Ramadan, a time for reflection and connection, often brings with it a heightened sense of community. Yet, for some within the Muslim fold, this holy month can magnify feelings of rejection and shame, spiraling into a cycle that clouds our innate purity.
Today explore the evolutionary sources of fear of rejection, the sensitivity that is related to it, and the corrosive impact of shame on our self-perception. We talk about how we can tap into the power of neuroplasticity to redefine our responses to rejection,.
This episode explores how as a multitasking Muslim woman, shame brews from juggling multiple roles and the crippling cycle of self-criticism that accompanies perceived shortcomings. How the intellectualization of shame prevents true emotional healing.
This episode is not just an eye-opener; it's a heart-opener, as we discuss the importance of cognitive reframing, emotional intelligence, and the recognition of bodily cues to disentangle our worth from our failures and successes.
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If this podcast has benefited you, imagine the value of a one-on-one meeting with me! Click below to schedule your FREE consultation. Discover solutions with no obligation.
https://www.islamiclifecoachschool.com/appointments
Ramadan, a time for reflection and connection, often brings with it a heightened sense of community. Yet, for some within the Muslim fold, this holy month can magnify feelings of rejection and shame, spiraling into a cycle that clouds our innate purity.
Today explore the evolutionary sources of fear of rejection, the sensitivity that is related to it, and the corrosive impact of shame on our self-perception. We talk about how we can tap into the power of neuroplasticity to redefine our responses to rejection,.
This episode explores how as a multitasking Muslim woman, shame brews from juggling multiple roles and the crippling cycle of self-criticism that accompanies perceived shortcomings. How the intellectualization of shame prevents true emotional healing.
This episode is not just an eye-opener; it's a heart-opener, as we discuss the importance of cognitive reframing, emotional intelligence, and the recognition of bodily cues to disentangle our worth from our failures and successes.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If this podcast has benefited you, imagine the value of a one-on-one meeting with me! Click below to schedule your FREE consultation. Discover solutions with no obligation.
https://www.islamiclifecoachschool.com/appointments
Welcome to Islamic Life Coach School Podcast. Apply tools that you learn in this podcast and your life will be unrecognisably successful. Now your host, dr Kamal Aftar. Hello, hello, hello everyone. Peace and blessings be upon all of you. Inshaallah, when this podcast goes live, we will be in the month of Ramadan. May Allah SWT accept all of your prayers in this month.
Speaker 1:The topic of today's podcast is a long time in the making and it's about shame how the cycle of shame increases rejection sensitivity. I've spoken about rejection sensitivity in the past, and a certain level of it is programmed into every human being as a product of belonging and connection, since human beings have evolved to connect because isolation meant death, this translates into some level of emotional impact at the end of a rejection. When people don't respond to you or people don't turn to you the way you expect them to, there's always a positive expectation of their response towards you, and when that's not met, it turns into a sensation of rejection. This is a part of a normal functioning for a human being to experience rejection and have a fear of isolation. But, like everything else, this emotion of rejection also lies on a spectrum, anywhere from somebody who is not affected at all to somebody who feels a slight pain or perceived rejection, to somebody who experiences extreme form of rejection sensitivity, a type of dysphoria or RSD, which is an extreme emotional sensitivity and pain driven by the perception that the person has been rejected or criticized. In rejection sensitivity, dysphoria or RSD, the response is much more intense than what would be expected for somebody who doesn't carry this diagnosis. This response can be a very sudden, severe emotional pain, anxiety or anger that is out of proportion to what the situation calls for. Rsd is commonly found with other diagnoses, like ADHD or other neurodiverse diagnoses.
Speaker 1:But the focus of today's podcast is what role does shame play in all of this? Shame is one of my favorite topics to study and every human being lies somewhere on the spectrum of shame. If you are somebody who is under the weight of a lot of shame, then your nervous system will be much more sensitive to interpreting rejections and it will make you a lot more intolerable to signs of rejection compared to another average human being. When people carry a heavy burden of shame, their emotional and psychological systems become more reactive to rejection, more reactive to failure and challenging situations. This heightened sensitivity means that they may experience these events more intensely and with a greater negative impact. So in this case, shame acts more like an amplifier, exacerbating the emotional pain and distress. And this is a vicious cycle where negative experience reinforces a feeling of shame, which in turn makes the future negative experience even harder to bear. So let's call this bearing of shame as your shame burden.
Speaker 1:If you have a lot of shame burden, you carry a lot of weight of shame on your shoulders and because of that your perceived rejection will be just as extreme at the most minimal incidences. And this happens because shame makes rejection about you. In presence of shame, the way your nervous system interprets the external is that things are happening because of you as a person. It internalizes the rejection, saying that you are inherently wrong or unworthy. Under a heavy shame burden, your thoughts will tell you that you are being rejected because of the very core of you is wrong. So, on one hand, while some rejection sensitivity is programmed into your nervous system as a part of normal human development, shame not only makes the rejection sensitivity into a heightened response, but it also tells us that it's happening because of us, because who we are, because of some inherent incapability that we are carrying around, because of our genes. This, of course, is all made up. Shame increases your perceived unworthiness and makes you a target as a human being, when, factually, we know that your worthiness is always whole and intact.
Speaker 1:Shame makes it more difficult for you to see that what you're going through might be just a challenging moment in your life, a cycle of up and down, normal ebbs and flow of life, because life as it moves on goes through failures and successes, cycles of winning people over and being able to help them, and cycles of not being able to make an effect in them at all. Without shame, you're able to recognize that if people are disinterested in you, that is a part and parcel of living, a human experience, and it's a normal part of life. Shame tells you that no, no, no, it's not normal. It just means that you are particularly broken and everyone's rejection is directed specifically at you because of who you are. In a lot of times, for practicing Muslim women, this becomes very challenging because this rejection becomes about their Islamic identity. Shame starts to tell you that you are being rejected because of your core Muslim identity. Shame blocks any and all perception of the possibility that you're being rejected not because of who you are, but because you're going through something inevitable, something that's inescapable, a challenging moment in your life as a human being. Shame makes you believe that challenges in life are abnormal and since you are particularly broken, you are especially rejected because of your brokenness.
Speaker 1:Having a large shame burden is a main contributor for your nervous system's dysregulation. Address the shame and work on regulating the nervous system and your rejection. Sensitivity will lose a lot of traction on you Because of the concept of Petra, the innate nature of a human being, the primordial self. In Islam, it is believed that every person is born with this Petra, and the innate disposition of a human being is towards virtue, understanding and belief of tahid, the oneness of God. This natural state is one of purity and innocence. When an individual experiences intense shame or guilt, it is seen as a departure from this state of Petra. But the only thing that's happening is that the underlying, pure, soulful self is being heavily veiled. It becomes increasingly inaccessible. You don't ever depart from it, and the Petra is inaccessible because of the burden of shame.
Speaker 1:But Alhamdulillah, for our benefit, neuroplasticity offers an incredible mind healing opportunity. Pathways that are now so ingrained with shame can be changed towards self-healing. You as an individual can reduce your heightened sensitivity to negative experiences. Any level of intervention can help rewire the brain to respond more adaptively to stress and emotional pain. Dr Daniel Aiman describes something called Autonomic, autonomic negative thoughts, or ants. In individuals with a heavy burden of shame or, more consistent with Islamic psychology, people under a heavy burden of waswas, these seemingly automatic negative thoughts that are supposed to be fleeting thoughts become more and more reinforced and they exacerbate the emotional pain. So you get to recognize and challenge these ants, the automatic negative thoughts, and this is so you can help break the cycle of shame and the heightened sensitivity.
Speaker 1:A shame disbalance or hyper-focus on the shame and less focus on the recovery should be the main focus of any therapeutic modality. Spiral of shame creates a negative downward vortex that becomes a self-propagating negative spiral where there's automatically an imbalance and hyper-focus on shame and minimal to no focus on recovery. Zooming out momentarily and taking a realistic picture of your life, keeping yourself accountable for your moment-to-moment reactions, looking at the forest rather than the trees, and with anything in Islam, this also requires a balanced approach, not a hyper-focus on your own unworthiness. Again, I'm going to emphasize this again your unworthiness is a false concept because there is no such thing. Every human being is created worthy If you have a tendency to internalize failures and rejection.
Speaker 1:Find out what your shame burden is. Start to view each incident as isolated, something that's external, something that does not reflect on your inherent character. Practicing this perspective will lead to a more balanced personal view, because a distorted personal view is where your flaws are blamed for these negative experiences and, rather than seeing a rejection as a mismatch of needs or seeing rejection as a learning opportunity, you start to interpret these experiences as proof of your inadequacy Again. The lesson here is to recognize that this is the direct effect of the shame burden that you might carry as an individual. When you don't work to lift your shame burden, you are essentially programming yourselves with negative beliefs, and this negative programming will affect biological processes, leading to more stress responses and potentially impacting your overall health.
Speaker 1:Our perception of our environment, including how we interpret experiences and challenges, captures our biology. If you are living with deep-seated shame, your perception is skewed towards seeing yourself as inherently inadequate. This perception not only reinforces the shame, but also creates a physiological stress response affecting your body's function and health. Dr Bruce Lipton's work in epigenetics and gene expression shows that your environment influences the expression of your genes through your perceptions. When your self-perception is through the lens of a heavy shame burden, then your environment will seem like it's full of rejection and these beliefs will activate a fight-and-flight response where you start to live in a constantly activated sympathetic response. This, physiologically, is what activates and deactivates certain genes. That leads to their unhealthy expression, and an unhealthy genetic expression alters the production of neurotransmitters and hormones in a way that perpetuates the feeling of inadequacy and unworthiness.
Speaker 1:This feedback loop is done through a biological response that reinforces your negative self-image and although this sounds like a never-ending doom-and-gloom story, the solution in this case is very easy. Solution is just your willingness to help yourself. So, as always, as a physician, I'm not telling you to take meds or not to take meds for the disbalance of neurotransmitters. I am a physician, but I'm not your physician, and this podcast is not to be used for medical advice, but what I am trying to help you with is trying to reduce your shame burden through your conscious mind. Solution in this case is with your conscious mind, which is creative and it can think freely.
Speaker 1:The subconscious mind is habitual and programmed by the conscious mind so that it can recall the past experiences. If you find yourself entrenched in shame, your subconscious mind is likely filled with negative programming of the past experiences and this programming dictates your automatic responses, like perceptions and reactions, to your environment. And because this is automatic, it makes it challenging to see these experiences in a more neutral and positive light. But the power of conscious change is that there is a large potential of change through conscious awareness and reprogramming these beliefs. Just by becoming aware of your negative beliefs and consciously choosing to adopt more empowering beliefs, you break the cycle of shame. This process involves you actively reinterpreting failures and rejections as opportunities for growth and learning. Again, it involves your active participation. Passively, your default mind will continue to reprogram shame in your body. The active participation is done through your understanding of mind and body connection.
Speaker 1:The thoughts and beliefs you hold have an impact on your physical health and well-being, and by changing your perceptions about failures you can not only improve your mental and emotional health, but also, potentially, your physical health If you are dealing with a significant product of shame. Typical difficult life experiences trigger disproportionate reactions and that happens because of an underlying dysregulation of the nervous system. And while I am talking very psychoanalytic type of language, what that actually means is it just might be manifesting in your life as anxiety, depression, emotional outbursts, reactivity all of it stemming from your inability to process and cope with challenges in a healthy manner. So there might be some scenarios in your life that, where you are otherwise perfectly capable of handling rejection, your shame burden is making it intolerable. If you get a rejection letter after an interview but you live in shame for days and weeks after that, crying over the lost opportunity, chances are you're carrying a heavy shame burden If you apply for a promotion but are not considered for the job. Living the vividness of the rejection and the pain constantly is a product of your shame burden. But what I am going to offer you is, instead of internalizing these news as failures or a reflection of your worth, you have the option to view it as a common workplace occurrence. You have the option to use this experience to seek feedback, understand your reaction to it, figure out where and if you have any areas of improvement that you can work on. You have the option to prepare better for future opportunities. All we're doing is reframing your thoughts, which helps in mitigating the feelings of shame, and it helps break the cycle.
Speaker 1:Many women in the west juggle career, family responsibilities and, when any challenge arises, like not being able to attend a child's event due to work commitments. Under a heavy shame burden, it's very easy to feel guilty and inadequate. Or if the curated lives presented on social media create a sense of pressure that comes from unrealistic expectations and standards, you might feel inadequate under the shame burden when you're comparing yourself to these idealized images Under a dysregulated nervous system. It's hard for you to normalize the idea that social media is just a representation. It's not even reality. But the reality will be hidden from you because of your own shame burden about your life circumstances. Shame makes you view difficulties in relationships as personal failures, but every relationship guru and expert will tell you that relationship ruptures are part of dynamics of human interactions. Because of shame, you will be unable to create healthy conflict management standards, even if they were modeled for you in your childhood. Without shame, you can have the strength and self encouragement to create open communication and approach relationships with problem solving rather than internalizing each argument as a personal fault. Actively work to change the way you interpret challenges. View them as opportunities for growth. This will help heal your shame burden. Seek out support, use friends, family, professional counselors, coaches all to gain perspective and reduce feelings of shame burden.
Speaker 1:Cognitive reframing, as is introduced by cognitive psychologists, is a fancy way of saying just change the sentences in your mind, think about things differently Frequently put your expectations through a fact-check type of a filter. I do want to take some time now to talk about the impact of shame on otherwise intelligent people. As an intelligent human being, you will have a strong capacity for understanding and reasoning, but when it comes to applying this understanding to your own emotions and behaviors, there will most likely be a disconnect. This gap between cognitive understanding, which is knowing better, to practical application, which is doing better, is rather wide. And otherwise intelligent women, because what ends up happening is women that are high, functioning and intelligent which, by the way, includes everyone listening, because I know as soon as I say intelligent women, some of you might have a tendency to exclude yourself from that group, but you carry the capacity to understand with your rational mind, so you qualify as intelligent in this definition. So intelligent women have a strong tendency to rationalize or intellectualize your experiences, especially the shame experience, but this does not necessarily translate into emotional healing or behavioral change.
Speaker 1:So what ends up happening is you, as an intelligent woman, will find yourself stuck in patterns of self-criticism and shame, unable to change these patterns, but you having an intellectual knowledge of it. So then there's this, another loop that gets created, which is the loop of knowing versus doing, and there's a disparity between intellectual and academic understanding and practical application, which grows wider and wider. Even when you know what is healthier or more productive, you can still struggle to implement these insights into actions, and this gap becomes wider and wider, which leads to more self-shaming, where you berate and judge yourself even more, especially for not living up to your own standards of understanding. It's a very gentle reminder here Intelligence, intellect, all of that create a high standard for you, but that level of wisdom lives in your brain, while shame lives in your body. The mind can be very smart and rational, but the body doesn't catch up, and it doesn't have to because the body operates under a different set of rules. So you have to slow down and create an experiential change to provide yourself healing from the shame burden.
Speaker 1:This discrepancy between cognitive and emotional intelligence is one of the main blocks that I see in people that I coach. Women with high IQs are very adept at processing information, understanding all of the theoretical concepts that I'm providing you. You are very good at solving abstract problems, but emotional intelligence speaks a whole different language, because emotions live in the body. It is a completely different skill set and this discrepancy leads to a situation where intellectually sound women understand what they should feel in a given situation, what they struggle to meet that standard. So the over emphasis on rational thinking and learning and acquiring of knowledge. It comes at the expense of acknowledging and processing your emotions. This over emphasis creates an intellectualization of feelings, which means explaining them away instead of experiencing them and managing them effectively. This is what leads to your inability to make meaningful behavioral change If you find yourself stuck in an intellectual self-fulfilling loop of shame this cycle of knowing what is better but being unable to feel differently. All that means it's time for you to get coaching. It's time for you to slow down. It's time for you to become aware of your body's cues and start living in the body's mind instead of your intellectual mind. And the more ironic thing is that the intelligent women have a heightened awareness of the gap of intellect and emotions.
Speaker 1:So the level of nervous system dysregulation that happens because of shame exacerbates your response to negative experiences. Your intellectual understanding does not help you as much in this regard as much as your emotional intelligence does. Trying to embody shame and accepting its presence makes it easier for you to accept failures as an external event, an opportunity to learn. Makes it easier for you to separate your failures from your self-worth. I personally have lived through many loops of unsuccessfully trying to solve for my shame with my intelligence. I tried and I failed. Thinking about your shame is not an advisable method of solving for it. It wasn't until I held space for myself and allowed myself to understand that my shame burden might be slowing me down. That level of acceptance allowed me to seek the right kind of help. Also understand that intellectualization, in your case, might also be a defense mechanism to shame.
Speaker 1:But I do hope that in this podcast I've given you enough food for thought and enough awareness so you have all the tools that you need to solve for your shame burden. With that, I pray to Allah SWT. O Allah, the most compassionate, the most merciful, only you know the depths of our hearts and the burdens that we carry. When I'm under the burden of shame, help me remember my Fattr, o Allah, make it easier for me to return to my pure and innocent nature, just the way you created us. O Allah, grant us the wisdom to tell the difference between knowledge of the mind and wisdom of my body. Teach me to align my actions with my heart, for you are the best of planners, the most merciful, the most loving. To you I entrust my affairs, my healing. Lift my shame and make easy my journey towards my wholeness. I'm Enya Rabul Alameen. Please keep me in your Dharaz. I will talk to you guys next time.