The Sovereign Self
On Rejecting the Curse of Shame
I’ve always had a knack for knowing things.
I was a curious, sensitive kid, a sponge. There’s a story my mom tells of me as a toddler. I’d be lying in my crib for a nap, and she’d hear me naming sounds outside my open window. If there was a passing vehicle, I would identify the kind: truck, motorcycle, Jeep.
This trait developed as I grew.
I liked learning new things, and I had my nose in a book most of the time. The Narnia series was a favorite; later, Nancy Drew. Then Judy Blume: Forever!
As I followed interests down their respective rabbit holes, I noticed connections, patterns. Ideas from disparate sources suddenly seemed part of a giant picture puzzle.
Putting together those pieces gave me satisfaction and purpose–not to mention a certain confidence that differentiated me from peers.
The first time I noticed it was a problem–not for me but for other people–occurred when I was maybe 7.
The phone rang, and I told my mother it was grandma for her. When she answered it, and it was, indeed, grandma on the other end of the line, her face dropped. Her eyes met mine, but they narrowed to slits, and in them I saw fear.
I had done something wrong.
Another time, I told a lady at church that “I prayed in my heart for Gary.”
Again, that look and the stony silence that followed. I was in the wrong again.
What I knew was not allowed.
Whether I started quieting myself at that point, I don’t recall, but those moments–announcing something I knew to be true and being met with distrust, even alarm–stuck with me.
At this point, I should tell you I grew up in the Midwest, a college town in a conservative state whose motto is “show me.”
This pugnacious, ‘prove it or lose it’ attitude is counterbalanced with equal disdain for direct communication.
Someone asks you how you are, you put on a smile and say brightly ‘fine, thank you, how are you?’ even if your pants are on fire, and you may just spontaneously combust.
The truth–no matter what it contains–is rude.
Period. End of story. You keep that shit to yourself. Never say you don’t like something, say “not right now, thank you.”
Never express an emotion that would cause a ripple, whether positive or negative.
Excitement and joy are just as taboo as sorrow or anger.
The cardinal rule I soon learned: never draw any attention to yourself. It isn’t safe; it might make someone else uncomfortable.
Conformity is King.
To say this rule ran opposite to my nature is an almost comical understatement.
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Whereas my family–a stoic lot even amongst the stiff upper lip crowd–kept everything tightly under wraps, I sought to express myself.
I liked to sing and be silly. I wanted to wear purple tights and go on adventures. Eventually, I joined a community theater where I could let my imagination run free.
While I found safe harbor at school with friends or in rehearsals for a play, I became more and more troublesome to my family of origin who did not care for my approach to life. Not one little bit.
When something terrible happened, and I cried, I was instructed to stop immediately. I was being selfish, and I needed to control myself.
That I could not do that–control my emotions or contain my natural exuberance–made me a problem to solve.
One way they set out to educate me: pretend I wasn’t there. If I said something they didn’t like, they just ignored me. Before too long, I was on the outside looking in.
The dramatic one. The selfish one. The problem child.
It didn’t take much for me to draw the logical conclusion that who I was and what I knew was a curse. I was doomed for exile.
My intuition became something to hide away, something to reject
Masking–as I’ve come to learn the term–became a crucial survival strategy. I began using my skills to interpret the energy of those around me and mold myself accordingly; instead of books, I ‘read the room’ and tailored my participation in social occasions to meet others’ needs instead of my own.
Not that I was particularly successful.
You can’t really escape yourself.
Even when I masked, some of the real me slipped out, leaked. So I became increasingly self-conscious of everything that made me who I was. My sunny disposition became separated from the misery I felt inside and sat on top of me, the elephant in the room.
You know the Greek myth of Cassandra?
Apollo offered the Trojan princess the gift of foresight in exchange for a romantic liaison, which she rebuffed. As retaliation, the God of the Sun, Light, Music, Poetry, and Prophecy doomed Cassandra to never be believed.
This curse meant that no matter how truthful her perception or clear her communication, she would never gain the trust or acceptance of others, leaving her to suffer tragic fates twice–once in her vision and again when it manifested in reality.
Speaking plain truth in order to prevent harm, Cassandra experienced over and over the distress of dismissal and the isolation of being ignored.
Chronic invalidation, they call it.
I can think of no worse fate having had a taste of it myself.
Years passed and I attempted to pass as “normal”, “average,” “typical,” not wanting to stand out because of what that meant for belonging. Yet, I continued to draw concern for the ways in which I clearly differed from the clan.
Eventually, I broke free from the rigidity of conformity, distancing myself from my roots enough to rediscover my essence, the quirks and oddities that make me unique.
Not unsurprisingly, this process was both painful and liberating.
In the end what I discovered from this experience is simple.
No one is cursed for who they truly are.
The curse is the shame in not accepting the gifts you’ve been given, in not embracing the full authenticity of your sovereign self.
