Internalized Beliefs from Trauma

We are built for heart-to-heart connections to each other and its so painful when that system is injured. We are intended to survive in packs and to depend on one another for nurturing, support, love, and so on. Brene Brown, Ph.D., describes shame as “the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging – something we’ve experienced, done, or failed to do makes us unworthy of connection.”

When we experience traumatic things, we can internalize negative beliefs that set up the foundation of our shame. Often thought of as “core beliefs,” some examples are: “I’m not good enough”

“I’m unworthy”

“I’m bad”

“Too stupid”

“Not important”

We begin to tell ourselves what we deserve (or don’t), and from this place we begin to limit that which we can expect or demand from our lives moving forward. Our hopes for a better life are compromised, along with our relationships with others and with ourselves. As being present with our core selves feels painful, we learn to block contact.

Originating in the mammalian brain, shame triggers the sympathetic nervous system, gearing our systems for a fight or flight, or freeze, or fold, response. The parts of ourselves that we find unacceptable and therefore hide, those link to negative core beliefs. We attempt to escape ourselves as we reject, deny, those shames. In doing so we further exacerbate our shame. Shame can build upon itself in a snowball effect. The more we feel it, the more inclined we are to hide it. The more we hide it, the more we feel it.

Shame has its place in anxiety, depression and addictions too. Various problematic strategies can temporarily dim the view of that which shames us. Some strategies obscure others’ view of our flaws. In the concealing process, we are kept from experiencing a connection to our full selves, as well as a real connection to others. When one begins to take steps toward trauma recovery, the hope is to build upon these authentic connections that have been lost. We begin actively seek what we actually care about rather than distracted by what we must avoid. Instead of hiding who we wish we weren’t, we become who we admire.

“Being cut off from our own natural self-compassion is one of the greatest impairments we can suffer. Along with our ability to feel our own pain go our best hopes for healing, dignity and love. What seems nonadapative and self-harming in the present was, at some point in our lives, an adaptation to help us endure what we then had to go through. If people are addicted to self-soothing behaviours, it's only because in their formative years they did not receive the soothing they needed. Such understanding helps delete toxic self-judgment on the past and supports responsibility for the now. Hence the need for compassionate self-inquiry.”

-Gabor Mate, M.D., “In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts”

Addressing shame takes courage. It takes looking at the sources of inadequacy (fear, fragility, fallibility, etc.) and giving them your attention, being brave enough to display them to others. A tall order considering the efforts that have gone toward the exact opposite. It requires challenging and dispelling that which has captured us, determining the extent to which we allow and risk real connection to others. It requires acceptance of what is and what has been, through honesty and self-compassion.