“Shame is a soul eating emotion.”  – C.G. Jung

 “But indeed this dance between hiding and feeling shame itself becomes a tightening of the noose.  We feel shame, and then feel shame for feeling shame. It begets itself.” – Dr. Curt Thompson in The Soul Of Shame

Good Morning, friend!

Are you still with me?  I know that Shame is not the most popular topic in the world and can obviously be a real downer, but if you’ll just stick with me for the rest of January, I promise you there is amazing hope at the end!

The past couple of days we’ve heard Shame’s story of where he came from.  Way back at the beginning of time, on the tails of the first sin ever committed.

Could you relate to the story he shared from Genesis 3?

Eve, the female representative for the human race, was the first woman to experience Shame.

One bite of the off-limits fruit and she experienced more than the bitter aftertaste of Sin’s consequence.

She received her first dose of Shame.

– He sent her into hiding and isolation.  From God.  From her husband.

– He led her to making excuses.  She was hiding “because she was naked”.

– At Shame’s suggestion, she blamed others.  “The Devil made me do it.”

(This all goes for Adam as well.)

There was a day when I couldn’t understand Eve’s choice that has affected all of us for all time.

But, after moral failure in my own life, I realized I would have done the exact same thing.

In fact I did.

And the Shame that followed created the exact same pattern for me that it did for Eve.

– I went into hiding.

Now, obviously I didn’t go out and gather fig leaves to put in strategic places on my body and run toward the nearest bush.  But I had my own version of leaves and foliage.

I kept myself at an emotional distance from others.  I avoided deep conversations and thought provoking questions. From the outside, you might not recognize it as isolation, but my soul was slowly dying from the withdrawal of intimate relationships with other women and even family members.

Hiding from God wasn’t extremely obvious either.  I was still reading my bible, praying, even blogging about spiritual things.  But I would limit my exposure to scripture to the passages that didn’t create that familiar twinge on my conscience (the Holy Spirit’s prompting/Guilt’s plea to come back to my senses).

– I made excuses.

Eve’s excuse is that she was hiding because she was naked.  But she was hiding because was ashamed of her sin.

My excuses were many.  I was lonely.  I was living in a literal desert that left my heart thirsty as well.  I would say that I was hiding because the people around me were not “my tribe” and I was homesick for the Northwest.  But the truth was, I was holding myself back in isolation because I felt ashamed of my actions and no one (including God?) would understand.

I even found myself rationalizing my behavior because my circumstances were “different”.  Excuses, excuses. Ridiculous excuses.

– I blamed others.

I’d like to say that I was like Eve in that I only blamed Satan for my poor choice.  But I blamed others, too.  My husband. My environment. My needs. My circumstances. Those around me.

Surely I wouldn’t have made the choice I did without having something/someone else to blame!

Shame told me that if I could point the finger at others then it would somehow take the pressure off of me.

Lies.  All of it.

What I learned, and I pray that I can pass on to others, is that all of this only leads to destruction.  Of our peace. Our joy.  Our well-being.  Our very souls.

Shame only leads us to behaviors that will ignore the obvious problem.  Our sin.

*Question: Is there an area of your life that Shame leads you to hide?  To make excuses?  To blame others? 

Why does Shame do this?  What is his goal?

We’ll look at that tomorrow and find out more about this Enemy we want to send running!

Until then,

xoxoxo

j