07/20/2022
In yoga, as we work with the chakras of the subtle energy body, shame blocks the energy of the Solar Plexus Chakra - the Power Center.
Yes, it's named the Power Center because its main organ is the stomach and its endocrine gland is the pancreas, and that is how we "power" our body with food. But the chief emotions of the Power Center are self-confidence and self-worth. Shame blocks both of those things. When looking at the positive and negative archetypes of this chakra, we have the Hero and the Slave. And this description helps explain how shame robs our Hero of its power to make us a Slave to others.
Shame shows us where we don't feel safe to be our authentic selves.
It creates tension and conflict within our hearts.
The very roots of codependency drink from this soil of shame that is so abundantly watered by our Western culture that thinks it's so advanced; all while living in such a divorced way from the most primal, innate and divine intelligence.
Nature.
It's no accident that we do not find shame in nature.
Nor do we find codependency.
Wild creatures are not afraid of themselves.
Shame is a painful, relational experience rooted in an absence of love that informs relationship to one's self.
It holds a felt sense of both grief and fear that we might not be able to name.
Grief for never having received vital things necessary for the development of a wholesome sense of self mixed in with a longing for the absence of a love that will never be able to be.
Fear that one will never be loved or know what it is to be truly loved. A fear that easily turns into self-sabotage, bitterness or even a pervasive anger towards self and life.
Shame can drive our attempts at healing or self-improvement, hoping that if enough changes or improves in us, we can change situations where there is no love and finally get what we long for.
This kind of "healing" takes us deeper into suffering and confusion rather than towards alignment with wholeness and love.
It keeps us disconnected from love by either running away from it or keeping us magnetized to the lack of it.
We are meant to flourish in love and life. It is our natural birthright, but we need to learn how to root ourselves back in the loving, nourishing and nurturing soil of LIFE itself.
We are worthy of it.
There is no need to remain loyal to this absence of love anymore.
It robs us of innate compassion towards the totality of who we are and what we have overcome to be here.
It stalls the momentum towards thriving and transforming our earthly wounds into something more beautiful.
It holds an essential part ourselves hostage, because the one who is yet to be loved, the one we have not yet felt safe inhabiting, holds our gifts, medicine and genius.
Our power.
Healing shame is an initiation into this power.
Love.
Rather than fearing ourselves like Medusa, we can learn to feel safe turning towards ourselves.
Our essential self will not turn us to stone, but rather awaken us into wholeness.
We can cultivate curiosity about the one who has yet to be loved, discover what they need and learn how to offer ourselves the soothing our hearts have craved.
We can grieve for what never was, for the absence of what will not be.
This acknowledges the lack we grew up in while honoring our hearts and lineage.
Our grief heals this ancestral wounding so we don't have to carry the weight of it any longer.
This grief is LOVE itself washing the past away and making space for us to restore our connection with primal source, heal our consciousness and open us into the vaster spaces of who we really are.
Shame is our modern human condition, a form of suffering that can initiate us back into not only our authentic selves, but interdependency and flourishing.
Stay tuned, I'm cooking up some things for you!
More love.
Not less.
Dr. Mia Hetenyi
