Shame is a universal experience of mentally healthy people. Defined as “a feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behaviour”, shame tends to have the negative impact that it inhibits learning. Whenever people feel shame, they tend to avoid discussing it with other people and they also try not to think about what lessons they could learn, because revisiting the experience is too painful. Whenever we feel that we have let ourselves or other people down, we feel diminished.
In the context of coaching and mentoring, shame might mean that, for example:
- A mentee doesn’t tell his or her mentor abut something silly that they did, for fear it will diminish the mentor’s respect for them
- A direct report will cover up mistakes they have made, because they fear their boss will see them as less competent
- People avoid certain tasks or places, because they don’t want to be reminded of the embarrassment they felt on a previous occasion.
Overcoming shame requires an “honest conversation with oneself”. A simple, but effective way of helping this happen is to invite the learner to picture their ideal self – the person they are, when they live up to their personal ideals and values. Explaining that no-one is that ideal self more than part of the time, ask: “What would it be helpful for your ideal self to forgive you for, when you do not behave or perform at your best?” This partial distancing of the issue makes it safer to engage with the idea of learning from the shame-inducing experience.
One of the good things about this approach is that you don’t have to identify the existence of shame in the client, or even assume it might be present.
© David Clutterbuck, 2015