A blog post a day for 30 days - Day 12 - Shame from mistakes

I hate mistakes, not that any of us love them, but even the smallest of mistakes really get to me. Being human I certainly make mistakes all the time but they typically elicit a fear response in me. Fear of what? Being in trouble? Shamed? Humiliated? Yes, it's all there in various ways. I hold myself highly accountable and freely admit to mistakes and try to fix them. On the flip side I get overly angry at anyone who doesn't own their mistakes. Perhaps some of my anger at them is really a reflection of my anger and disappointment with myself when I make one. 

Mistakes are part of life. I get that. And though there is some part of me that believes everyone remembers my every mistake like I do, from most of them I do eventually move on. Yet there are the repeated mistakes. The ones you get into a vicious cycle on and can't seem to pull out of. Others are watching, even asking "Why are you doing this again!?" and you don't have a good answer. It's said until you learn the lesson that cycles will repeat. My therapist will often ask, "What age does this feel like?" and I see it's never my current age, but a time when I was much younger. Many times I do see the pattern but feel under a spell of sorts and can't break free.

I was speaking a friend this morning and we spoke about being "stuck in your story". I do feel patterns of repeated mistakes, or rather not doing the best for ourselves, are part of this. It's said with repressed memories that the mind will let you remember when it feels safe and you are ready (which is perhaps never if you don't do the work). I've found a lot of old anger and shit coming up for me recently with situations happening to me now. And though I feel the answers are there it's as if something is preventing me from fully getting to the root of it all. Immobility, freezing, stunned silence but punchy as fuck. Is being in isolation during a pandemic, when emotions are prickly and intense, really the time to go this deep? Or is it the perfect time?

So why be ashamed? We're all struggling through the muck of life, trying to figure it out, attempting to manage our healing, and there is no shame in that. Yet when we're doing the work we trip up, we stagnate and we make the same repeated messes sometimes. And others witness this and it feels so shameful. I hide my mistakes, I bet you do too, out of this shame so as not to be called out on our perceived failures. This is so isolating and lonely but it feels safer than the full truth out loud.

What would happen if we felt we were safe to fuck it all up and not be judged? What would happen if allowed others the space to fail badly as they figure it out? Owning my part; if I want you to give me a soft place to land when I'm coming out of a failure free fall...I have to do the same for you as well.