Is Our Secret Shame Destroying Our Children?

how some subjects at home were never discussed out in the open? Perhaps it was your parents relationship, your father losing his job or your Mum's near exhaustion. Anything that could be perceived as embarrassing or shaming would simply be hidden away to avoid social judgement.

How ironic to think the very things that were hidden from us as children are today the things we struggle to reconcile in our own lives as adults.

All of evolution relies on one very simple principle, all species emulate their parents behaviour for survival. How does a youngling survive if it's parents wont teach it to hunt, or gather food, or prepare to hibernate in the winter?

This same principle applies in human behaviour too. How does a child learn to manage money if their parents never teach them how to manage wealth? How do we learn to keep our minds healthy and resilient to stress if we never see our parents actively overcome challenges?

It is often part of the shame of people who avoid seeking help that their parents "never needed to". Many a time a client has suggested that they are inferior as they struggle with an area of their lives their parents appeared to sail through. It is this feeling of inferiority and shame that leads to a distorted sense of self worth and a resistance to seeking help.

You've never seen a tennis player win Wimbledon without years of expert training and a support crew have you? You'd never see an athlete take home an olympic medal without first achieving several milestones along their journey from amateur to professional.

Yet when it comes to our private lives, this is EXACTLY what we expect from ourselves!

It should be perfectly reasonable to expect training in all aspects of our lives that we want to succeed in. Be it our career, our nutritional health, our mental health or our physical health.In fact, these should be taught more at school level where possible.

Every sage will tell you that they continue to practice their training daily to achieve their state of peace and serenity.

Repetitive activity ingraines itself in our brains and becomes a part of our reflexes. The brain is able to take all its train and merge it into a cohesive action when needed. Tennis players anticipate a ball and their response, golfers can aim for a tiny hole hundreds of meters away and we can anticipate and respond with more clarity and calm in any situation, if we are given the tools and training to do so.

More often than not the overwhelm of dealing with a situation is "not knowing where to start" or feeling inadequate and ashamed.

Thankfully in today's world there are a plethora of online resources to help us address our training shortfalls, because that is all they are.

From books to online training courses and individual courses, everything you need to address your challenge head on, is at your fingertips.

The joy of getting help and taking on training, is that you are then able to pass on these tools and break the cycle of shame.

Image a world where children are taught from early on to practice mindfulness, forgiveness, a good wellness routine of exercise and nutrition? Imagine how differently exams would feel, how much more we could achieve as a species if we were elevated beyond our shame into a world where anything is possible?