Have you been part of bullying? Either bullied someone or got bullied or watched someone being bullied? I have witnessed all three as a kid.
I was bullied as a kid because I was not one of the most well dressed richly kids in my perfectionist school and I was dyslexic( I recently found out) that made me an odd kid. All reasons for kids and my teachers to shame and judge me every day. When I grew a bit older, I easily shamed and bullied somebody else(not proud) as well. The KEY of bullying lies in SHAME….it thrives in shame.
Bullying happens as kids learn shame and to judge people for that.
Growing up we learn from our environment when to judge and shame. Which behaviours to be proud or ashamed of. How do we learn this as a kid? By Observing adults.
We watch our parents, teachers and almost all adults around us blaming, shaming and judging each other.
Instead of learning empathy and kindness, we as kids learn to shame, blame and judge.
And this happens with every kid, our kids.
We ask kids to be kind and honest. But we as adults judge them and shame them and the people around us. We also hide our own shame stories under the rugs and do not talk about it right. Whenever we get a chance we shame and judge others.
Did you know we judge others the most on aspects which we find most shameful for ourselves?
So, kids learn from our actions. They learn pride is more important than integrity so they hide shameful hard stuff.
They learn that making mistakes and talking about them is the biggest shame of all.
So, they are unkind towards themselves and towards people around them.
What they also learn is to not appreciate differences, diversity and uniqueness. They learn instead of having empathy let’s troll and bully and make fun of faults in others.
That’s a shame.
The more I study this topic the more I have come to realize that if we want a kind, the inclusive world we do not just need to preach to be kind and honest. We must learn to accept shame, talk about it.
Practice self-kindness, be kind and empathetic towards others. Shame is contracting energy neither good nor bad. But the way we deal with shame is crucial.
#shame#selfkindness#kindness#empathy