Lois Hollis is a shame and guilt educator, counselor, and filmmaker. She is a registered nurse right now. She built the first dialysis unit in the country. She talked about the most forbidden topics, which are shame and guilt. Lois’ passion is to teach the ways to self-love by alleviating the shame and guilt traumas.

Health is the most important thing. You just can’t buy health. Shame and guilt are the worst emotions. They keep building inside of us. If you do not resolve shame and guilt, it compounds within you. Shame and guilt do not go away until you find it, face it, and go through it.

“Positive thinking is very important.” Positive thinking will bring you so far. There is a whole concept of toxic positive thinking. As humans, we are conditioned to stay positive all the time. We have to go through ups and downs. Change is the only constant we have. Being positive all the time is not realistic.

Shame and Guilt:

Shame and guilt are not two different phrases. Shame and guilt are the same energy. We have love energy coming into us; it brings joy, happiness, success, and peace. On the other hand, we have shame and guilt energy. These energies bring the emotions of depression, anxiety, and fear, as well as suicidal thoughts and hatred.

Shame and guilt turn our positive energies negative. Convert our compassion into depression, our passion into anger, and our happiness into hatred. It is like a computer virus; it comes into the computer, hacks it, and makes a huge mess. The same is true in the case of shame and guilt. It is not ours to own. They come inside us, hack our systems, make a huge mess, and confuse us.

Shame and Guilt Affecting Our Lives

Shame and guilt are responsible for affecting our physical bodies as well as our emotional traumas. The first thing shame and guilt do to our bodies and souls is snatch away our thinking ability. We do not feel clear.

Most people believe that shame is bad and guilt is bad. Guilt makes us moral. Shame and guilt are the same energy. They just keep dragging us down.

Owning Shame and Guilt

Do not ever own shame and guilt. If you make a blunder or a mistake, don’t shame yourself by saying, “It’s such a shame that I made this blunder.” Just simply say, “Duh or dumb, I did it the wrong way. Do not embarrass yourself. There is a significant difference between intentionally doing something wrong with any person and unintentionally doing something wrong with a person. Bullying is sending shame and guilt from person to person. Shame, like love, is transferable.

Justification is a really important thing. You have to justify yourself, what you are saying, or your emotions because we are inferior. It is a method of managing your own and other people’s emotions.

Awareness

Awareness is the key step. If you are aware of shame and guilt, you can kick them off. If you do not realize it, you just keep going through it and it keeps building and building and keeps becoming worse.

When we start addressing or realizing that such emotions like shame and guilt exist and try to manage them, we become smarter. If you ignore the emotions, you just become repressed and depressed. That does not teach emotional intelligence.

How do words affect behavior?

Not only do words influence behavior, but so does the tone with which they are said or expressed. Saying “bad” to yourself is so destructive. Never say “my bad.” Hearing affirmation from another person is not as powerful as affirming yourself. I believe in the inner child healing process.

You can make anything positive. No matter how hard it is, just compliment yourself. It builds self-confidence and self-esteem.