Why Overcoming Shame Can Transform Your Performance
Performance means being seen.
Whether you’re dancing, speaking, trading, leading, or simply showing up socially — performance always involves an audience. And shame, by its very nature, is about seeing yourself through the imagined eyes of others.
Shame often whispers in the background:
“If they really knew me…”
“They’ll see who I really am.”
“I shouldn’t have done that.”
“I’m not worthy of being seen.”
When shame is unresolved, performance becomes tight, stale, or avoided entirely. You over-monitor. You hold back. You perform with a split inside.
That internal tension dulls clarity, disrupts spontaneity, and disconnects you from your authentic self.
What Is Shame, Really?
Shame is not weakness. It’s a signal — an internal message that says:
You crossed a line.
You abandoned a value.
You missed a moment of courage.
You caused harm and you know it.
You sold yourself short
Here is a common mistake people make: they either drown in shame, suppress it with force, or dismiss it completely without processing. Suppressing shame isn’t strength. And dismissing it altogether is closer to sociopathy or narcissistic detachment — a total severance from moral reflection. You’ve likely seen people like this.
Healthy individuals feel shame. The majority of us are not perfect or saints.
So what you need to do is actually very simple, so you don’t stuck in the loop of shame. You need to process it and integrate it.
Step One: Sit With It Before You Release It
If you’ve been carrying shame — and you know it’s been limiting you — this is what you can do.
Start by asking yourself honestly and write down the answers.
What am I ashamed of?
What exactly happened?
What did I do?
What did I fail to do?
Maybe you were harsh with your aging parents. Maybe you neglected someone who needed you. Maybe you turned away from courage when it mattered. Maybe when you were 21 you did something reckless and still think about it. Let those images surface. Name them. No need to hide. No one is judging you in this process — not even you. This is reflection, not punishment.
If you can’t write the answers, speak it all aloud. Your voice matters. Hearing yourself declare this begins the rewiring.
The Turning Point: One Sentence That Shifts Everything
Once you’ve written the reasons for shame down, speak this aloud:
“I did it, and it was because I didn’t know better.”
That’s it. This is now an excuse — it’s a developmental truth. Everyone acts from their current level of awareness. Often because they are too young or never had anyone show them a better way or the enviroment wasn’t supportive enough.
So sit with this: I did it, and it was because I didn’t know better.
Now the next and most important step is about a lesson. Without this step, the shame release will not be complete.
You must extract the lesson from what you were ashamed of. Write or speak out loud the answers to these questions:
What did I learn from it?
What value has emerged?
How would I act now?
Now, you have taken responsibility. State to yourself out loud and internally what you have learned again and promise to yourself that you intend to never do this again, wether this act ( you have been ashamed of) was done to yourself or to others.
The Growth Loop by science and theory
You can go and confess to a priest or a therapist or share your so called perceived “wrong-doings” in workshops and personal growth circles. You can do that, if you want to been seen, accepted of even forgiven. Thats good. Or you can at least do the simple aforementioned process that involves self-reflection and lesson extraction.
Here is how Psychology and educational theory is behind it too.
Psychologist David Kolb defined a four-step learning cycle:
Concrete Experience – Something happened.
Reflective Observation – You examine it honestly.
Abstract Conceptualization – You extract the meaning.
Active Experimentation – You apply what you’ve learned.
Growth requires completing this cycle. But most people loop between Step 1 and 2 — stuck in replay without integration.
When you complete all four, the shame dissolves. It served its purpose. You’ve grown out of it.
What Happens to Performance When Shame Is Gone?
When shame is unresolved, you unconsciously perform from defense:
Trying to compensate
Trying to prove
Trying to hide
Trying not to be “found out”
This fragments your presence. You could become overly withdrawn or in some rare cases even aggressive ( dismissive or gaslighting others), trying to compensate for the unresolved shame.
Let’s repeat this clearly:
When shame is processed and integrated — you stop imagining judgment, stop performing for redemption, and stop fearing exposure.
You become present. And presence is performance. People feel the difference between someone who is hiding and someone who is whole. When shame is buried, you either shrink back or lash out. When shame is integrated, you glow with calm power.
People want to be around you. Your performance sharpens and shines.
Shame isn’t your enemy. It’s a developmental signal. Fragmentation or Integration - you choose.