A big reason why you’re not growing as a high performing man

Is because you are shaming the very behaviours that will lead you to your next evolution.

If you’re reading this, chances are you hold a very high standard for yourself, you place a lot of pressure on yourself and you are highly critical of yourself.

When you make mistakes or act out undesirable behaviours, your first point of call is most likely to start berating yourself for doing it and go into deep shame of what you’ve done.

The problem is, when you shame yourself aggressively, you’re deeming your behaviour or mistake as unacceptable, and you end up unconsciously denying this part of you and tend to disown it.

Out of sight, out of mind. We can't keep being hurt by it, if we push it away. So, back it goes into the unconscious.

This actually stops you from taking responsibility for it, and owning it.

The moment you disown a behaviour, emotion or a part of who we are, is the moment it controls us.

The moment we own it, is the moment we take control of it and it no longer dictates our actions. Hence, we can now change it.

Those behaviours and mistakes we deem unacceptable, are what we actually need to address, learn from and transform in order to grow into the next best version of ourselves.

e.g. I uncharacteristically react to my partner, I shame myself for it, and disown the fact I am capable of doing such a thing. I don't learn anything because I don't look at it, and so it repeats again a few weeks later. Versus, I react to my partner, accept responsibility for it and understand why I was triggered to do it in the first place, realise I have an unmet need and go ahead and address that. The need to lash out stops.

This is where a big portion of our growth lies as a man.

We can’t do this, if we are deeply shaming ourselves for the things we actually need to change.

We all make mistakes, but the more we keep shaming ourselves for it, the more we keep repeating them.