Durge Smrita Harasi - Dispelling Guilt and Shame Through Compassionate Reflection
A few days ago, I was trying to find out something about my
child, but I ended up discovering something
about you and me. And that is what
I want to present to you in today's episode. Today's
episode, dear listener, is going to be a true
test of how we've been treating ourselves
and others around us. Are you ready?
Are you ready to dive deep into who we have
become and understand what we've been doing
wrong all these years? Then dear listener, I
welcome you to today's episode of the Mahakatha meditation
mantras podcast. I'm your host, Preeti. And like I've
suggested today, we are talking about something that is
deeply rooted in who we have become and that
directly relates to our childhood.
I'm a mother to a toddler, and having a toddler at
home is a complete adventure by itself.
Their behaviors are constantly changing. They are constantly
developing new abilities physically, mentally, even
emotionally. So I make it a point to read up a
lot on these stages of development so that I
know what my child is learning and going through right
now. And the other day, I found out
that my child is now learning
and developing guilt and shame.
He's developing the ability to feel guilty
for something he did or feel shame about
something he did. He's developing the ability to
feel embarrassed or humiliated, and that must
be very new to him. And for me, I had
no idea that this happens so early in life,
that a child has to take in and process
such heavy, such intense emotions so
early in life. On the other hand, I also think it's
amazing that we build our emotional muscle
this early in life as well. And while I kept reading
about how my child is developing the ability to
experience guilt and shame, I also learned about
things that parents and people in general
should avoid doing around these children.
They say that there are these three things that
should not be done in order to not damage the
child's conscience or hamper his or her
confidence. Now my child
is 3 years old, and this applies to him.
But you and I are much, much older. We
developed guilt and shame years ago.
And what I'm about to share, like I said, is a true
test of how we've been developing
and processing guilt and shame all these years
and treating the guilt and shame within others around us.
They say that once the child develops guilt and shame,
one should stop doing these three things.
Number 1 is stop attaching labels to
them. When I say labels, I mean even
the simplest seeming, most harmless seeming
labels like the naughty one or the funny one
or hey, you are the shy one. You're the troublemaker.
It is advised to stop attaching these
labels to them. To stop defining these things for
them. Because if they attach a lot of value
to your words, if you are someone very special in their lives,
and additionally, if they tend to have a lower
self esteem or an incomplete
developing, growing self esteem, then
they're going to take these labels very seriously.
They're going to embrace these labels and adjust their
behavior to match these labels. So if you're calling
someone the funny one, they're going to develop this
need, this forced necessity to
always be funny, to always crack a joke, to
always be sarcastic even at the cost of
hurting someone they love. If you call someone
the shy one, then they're going to develop the behavior
of being shy, being socially
challenged, lacking initiative, and they're going to
struggle in their social relationships. Why
would you want to do that to someone? Now
I want us to think, how many labels did we
attach to people around us? How many
people did we call the funny one, the shy one, the
talkative one, the selfish one, the
unreliable one. I'm sure many of us
use some of these labels even today because we
are unaware of how it affects the other person
and how many labels, my dear listener, have been
attached to you all your life? How many
of your behaviors have you altered to
fit your labels? And if you were to
drop the labels that were attached to you, who
would you want yourself to be?
Coming to the second thing that must be avoided
while dealing with the child who is developing guilt and
shame is stop mocking or criticizing
them especially in front of others.
Stop mocking a child. Stop laughing at them.
Stop mimicking what they're saying in a funny way even though
to you, it's just funny. But to them, it
must be hurtful because their emotions are still
raw and they don't understand your adult
intention. And when we criticize them,
especially in front of others, we might see, we might
feel that we're doing it for their own good. We might feel
that we're being practical parents. We're
disciplining them, or we are grounding them by criticizing
them and showing them that they're not perfect. But when we do it
so directly, so harshly, and especially
in front of others, when we say you're doing
it wrong, when we say that's not a circle you've drawn
there, or how many times do I have to ask you to clean your
room, Or I don't have all day, can you speed up?
Or when we are completely fed up and we say, you're being a very,
very bad child right now. The child
internalizes these things and first gets hit
with guilt. And then on a deeper
level, if it remains unaddressed, it develops into
shame. And I don't think it hurts less when we
grow up either. I don't think we are immune to feeling
hurt when someone criticizes us in public or when someone
mocks us in public. It still hits us.
It still makes us feel insulted and belittled. It
still makes us feel like there may be something deeply
wrong with us. And we may still carry the
shame of something someone said or the
way they mocked us or the way they told us that we're not good
enough years ago. We may still be carrying
those things in our hearts today. And the
question I wanna ask you is, how many
people, whether kids or adults, have you done this
to? Do you have a tendency to mock
people even just jokingly?
Or do you have a tendency to criticize people,
especially at your workplace or in your social relationships?
Unaware that there are other people around you.
That is something I want you to think about.
Now the third thing on the list. The third behavior
that we're supposed to avoid towards these gentle
toddlers when they are developing guilt and shame
is to stop comparing them to others.
This runs so deep down our childhood when we
started feeling evaluated, started feeling judged,
started feeling that our true value is when we are better
than someone else, when we are more than someone else.
And when we fail in that comparison, we are a
lesser being. We are not good enough. We are
unlucky. We are untalented or we are stuck.
If you are someone really really important in someone else's
life and you constantly compare this
one person to someone else of their age or caliber
or career path. Even if you're saying that, hey, you're better
than those guys. Hey, you are way more successful than
those other guys or those other kids. Hey, you are way more talented,
way more special than the others. These are
words that they're going to carry, they're going to believe, and
they're going to act upon for a very, very long
time. And, eventually, they're either going
to develop arrogance, which makes them act in ways
that are hurtful and unacceptable
to others. Because of which they will struggle in their relationships, at
their workplace, or they will develop
really low self esteem and they might not even
attempt to realize their full potential.
The question is, were you constantly
compared to others? Were there
voices in your life that told you you were
better because you were better than others or you were
small because you didn't meet their expectations
and comparisons? How has being compared
shaped your personality and the way you live your
life? I think these three pointers
are really important tools that we can use
to analyze why we are the way we are in certain
aspects and to gently put a
stop to any destructive patterns that
have impacted our lives, that have limited our lives, so that we
don't become carriers of them, so that we don't
start attaching labels to other people, start mocking them, criticizing
them, start comparing them to others, and
lowering their self worth. It's important to think
about these three things, dear listener, so that you become
a pattern breaker and you become the kindest
voice in the room no matter where you go.
And so that you slowly release all the guilt
and shame that you have been carrying for
so, so long. Speaking of releasing
these burdens, I bring you a beautiful mantra this
week to help you do just that. And the
mantra is the Durge Smrita Mantra.
The Durge Smrita mantra is a divine
chant dedicated to the mother goddess, Durga,
who is known to be fierce and yet kind,
who is known to give courage and strength
to anyone who asks her for it with true
intention. And simply put, it is a prayer
to awaken our most enlightened,
most fearless, and wisest voice
while tuning down all the other negative voices
that we've been listening for so long.
So if you do not have the Durga smrita mantra with you
or if you haven't practiced meditating with this mantra, you can
avail this mantra at a 30% discount by using the
code in the description of this episode. And I want you to try
something interesting. I want you to
come back to this episode when you feel like you have the
time and space to ask yourself these hard hitting questions.
Come back to this episode and also listen
to the Durge Smrita Mantra in the background
as you reflect on your past, on your wounds and your
scars. And with the help of the soothing mantra,
you will not only arrive at answers, but you
will also begin to slowly and gently
experience deep relief from whatever has been
weighing you down. So go ahead. Give this
mantra a try and suggest it to people
who really need it in their lives. My dear
listener, I hope you enjoyed what we discussed in
today's episode. And if you did, I would
request you to leave us a review and tell me what
you think of this episode and of all the episodes you've been
listening to till now. We would love to hear
your experience of our podcast. Thank you so
much, dear listener, for joining in, and I hope what we
discussed today stays with you throughout the week.
Because next week when I come back, I'm gonna talk about
3 things that we should start doing to
counter this guilt and shame. Until
then, my dear listener, stay blessed.