all carrying bags of shame around, and those bags will often collide with a lot of other people, unless we get really good at holding them in a way where the bags stop colliding with other people.

Rasanath: Yeah, it's a lot of responsibility.

Michael: And at the time you told me that the bag is too big to carry ourselves and we actually need support from other people to carry our bags.

Rasanath: It's true and that's what we're looking for very desperately and many times we don't find it. Because people are carrying their own bags that are heavy. So then when I need somebody else to carry mine, it's pretty hard. And this is part of the challenge where, when we think about community building, only people who have actually healed can then help.

And that doesn't mean you fully healed, but you have done enough healing work. To then be able to give that to others.

Michael: Turn to the next guy and say, let me carry some of that for you. That looks really heavy. Let me carry some of that for you.

Yes, and the reason why you're doing it is because somebody did that for you as an act of gratitude to somebody who actually, like, so this becomes a chain of expression of gratitude,Yeah, you often hear in a lot of circles, Oh, I'm a healer. I'm a healer. You know, that's a healer circles of doing different things. But that actually comes from a really beautiful place. And the image that you just shared of somebody who's Who's really done a lot of work on themselves and then has enough courage and capacity to be able to turn to the next person and say, come along or like, I got you here and I want to hear you.

I want to see you in a way that might feel exposing, but is coming from a place of love and support. So it doesn't feel like I'm being exposed instead. I'm being exposed. listen to and seen in a very authentic way. And that is healing. That is the healing journey.

Rasanath: That is the only way. And to go back to what we were talking about, walking through shame is the deepest experience of authenticity.

So when you see someone doing that, it's incredibly moving. That's why when you hear stories of suffering and pain and how you see people walking through them with courage. It's not that when the person tells the story, the person is like, Oh yes, this is what I did it. You see when the person is telling the story, it is very uncomfortable as you see their discomfort as they try to walk.

But you also see the silent spirit, but there is no other way. This is the only way. And I'm going to do it no matter what, although it is very, painful, you know, I stumble. It's not very pretty, but you know what? There is no other way of living. But when you experience that there is a way it touches your heart like nothing else, because there is humility attached to that authenticity.

It's complete. There is nothing to hide at that point.

Michael: In what way do you feel shame in your life right now? I

Rasanath: I was in the monastery, as some of you know, and I sometimes share in a joking way that I wanted to be the best monk that walked the earth.

And there were a lot of identities that were attached to what does it mean to be the best monk that walked the earth. And then four years down, recognizing that I couldn't do it. And I still carry the shame for it. But it's weird because I also recognized that the goal that I had set for myself was a very egoic, it came from an egoic place, but how intensely that goal was set.

And then recognizing that I, I was not able to live up to it is a shame that I still carry and I'm working to heal that part.

Michael: Is there a current version of that story that's playing out? So I can say, when

Rasanath: you say playing out, I look at myself every single day. I have these conversations that I'm having in my head with two people in my life. Who I felt in whose eyes I wanted to shine as being the best monk that walked the earth.

And I find myself having imaginary conversations every single day with them, imagining that, you know, when I see them, how will I justify to them that I was not able to do? And also in my mind, imagining that they must be thinking so lonely of me. And this is not conscious. It just flares up. It flares up when I look at their pictures.

It flares up when I, you know, read something in social media about them. The first place that I go to is how, what are they thinking about me? And they must be thinking so like, so quote unquote, lowly of me.

Unfortunately, I have received a lot of help and I continue to receive a lot of help in this particular topic. In fact, just a month ago, Ari was coaching me on this topic. And I have internalized these individuals so deeply that it's impossible for me to separate how they see me. I have seen myself through their eyes for such a long time in my life, and it has been incredibly helpful, valuable.

But there is also a lot of shame that accompanies it. Again, I'm sharing all of this very briefly. There is just so much.

Michael: I appreciate it so much, and thank you for sharing. And I also know you and how one of the ways that you grapple with and work through this stuff is by sharing it openly. And it's your own way of healing and also your way of supporting others in their healing.

Because sometimes people aren't ready to necessarily look at it themselves. But when they know that others have some version of the same story that they have, all the details might be very different. That can be a huge first step on that healing journey

Rasanath: I hope it can be helpful, in the last year sort of made a vow to myself that I am not going to react to this shame that I have to carry it.

And when I observe myself having these emotional conversations. And, you know, in my mind, I mean, today morning, it happened today morning, by the way, I found myself having this conversation in my mind. And then in the middle of the conversation, I recognized, wow, this is just wasted energy. And so learning to pull back from wasting valuable psychic energy in trying to prove something to someone, that is what I'm really working on now.

It's hard for me to stop myself, but when I find myself in that place, so the first thing that I have been able to do is to act it out externally. It's taken time to actually stop doing that. Then there's just this internal mechanism of like imagining these conversations and trying to have them mentally, even when they're not happening externally.

And now trying to stop myself from engaging and wasting my, my energy in that. So that's the work that I'm doing right now.

Michael: Beautiful. Thank you for sharing that and sharing that with everyone. I know that's raw and tender for you and live, clearly. It's true. So going back to the three steps you shared earlier, become aware of the feeling, accept that I'm feeling that way, and then asking this question, what is that pain trying to tell me?

How is it pushing me towards my real self and away from my ego?

Rasanath: Sometimes I don't even know what the real self is. But there is a way in which I can acknowledge that there is some truth in this and The more I go closer to the truth and act on the truth, the more it will start guiding me to my real self.

The second piece, which is, uh, when I said that the healing requires for someone to be walking with us on this journey, when somebody has done the work to heal and go towards their true self, they are able to reflect to us some semblance of what our true self may look like. Which is what we call role models.

So the idea of role modeling, at its deepest, is when someone has actually really reached their true self, and because of who they have become, when they reflect back to us, or back to the mirroring that we talked about, they actually then, through their eyes, we see some, we start to begin to see some version of our true self.

Michael: And the true self is authentic. So as soon as we start talking about our shame, which is real, and that's what we're experiencing, that is authentic, we immediately step into our authenticity. And you can just feel it. I mean, I just felt it a minute ago when you were speaking about your own stuff, about what you're going through.

There's an authenticity that's there, and it immediately shifts us up in consciousness. We talk about how the goal of all of our work at UpBuild is to raise consciousness, and as soon as we start talking about shame, we move into authenticity, and that immediately shifts up our consciousness.

Rasanath: We want to see a world without masks, right?

And of course, post COVID, that, that statement might mean, mean a lot of things, but the idea of the metaphorical masks that we wear, that covers our shame. What we do is we take off those masks and in taking off those masks is the experience of authenticity. There is one more thing that I wanted to explicitly state around.

the transformation. So I talked about how when you hold the shame, and when you walk through the shame, when you carry it, when you walk through it, shame transforms itself into humility. And the experience of humility, both from a receiving end and a giving end, is one that is so powerful.

When we experience somebody who is genuinely humble, it becomes addictive. We don't want to leave their presence of that person because it is the most authentic freeing experience that we can have. That's what humility is.

Michael: And just to make sure that I understand that, because I feel not enough, I think I should be something and I'm feeling not enough to that.

But when I see that there's actually a truth, that there's something much bigger than me and there are people much further along the path than me. And rather than that feeling so threatening and be all about me and my ego, I see that there's a truth there. And instead of feeling horrified by it, I'm actually alive and energized and so grateful that exists.

Rasanath: Right. And there is the honest acknowledgement. I'm going to be very direct here. There is an honest acknowledgement that I'm not God.

There is an acceptance and there is a humility attached to it.

Michael: Which is extremely freeing. So that feels like a very good place to end. It also feels like a cliffhanger because we've opened the doors on the G word.

We don't have time for more, but thank you for having this conversation today. It was very enlivening, and I was so happy to be able to hear from you, extract more and more wisdom, and just to be in your company, and to be able to work through my own shame in your presence is pretty incredible.

Rasanath: for creating this space,

I really deeply appreciate it.

Michael: And thank you everyone for listening.