You're listening to unhooked on today's podcast episode, what you don't know about shame and why this might be the missing piece in your porn addiction, recovery journey. On today's episode, I'll share why many people in the recovery world are missing out on a crucial element in the conversation around shame. And how this understanding can help you move forward in your journey. So stay tuned.
So welcome ladies and gentlemen, to another episode of unhooked.
I am your host, Jeremy Lipkowitz. I'm still here in Cape town, South Africa. I just got back from a week of rock climbing with some friends in the Cedarburg wilderness area. And boy was it incredible? It was so nice to get away from the hustle and bustle of city life, the hustle and bustle of. Getting things done and entrepreneurship and, you know, making things happen and just getting away from it all and spending some time in nature, doing a bit of outdoor rock climbing. Some hiking, visiting waterfalls. Reading in the morning and just watching the stars.
It was really rejuvenating time for me. And now I'm back in Cape town for a few days before I actually head into a 10 day silent meditation retreat. So next week I will be on retreat, but I will be recording an episode this week to be released next week. And I'll be talking a bit more next week about why I go on these retreats and why you might want to as well. So if meditation and retreats are things that interest you make sure to follow and subscribe to this podcast, if you aren't already and tune in next week for a special retreat edition episode. Now onto the topic for today, and that is shame and shame is a topic. That comes up in many different conversations around addiction, around recovery. And for good reason. You know, shame is something that exacerbates addiction.
It's something that we need to learn. How to let go of. Because it's one of the main drivers of addiction. Shame. If it's the toxic form of shame, it can make us feel down on ourselves. It can make us feel like we want to act out. To run away from the feeling. Uh, it can also cause us to isolate. It can make us feel. Inherently broken and hopeless. Like, there's no point in trying to change. And on top of all that sexual shame in particular is for some reason, a very strong. Type of shame.
There's something about shame with our sexuality. That is slightly different from all the other forms of shame. You know, we're taught at a very young age that sex and sexuality is shameful that we should hide it. That it's dirty. That it's gross. And so obviously if we have a. Uh, shameful or negative feeling towards our sexuality.
If we feel like it's something wrong or something we need to hide. It's going to be very hard to have a healthy. Thriving and beautiful sex life. Hard to have a thriving intimacy with our partners. So for all these reasons, we do really need to learn how to let go of shame and particularly sexual shame. But, and here's the, but. Today.
I want to talk about the other side of shame. The wholesome side of shame and why we can't throw out shame all together. And this is a topic that was brought to my attention in my studies of Buddhist philosophy. And so, you know, for many of you who listened to this podcast, you know, that. Buddhism and Buddhist philosophy had a big impact on my recovery in my life. And most of Buddhism. If we kind of boil it down to what is Buddhist philosophy all about?
It's really looking at. What are the factors of the mind that lead to happiness, to wellbeing, to integrity. Self-mastery. It looks at kind of the dynamics of the mind and different qualities of mind or mental qualities. That we should cultivate. So we cultivate the good ones. And what are the mental qualities that we should let go of?
You know, what should we stop practicing? Because those lead to suffering to greed, to anger. So a lot of Buddhism is just looking at these mental qualities and which ones are wholesome and which ones are unwholesome. Another word you could use as which ones are skillful and which ones are unskillful, you know, for some people wholesome and unwholesome has a bit too much of a moralistic superiority. But skillful and unskillful, I find to be very useful. Now what's very fascinating.
Is that in Buddhist philosophy? All of the unwholesome mental qualities, all the unskillful, mental qualities. Are unpleasant, meaning that when we're feeling them. It is an unpleasant experience. So anger, hatred, greed, craving impatience judgment. These unskillful mental qualities or unpleasant feelings. And all of the pleasure or all of the skillful or wholesome mental qualities are pleasant.
And so things like love, compassion, patience, equanimity. All of these things that are wholesome and skillful, they actually feel good in the moment. But there are two exceptions. There are two mental qualities. That are skillful or wholesome. And yet they are unpleasant. So these two random exceptions and these two exceptions. They're called the two guardians of the world.
And I just love this way that we phrase it. The two guardians of the world. And in Pali or Sanskrit, they're known as Henry and or tapa. So those are the Sanskrit words here. He endo tapa. And what they, what the translation is, is that their moral dread and moral shame. So moral dread is the feeling of. That dread that if I do something immoral, You know, why is people will look at me and think I've done something wrong.
It's that dread of? If I do this bad thing, I will feel that guilt. If I do this bad thing, people will look down on me. That's moral dread. Moral shame is the feeling of shame you experienced when you've done something unskillful or a moral when you've acted out of integrity. And, you know, you've done something wrong.
There's that shame that you feel that feeling of that unpleasantness, the unsettleness. And these two qualities, moral dread, and moral shame. Again are wholesome qualities. They are good. Skillful qualities that lead us towards happiness. And what's interesting again, is these are called the two guardians of the world.
They protect us from doing. Bad things. And so I really want to emphasize, you know, these, these too, because a lot of time in the recovery world, we give shame a bad name. We say, let go of shame. Let go of shame. Shame is bad. But we have to remember and recognize that. Shame is actually the signal. It's the thing that we can tune into. That shows us when we're out of integrity. And so what I want to talk about today, Is how do you know the difference between what we might call healthy shame versus unhealthy shame? So the healthy shame we can call it moral shame or healthy shame. The unhealthy shame I find a very useful term is toxic shame. So. The overarching kind of way to know the difference. At least one way of looking at it is that healthy shame is really about steering you in the right direction. And it's trying to lift you up, trying to guide you towards better actions. Unhealthy shame or toxic shame is more about beating you up and pushing you down.
So the feeling behind toxic shame is I am a bad person. The feeling behind healthy shame is. I have done a bad thing. But I'm not a bad person and I know I can do better. So, what I want to go through today is a few other ways that you can tell the difference, because it's very useful, you know, when you feel that moment of shame. Let's say you've acted out with pornography.
You've acted out with, um, some sexual misconduct, maybe doing something towards someone else that wasn't skillful or that was unethical. Um, betraying someone's confidence, all the different things we might do related to porn, or just things in general that we might be ashamed of. How do you know the difference and how can you transform it into healthy shame? So first, what do they share in common? What they share in common, both the healthy shame and unhealthy shame is that they will both feel unpleasant. You will feel unsettled, whether it's healthy shame or unhealthy shame. But when we look at what healthy shame is, There's a lot of humility and taking ownership of what happens.
It's, you know, there's this kind of acceptance of yes. I did do this thing that was unskillful. I did do this thing that was wrong. And there's an acceptance of that. You're not running away from it. You're not trying to hide from it. There's also a desire to take positive action. You know, when you feel. Healthy shame. There's this feeling there that, Hey, I want to do better. I know I did something wrong.
I want to do better. There can even be some gratitude for the shame. So this is something I've worked on with a client recently who was feeling some shame. And one of the things you can do is really be grateful and say, I'm so happy that I'm feeling this because it's protecting me from causing harm. It's protecting me from harming others and harming myself.
And I'm grateful. For this unpleasant feeling for this heaviness. The last thing that I'll say, you know, there about how to know if it's healthy, shame. Is that there's still this fundamental recognition that you're a good person at your core. You're not a bad person. You're not, you know, fundamentally broken or flawed.
It's not hopeless. So that recognition that, Hey, you're okay. You know, this doesn't mean you're a bad person. Looking at toxic shame. How do you know if it's toxic shame? Well first, you might notice that there is a desire to act out or run away. So their desire to numb out, to escape the feeling to kind of get rid of the feeling of shame. There might be some denial or arrogance, like. I didn't do anything wrong.
This isn't, this isn't fair. That kind of denial and arrogance can also be there with unhealthy shame. There's also a chance that you will be feeling some hopelessness. You know, again, this relates to that fundamentally feeling broken inside or feeling like a bad person. If you're feeling hopeless. It's always going to be this way.
I'm never going to get it right. Again, that might be a sign that there's some toxic shame going on there. So this can be helpful once you notice, is this healthy shame or is this unhealthy shame? You can start to cultivate the healthy form of shame again, recognizing it's a beautiful thing. It's a protector. And if you notice that it's unhealthy shame. See, if you can tap into some of these characteristics, you know, really just remember, Hey, this thing is trying to help me. And remind yourself, you're not a bad person.
The main point, the main takeaway from all of this is that yes, we have to let go of toxic shame. Because toxic shame exacerbates our addiction. It makes us isolate. Uh, runaway and act out. And at the same time. We need to celebrate. And make space for the healthy shame. The kind of shame that is related to remorse or maybe guilt. Where we can correct our past mistakes.
We can learn from our past mistakes. And stay on a path of integrity. So when you feel shame for doing something you know is wrong, you can either let it beat you up. Or you can turn it into fuel for becoming a better version of yourself.
Another, just kind of little note on this is that when their shame, again, it's easy to fall into this pit of thinking like you're a bad person. And you've done something wrong. You said something mean or harmful you acted out unskillfully again, it's easy to think. I'm a bad person. But in fact, feeling bad about doing something wrong, that feeling of being unsettled or unpleasant. Is in fact, the very sign that you are a good person. Because if you were a bad person, you wouldn't feel bad for doing the wrong thing. And the fact that you feel bad, the fact that you feel that unsettled. Feeling. Is a sign that at your core, you are a good person. So just remember you are not broken.
You are not a bad person. And the heaviness, the unpleasantness from shame is a guardian. It's like a guardian angel or a guardian spirit pointing you in the right direction. One of the things I've worked with with my client recently was just having him envision every time he feels that sense of shame. To envision this guardian angel over his shoulder. Saying, Hey, you know, I've got you, I'm pointing the right direction. I'm doing this because I know you can do better.
And I know that you are a good person.
So that's it, that's the missing element of shame, and I hope that it really resonates with you so that the next time you feel it, you don't let it beat you up. Next week again, I will be on retreat, but I will be recording an episode. And releasing it virtually while I'm in my meditation retreat. So that you'll still get my weekly episodes coming out on Monday. If you want to support this show as always the best way to do that is to leave a review, hit the follow button and consider sharing an episode with a friend. It really does go a long way and I am so grateful for your support. So that is it for today?
Much love from Cape town. I will see you guys in the next episode.