Welcome And Career Bumps

0:53

Hi, and welcome to The Fulfilled Leader. Every career has a bump in the road. In over 25 years of coaching, every person I've worked with has had at least one challenging career moment. Being made redundant, not getting a role they thought they were destined for, making a big or a little mistake, stepping down to a more junior position, or needing to leave a job because of relationship clash. We can receive difficult feedback, or we can be put on a performance improvement plan. We all have these moments in our career, and they lead us to feeling not acceptable either to ourselves or we believe in the eyes of others. We worry about being judged. And these experiences hide away inside us, and we wish that we will never have to talk about them, and we wish that the feelings will go away. But sadly, they're generally just hiding. They're not disappearing, and they remain firmly in place. And psychologists and researchers describe this as shame. If you're a dog lover, here's a way of thinking about this even if you aren't a dog lover. Imagine a dog who's caught in the act of trying to do something that is naughty, that they shouldn't. It's normally food related. And you tell them no, and they show guilt. They come to you with their head down, tail between their legs, trying to win approval again. They try to make themselves small. But as a dog, their guilt lasts about a minute. As soon as you give them a cuddle, they go back to lying down. In humans, we feel the guilt, and then we internalize things and ruminate. We do make ourselves small like the dog, but in the rumination, we make it bad internally. We say, "I was told off. I must have done a bad thing," and then we take it a step further and we say, "It's because I'm bad." As humans, we seldom get the cuddle or the empathy we need at the time, and so it festers.

From Guilt To Shame Spirals

2:59

We remember, we ruminate, and it grows within us, and we also wish that we could hide it away I'm doing some prep at the moment for a series of podcasts about redundancy, and I realized as I was doing this how much shame plays a part in our experience. And so I thought I'd start here today because shame doesn't just show up in redundancy. It shows up in so many aspects of our work. I'm gonna share a little about shame, the impact it has on us, and of course, what we can do about it. How can we move towards the light, and how can we hold our head high? We all experience shame, and here's one example of how it shows up for me. I once said something really dumb on a presentation to a large group of people. The session was recorded, and so there was no ignoring it. What I said broke my own values of inclusion. It was insulting to the person I referred to, and it probably cost me more work with that company, and rightly. And to this day, I can't even believe I said it. Every time I think about that moment, I feel a little tension in my stomach, and I feel like I want to hide away. I go to feelings and thoughts of, "Why am I so stupid? Who am I to think? This means I'm no good at..." And so on. And using the methods I'm gonna share today, I've got much better at releasing these feelings. It's been 10 years, but a certain situation reminds me of it, and so it still shows up at times. And what I've learned to do is to notice it and release it, and I'm gonna talk about how we can do that today. Because we all have these feelings, and one common place it shows up in our careers is around a gap in our CV. And I'm going to use that as an example as I talk about shame today. Gaps in our CV can come up because of things that happened to us, so we were made redundant when we didn't choose it, or they can happen because we create things. We can intentionally take time off to be a carer, or we can travel. We all have some part of our CV that doesn't quite fit, and some of us will have a few parts. It may be a part of our CV where the job doesn't look like it fits on our career journey, or as I've said, it may be a gap. And in modern careers, gaps are really common. They don't matter in the same way as they would have 30 years ago. But our human system doesn't quite believe that, and so we can wish that we could hide it away, and with that can come some feelings of shame. Even a gap that was intentionally taken to take care of children, for example, can bring up some feelings of shame around stories like, "I shouldn't have stayed working," or maybe, "That shows I wasn't ambitious enough." And actually, not stopping work to be a carer can also bring up feelings of shame, of things and stories like, "Oh, I should have, I should have stayed home. I shouldn't have gone back to work." So shame is there, is present in our lives. And it really matters because it impacts how we talk about it When you think about your own career journey, have a look and see if there are moments in it where when you go to talk about them, you don't feel quite right. And maybe pause now and think about what it was. Maybe it's something that when you're in an interview or over dinner with a new colleague, you brush over. You don't want to have to explain it. And then think about what the feelings are that come up with it. Could be emotional, physical, and what are the thoughts that go through your mind? Shame can feel physiological, a tension in our stomach, or it can trigger sadness or shyness, and we can feel like we want to brush over it, ignore it, push it down.

Definitions That Change The Story

6:54

The definitions of shame are really helpful in helping us to think about how we can handle it and move beyond it. Brene Brown was the person who brought shame into our dialogue through her TED Talk in 2010, and I'll put a link in the show notes to this. She describes shame as the fear of disconnection. Is there something about me that if other people know it or see it, I won't be worthy of connection? She describes it as universal and that we don't want to talk about it, and strangely, that the less we talk about it, the more we have it. It comes with statements like, "I'm not ambitious, clever, competent," and it's normally meaning I'm not enough. She goes on to define the difference between shame and guilt, and this is quite helpful I think. Guilt is behavior. I did something bad. Versus shame is about the self. I am bad. Our dog had guilt. I did something bad. We then turn it into shame thanks to our ruminating brain, and our ruminating brains have a job that is to keep us included in the family because that's where we're safe. They are programmed to help us remain connected. And Russ Harris talks about that because he says that shame is trying to protect our belonging. He goes on to say that shame isn't a bother except when we hold it rigidly, hide it, ruminate about it, or fight it, which we're all doing a lot Brené introduced empathy and vulnerability as two ways of managing and living with shame. I think vulnerability is a bit of a tough call if we think about it particularly in the context of our work situation, and I think we're better to go via a plan to find a way of talking about the things that we feel shame about without feeling too vulnerable. Empathy is different. I think we can work with empathy. Everyone who writes about shame says it thrives in the dark, in silence within ourselves, but it dissolves with empathy. I love this, and we can do this by showing empathy towards ourselves We will all feel shame differently and for different reasons. It's very individual. You could be sitting alongside someone who feels ashamed for not being more ambitious, whilst you feel shame for being so very ambitious. We're both feeling shame. Our triggers and stories that lead us there are very personal. Someone in a senior position can feel shame for not doing more things that are service-related for their country or society or for good, and somebody who's doing those things, maybe working in humanitarian service, may be feeling shame for not making enough money and not being successful as designed by the culture or the family they grew up in. Then with those stories about shame, we turn it into something internally. So if we take the ambition example, as a result of shame, I may be tempted to hide it, pretend I'm not ambitious, or I could have endless arguments with my mind, one saying, "It's great that you're ambitious," and the other voice saying, "No, it's not. You're going against what matters in your family." And so shame then arises from our internalized messages and stories. Something happens, and we create a belief that we're flawed, that we're not acceptable. It shows up in so many different experiences in our working lives., It can be being belittled by a manager, making a mistake, wanting to step down from leadership. It can arise from going against our cultural stories and norms, those in the family or in the wider society. We might not have a degree or the right degree, or we feel that we come from the "wrong," in inverted commas, background, class, race, gender, sexual orientation. We may have been raised to be in a professional role, engineer, doctor, accountant, and instead we want to be a landscape gardener. You prefer to be outside and working with your hands, but because you're not following your family's hopes for you, you feel uncomfortable and sometimes even shame.

A Personal Shame Story At Work

11:02

And I can't really talk about shame without noting here something that I never, ever talk about in public in my working life, and that is that I'm gay and married to a very wonderful woman. I talk about it in private circles, but I don't talk about it, and I've never shared it on the podcast before. I used to. I was the chair of an LGBT+ charity in London. I founded a gay woman's network in London and it's very easy to find out on my CV. But when I moved to Asia, I moved back into the closet, and along with that has come many feelings of internalized shame about being a lesbian. No one has ever done anything to suggest that it's not okay. I have been loved, supported, and welcomed, but I created a story and internalized it and then stopped sharing something that is very important to me with other people. So there it is. I created a shame story. And we all have shame, and when we have it, we hide it, and when we hide it, it's really bad for us. It ends up in us ruminating and feeling bad about ourselves, so let's do something about it.

A Practical Framework To Release Shame

12:16

I'm drawing on the work of Brené Brown, Kristin Neff, and Russ Harris in this approach, and I'll go through s- the stages first, the ways I think we can do something about shame, Then I'll bring it to life using the example of having a gap in our CV. Brené invites us to approach shame with courage, to tell who you are with your whole heart. It's about holding the courage to be imperfect, to see that shame is often a feeling of, "I'm not perfect." Well, of course we're not perfect. We just need to be who we are. And so we start by having the courage to notice our imperfections and to notice the shame stories that we're holding. Shame often shows up in the body first in a h- a feeling of heat or a sinking feeling, wanting to disappear or go quiet in a meeting. I can feel a bit nauseous if it's bad, and usually we're tempted to push it away. Instead, a good first step is simply to name it, simply to say, "This is shame about X," because just doing that creates a little distance. You can notice that you've got that harsh critical feeling and just say kindly to it, "You're not very helpful programming." We're bringing shame out of the darkness into the light. And then you can reassure yourself and normalize it. This is what Kristin Neff talks about in her self-compassion work. She says we can see our common humanity.. We can see that we all have moments and feelings like this. This is just your one, and this is just your one today. We can acknowledge that it is trying to protect our sense of belonging. It's trying to keep us safe from judgment. It's our human imperfection showing up. And now that you've acknowledged it and reassured yourself, you can ask this question: Is pushing it down actually helping you to build the career and life you want, or is it costing you energy? Is it actually getting in the way of you building the career and life you want? And then you can move to externalizing it. And you can do this in two ways. You can do it very privately. Write about it in your journal. Treat yourself as you would your closest friend. Show yourself some empathy and some self-compassion. Or you can go and talk to somebody about it, a close friend, a close family member, a colleague, a coach, somebody who you know is going to be safe when you share it, and then you want to go on and make a practical plan relating to it and move on to letting it go.

Reframing A CV Gap With Confidence

14:50

So here's how this might work with your gap in your CV, and this really matters because when we feel shame about the gap, it's really hard to talk about it, and there'll be times where we need to talk about the gaps in our CV constructively and openly, and to be able to do that without shame, and that would be great because you want to stop dreading those questions. So start by going through your CV and looking at where you have a part that you really don't like to talk about, and notice the feelings and the thoughts that you have about it. Notice emotions, physical sensations. Write down all the limiting thoughts about it. "This happened because..." And then step back, read through it, and then write down, "This is shame." Notice that it's your mind telling you a story of not being good enough and that it's unhelpful programming. This is you bringing this experience and these feelings into the light. Now reassure yourself and normalize it. Remind yourself that everybody has a career gap or a moment in their career that they want to hide away from. Everyone. This is showing your humanity and your imperfections in your career, along with everyone else, along with all of us. Allow yourself to be empathic towards yourself, And then get practical. Either alone or with the help of a friend, start playing with ideas for how you can talk about this gap. This might take a few attempts. It might take a few days or weeks. But start to create a story that you can tell about that experience, about that time in your career without feeling shame. Include what you learnt, how you moved through it. Find ways to show your resilience, your openness to learning. Find ways to talk about who you are at your best. And then when you're feeling happy with that, practice saying it out loud. Practice saying it to your trusted friends. Bring the feeling into the light, and then notice the shift. The shift won't happen overnight, but soon you'll notice that you can share and talk about that experience and feel okay, and soon even proud I know this is possible. I've worked with people where we've done it, and I know you can retell that story. You can craft that story about what happened in that moment in your career in a way that releases the shame and brings back helpful feelings and emotions.

The Paper Exercise To Let Go

17:19

Before we go, there's a simple practical release exercise you can try, and this comes from Russ Harris. Grab a piece of paper and write your shame experience in one sentence. For example, I was re- made redundant from a job I loved. Then scrunch the paper as tight as possible and hold it. Hold it, hold it, hold it, and notice how exhausting that is. And then when you've done that, release it and just hold it. Let it sit in the palms of your hand and notice the difference. Notice how when you release it, you're just observing it. You're looking at it sitting in your hands, just noticing it, letting it be. You can go further and decide to destroy it. Plunge it into water or burn it, safely of course, or throw it away. With all shame, we want to be able to bring it up, hold it lightly, observe it, and release it because bringing shame into the light is powerful. Allowing ourselves to see our common humanity will help us to eventually release the feeling and move forward.

Moving Forward With Support

18:28

In my community, Flourish, we have a safe space where you can do this, where you can share experiences and get help with reframing them to help you move on to what's next in your career. I wish you well in releasing your shame and finding your power in your career journey and in your life