Unmasking Shame: Why Men Trade Authenticity for Approval

Today, we are pulling back the curtain on a silent epidemic that has been undermining the empowerment of men since the beginning of time and has worsened in today’s multi-media world.

Look at how we praise men in our society. We celebrate the builders, the fixers, the high-achievers, and the men who get results at all costs. We are taught from a very young age that our value is entirely tied to what we can produce, what we can buy, and how well we protect our exterior image.  I know for me, my worth was measured through the lens of whether I had the validation and/or approval of the father figures in my life.  And later as I got older, of my larger community. 

But if you look closely beneath the surface of all that frantic doing, you will often find an agonizing engine driving the machine for most of us that many of us find it too hard to look at: shame.

The underlying fear that we are fundamentally not enough. The terror that if we ever slow down, if we ever stop performing, the world will realize we don’t measure up. We trade our authenticity for approval, and in the process, we lose our souls.

Joining me today to unpack how shame drives our need to perform, and how we can break free from the trap of conditional love, is my guest, Charles Sue Wah Sing. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:51

Welcome listeners. Um I am really excited to uh unpack uh and a pretty credible topic with a very, very close friend of mine today. And uh we are pulling back the curtain on a silent epidemic that has been undermining the empowerment of men honestly since the beginning of time. And it's this notion of shame and the guilt that that you know gets brought along with shame. And if we look at how we praise men in our society, we celebrate the builders, we celebrate the fixtures, we certainly celebrate the high achievers and you know, the men that get results at all costs, regardless of what those costs are. And we're taught from a very young age that our value is entirely tied to what it is that we can produce, what we can buy, and you know, how well we protect our exterior image. I know for me, you know, my own self-worth was measured by the validation of my community and my people around me, and that's how it showed up for me in terms of my own worth. And if you look closely beneath the surface of all the frantic doing that all of us do, uh particularly as men, you know, what's at the root of it is shame. And that's what we're here to unpack with our guests today, and I'm really excited to be doing this. And, you know, this this the notion that this underlying fear is that we're not enough. And that has showed up for me in my own life time and time again, even with all the work that I've done around shame, you know, and uh so joining me today is uh Charles Suwasing, who happens to be a very good friend of mine. I'm gonna brag on him a little bit, and uh then I'm gonna turn it over to him to introduce himself. Uh, Charles is a certified coactive leadership coach and an advisor. Uh, and he's in this incredibly privileged, honorific situation where he helps executives and their teams develop deeper self-awareness and lead with greater authenticity and impact. And I'm so moved by that work because I know the ripple effect it has when you do what you do with one leader, Charles. You know, it's really uh it's really a big ripple in fact. Um, his work, you know, is a process of radical self-discovery for these leaders. And, you know, he looks beyond performance and achievement, which is actually what we're talking about today, that this notion of performance and what it does to us as we get older and how we show up in the world. Uh he's a faculty member with the Coactive Training Institute. I myself have done some courses there. What an institute, what integrity. Um, the place that they teach from is incredible. And Charles is also passionate about the, I'm gonna hopefully say this right, the Enneagram and its practical application in leadership. And Charles is gonna explain more about that, obviously. Uh, you know, and relationships and personal growth for these leaders. Um, you know, at the heart of his work, which we'll talk about today, is you know, how do we get back to being naturally creative and you know, resourceful? And uh and how do we reconnect with that part of ourselves that is truly authentic? You know, a lot of people could call that our soul, but that part of us that we're born with, that really curious part of us, you know. So Charles, I'll pause there. I know there's some other things that you probably want to let our listeners know about. Um, you know, but I don't I don't want to I don't want to get your head too big, you know, bragging on you too much because you know how much I love you.

SPEAKER_01 4:49

So I'll I'll take it as as much as you can give it, man. I'm good. I'm good. Well, thank you for having me. Thank you for having me. You know, I always look forward to having conversations about this and other topics regarding, you know, men and and how we walk in the world. So to be on this platform and to talk about it with you is you know, is it's part of our journey together as it's been intertwined for so many years. Um, but I would I love to start where you just left off is recognizing that we are naturally creative resource one whole, that we have innate qualities, we have a soul, we have a spirit, we have instinct, we have gut, we have knowledge that's sort of baked into us. Um, unfortunately, you know, we're brought up in a culture that uh believes in punishment and reward, in grading people and putting people into boxes and defining what makes a good person, a bad person, da-da-da-da, and it gets in the way with that. And and when we internalize it as if it's a true thing, it leads into the conversation we're having today about shame. Yeah, so it's very important for us to start here.

SPEAKER_00 6:02

Yeah, and uh, you know, again, thank you for the work that you're doing with men, you know, and and the men's groups that you're in. And so, you know, you're in this unique position to be able to see firsthand how this shows up, not only with your work with executives and leaders, but you know, just men trying to live and doing their best to live ordinary lives, you know, because it's it's so hard to live in the ordinary. So so, Charles, I want to I want to just jump into the deep end. Um, you know, in the in that work that you're doing and leading men's groups and and and working with executives, you know, uh, and when we were talking about this a few weeks ago, you know, you said something to me that that kind of blew my mind, even with all the work that I've done around shame, the writing that I've done around it. And it was this idea that, you know, we have a desperate need to perform and to get the next promotion, uh, to buy the bigger house. And, you know, it especially in today's digital world, you know, having the social proof that we're doing well and that we're we're performing in some way, you know. And so I I the question that I wanted to start with for our listeners is why is it so hard for men to admit and and I guess know that our and their ambition might actually be fueled by a fear of not being enough?

SPEAKER_01 7:25

Well, I think that's you know, it's it's one of those things where you do not know what you don't know because we've been conditioned from childhood to think that our value is based on what we produce. You know, we do our chores, we go to school, we get grades, we score goals, we do all of these things to get results, right? Um, and we're taught that from childhood. And I think it's also, you know, shows up in our relationships with our parents, what they expect of us as boys. And it just continues on into adulthood, this constant need to prove that we are worthy, to validate that we're smart enough, we're good enough, we're strong enough. Um, we can get things done, we have the right careers, we got the right education and everything. So it's just one of those things where over time is just continuously on living in that same belief that we're only as good as what we produce.

SPEAKER_00 8:25

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and it's it's you know what that that really resonates with me. You know, it's it's it for me, Charles, it that is it could not be more true. It's almost as if my nervous system is programmed to look for that next, hey, good job. Hey, well done. You know, and yes, because we focus on, you know, so heavily on things that are quantifiable, right? We learn more stuff, we buy more stuff, we fix problems, we hit the numbers. Um, and it's all performative, right? But I think, you know, one of the things that you you taught me when we last talk, it's it's like a hamster wheel, you know, it in it it because it doesn't really matter how much we achieve, you know, the voice of shame and guilt whispers, yeah, but what have you done lately? You know? So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:17

And it shows up in our relationships, it shows up in my men's groups, right? Like one of the things that I see often in group is uh men always figuring that they have the answer for another guy. They can always fix somebody. We always like look at we have this kind of internalized belief that there's something wrong with us, that we're a problem, right? We need to be fixed. And so tied in with this kind of idea that we need to perform it to fix things, we look at each other as problems to be fixed, right? And one of the things I have to stop men from doing inside of our circles is looking at each other as okay, I got the fix for you.

SPEAKER_00 9:55

Right.

SPEAKER_01 9:56

Yeah, because it plays on both the shame and this kind of overindexing of performance and fixing things, right? Um me trying to fix you is just making you know you live in your shame that you're you can't fix yourself, you can't, you know, something's wrong with you, right? And it just becomes a cycle, right? Yeah, so I have to encourage them to slow the fixing down.

SPEAKER_00 10:22

Um yeah, that's that's beautifully said, you know. I've been in men's groups with you for a long time and been in my own men's groups, you know, the the somebody wanting to fix me really just triggers my shame that there's actually something wrong with me, you know. So yeah, I I I love that. And you know, what when we connected this on this a few weeks ago, Charles, you you also brought up this beautiful point about how we're actually born. And you you had noted that we are born with a natural and innate uh want to be creative, this urge to be creative. We're actually built and brought into the world to make things, to contribute ideas that were fundamentally born out of curiosity and meaning. It's literally our our you know building blocks as infants. Yeah, and I thought about it afterward. I mean, you know, having you know done the research that I've done, it's it's actually how our brains are built to develop from you know from the time we're born as infants. And we get placed into environments, you know, whether it's in childhood, schools, societal circles, and it runs on this system of reward and punishment, you know, and you know, you were talking about that, and that it it that it breeds and fosters a sense of you know, guilt and shame, you know. So I think it's important for our listeners, Charles, because all of us show up the way we do in the world, and a lot of us don't necessarily know where the triggers come from in terms of how we are today and our experiences and how our nervous system has gotten built. And so, you know, I think referencing childhood homes, being in school, the war, the reward system that all that comes from that, you know, is I think that's really important for our listeners, you know. So talk to me a little bit about what happens to, you know, a little boy or a little kid. Uh, what happens to their creative spirit when it continues to get subjected to that kind of conditioning?

SPEAKER_01 12:27

Well, I think, yeah, like to your point, I think we are all born naturally created resource from the whole. I think that's our in our DNA, that's our nature. Um, but you're looking at you know, households with one or two parents who have may have not done their own work of healing and transformation. So they're projecting their own internalized shame onto the child, whether they realize it or not.

SPEAKER_00 12:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:56

They're projecting their internalized shame, guilt onto the child. Whether again, whether they realize it or not, that's that's what they're doing. And it's gonna come out like, okay, you didn't do this right, you need to improve this, you need to be more responsive, you need to be all these need, neat, neat, neat things, all of it's doing is reinforcing in the child that they're not good enough, that they're not gonna excel, they're not gonna, you know. But what I what I hear and particularly in our groups is not that the parents are doing things, you know, um, with the intent to hurt the child or to the intent to shame the child. Some of it might sound like I'm trying to protect you, I'm trying to have your back. Right. But the communication, the way it's reinforced, is teaching the child, especially boys, that they're not good enough as the way they are. So that instinct to love, to create, to be resourceful, to be curious, gets the shaper conditioned into this thing. Well, I could only perform within this box to be accepted, yeah, to be approved by, to be valued by. They don't know what it is to love unconditionally, they only know what it is to love by condition. Yeah, and once that belief is rooted in your childhood, like you're talking about the nervous system. I even think it's like in a belief system, yeah, that this is how I see the world, right? Or this is how the world sees me. So now you're just going to replicate or project that over and over time in every in every context at work, at school, with your intimate partner, with your children, with your friends, wherever, you're just going to cycle through that belief system over and over again.

SPEAKER_00 14:35

Yeah, and and you know, that belief system carries right into adulthood. And I think that, you know, the the the important thing, and and certainly uh my belief system, you know, about you know, you and I doing the work we're doing in the world is there's there's nothing to fix. And we're not, we're you and I are certainly not suggesting, because I know you and I are both aligned on this, that because these things have happened in our lives, and obviously for most of us it has, that's the way we've been raised, there's nothing to fix. It's really the awareness, the awareness that it happened, right? And that provides the opportunity for us to be able to grow from from that awareness. And this conversation, I think, brings a lot of awareness to that. It certainly has for me, you know. Um you know, when we become this person that is constantly trying to prove our value, that we're lovable, that we're enough, you know, we and I have learned for myself, particularly in the last few years, as I've gone through some tough times, you know, that we lose our ability to just be. You know, we don't know how to rest. And, you know, as I've shared with you, I've gone through some pretty challenging health things in the last, you know, several months. And man, for me just to chill and relax and take care of myself, like it was so hard for me to do that because this this programming of I gotta do, do, do, do, do, I'm not doing enough, you know?

SPEAKER_01 16:10

So I yeah, go ahead. Go ahead. Yeah, I'm gonna piggyback on that last thing because I like it. One of the things I had to come to terms with was that I never stopped. Like I worked, work, work till I burned out. Right. And it starts from the same thing. And um, you know, and I was conditioned to believe that my value was what I can produce. And that being, and I'm gonna be particular about being a person of color, I have to work harder than everybody else. Right. And you hear the whole stereotype that you know, men of color have to work twice as hard to get half the distance. Well, that's conditioned into us, right? Um, and I had to unpack that for myself and learn that no, I don't have who's on whose terms do I have to work so hard? Right. On whose terms do I have to burn out? Right. I had to look behind that curtain of my own shame to recognize, no, I'm okay. I'm I'm good. I'm good the way I am. But I had to unlearn my own belief system about what it is to perform, to learn that I can I can operate at my own pace, right? I can operate at my own standard or expectation. I don't need to rely on what people think of me. Right. And that has allowed me in my own journey just to slow down and breathe a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 17:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:31

You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_00 17:32

So yeah, that's well, that's beautiful to hear. It's a and it's certainly a good lesson for all of us. Um where I wanted to go next with this, Charles, is the kind of the collateral damage of this performance trap, which you know, our our environment, you know, it it's a reality for most of us. And when a man is running on shame and guilt, he's not just damaging himself. And you talked about this earlier with families and being in the boardroom, you know, but he's impacting everyone around him.

SPEAKER_01 18:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:05

So how does this need to constantly prove ourselves, you know, how does it distort the way we lead, you know, and what does it look like when, you know, a man who's got this, you know, innate uh shame and guilt, uh, you know, what does it look like when he walks into a boardroom? And maybe even more importantly, you know, what does it look like when he walks into his house with his wife and kids? And I and I know you touched on this a little bit earlier, but maybe you could expand on your your experience and and what and what you see.

SPEAKER_01 18:38

Well, I've seen there's not one single story about how it shows up, right? Um, because I've seen it kind of in a spectrum. I've seen men in in moments of pressure or high performance completely collapse, right? They become almost virtually invisible, right? Because they don't have a sense of confidence to bring their value out in the world. And then I see on the other spectrum where men are hyper-controlling, right, and determined, right? And which they then create a culture where there's, you know, where there's a lot of dysfunction, a lot of turmoil, breakdowns in trust, poor level of engagement, because they have to prove themselves more powerful than the next person. So I see this kind of spectrum of men who are one, they acquiesce to everything, they people please, they they self-forget, they self-deny themselves, hoping that that would get the validation that they're looking for. Or I get this hyper-controlling, hyper-achieving man who's dominating every single conversation at the expense of their team. And both teams are losing, by the way. They're both, they don't win, right? Yeah. Um, they're not getting what they need from their leader. But imagine what happens when it shows up at home with their partner, with their children, with their extended family and friends. Those same dynamics play up. You're not going to get healthy relationships that way.

SPEAKER_00 20:11

Yeah. Yeah. I it beautifully said, Charles. And it's so it so resonates with uh with me because you know, uh certainly younger, you know, in my 30s and then my 40s, you know, being so driven by performance and my results, the way I showed up as a leader was I was controlling. You know, I I wanted the results so badly, I was controlling, and you know, it's it's it's the opposite of empowering, you know, and I and I had to learn the hard way in some cases that that's not the way that other people want their leaders to show up, you know? And and you know, it's it's that realization that our families for sure don't want our resumes or our metrics, they don't want us to manage them, you know. Um, but when we're blinded by that armor, like I certainly was, you know, uh in my career, my professional life, um that's how we show up, you know. And you know, again, I think it's it's the awareness so that that a lot of the listeners, you know, for them to be able to avoid um, you know, those parts of them taking them in the wrong direction and not being who they want to be in the world, it really starts like the with the awareness that what you and I have been talking about.

SPEAKER_01 21:29

Yeah. Yeah. Like for myself too, it's like, you know, in certain contexts, it's like me assert, I would I had a way of asserting myself in different contexts. Right. Not so much the needing to control things, but to make my point across. Right. And, you know, and then it also like I think similar to my experience in the some of the conversations you and I have had, is that that armor comes up where I'm not as vulnerable as I want to be. I don't expose myself as I want to be. I might avoid certain types of conflict out of risk of being exposed or vulnerable or judged or shamed further, right? And I had to come to terms with that, you know, and realize, well, no, that's me doing the work to myself. That's me, like it's it's not had nothing to do with the people around me. I'm creating my own internal hell about this, right? And the root was the shame. The root word was the shame that I was carrying from my own childhood. Um, but having unpacked that, having looked behind the scenes on that, had me recognize I'm doing this to myself. Nobody's doing this to me. No one's asking me to perform at this level. No one's like, and that's giving me a breath of air where I can now choose how I want to show up.

SPEAKER_00 22:49

Yeah, it it is so beautiful, you know, the this work that we do. I mean, obviously you and I have a, you know, I've had a deep friendship, you know, and this, you know, unknowingly, this thing that connects us is this, you know, inability to be vulnerable and also our our lack of awareness around where all that comes from. And actually that that's what binds us together as men. And, you know, the beauty of your work and helping other men do that with each other, all of a sudden those men become more connected in a way they didn't know, right? They didn't know that that was there, right? So beautiful. Thank you for appreciate you sharing that, man. Um so Charles, if if if if a man is listening right now, or or a woman or or whomever, you know, this podcast is certainly directed at men, but I know there are female listeners out there that are just as important in this journey. You know, if if someone's out there and they're listening and they're hearing this and they've got that heavy pit in their stomach, recognizing that, hey, you know, maybe, maybe this is a trap that uh, you know, is showing up in who I'm being today and it's coming from this place, uh, this performative place from when I'm younger. Um, you know, and they realize that they've been running a marathon fueled by shame. Um how do they start to look at turning the ship around? You know, what are some things that they can do to start to take this awareness and have it show up with a positive impact in their lives?

SPEAKER_01 24:19

Well, I think the first thing is to slow down. It's to stop the run, is to stop the marathon, right? It's it's learning to become more self-aware. You and I talked about use this word self-aware of when we are performing and where's the source of that performance coming from? But you can only do that if by slowing down to observe yourself in action, right? How are you being in certain contexts and situations? You know, going somatically, how is my bot, what's my body telling me when I'm in hyper performance mode? What's the feelings that come with it? What's the language I'm telling myself as I'm slowing down, observing when I'm being this way? And if if that's hard for you to see, because not every man can see that, get feedback, join a group, have a therapist, have a coach, get feedback from your loved ones, from people that you work with, what they're observing in you. And not to take it as judgment, but just take it as an insight, intelligence is like, okay, this is how the okay, this is how the world sees me, this is what the world needs from me. How do I know? Okay, learn to, okay, I might be getting in my own way here now. Right. But I think it begins with slowing down, getting curious, observing your your behavior, what is you know, how you speak to yourself, how you behave, what's happening in your body, what's happening with your emotions, and explore that. Yeah, especially when you're in a hyper achiever, hyper dominant, hyper-performative, whatever it is, experience in your life is to observe, okay, where am I right now? Where am I right now? Yeah, and where am I operating from?

SPEAKER_00 26:04

Yeah, yeah. It's it's beautiful. It's it's it's the way you're describing it as if there's this invitation for us to re-remember that infant part of us that was just curious, right? That was innately who we were before all this other stuff showed up, right? So, I mean, beautifully said, right? It's being slowing down and just searching for radical presence, you know, and and dropping the armor so that we can, you know, finally have a you know, a true connection with our authentic selves, you know. So Charles, I want to thank you for, you know, shining a light on this uh, I guess darker corner, you know, of our of our psyche, you know, that a lot of us are not aware of. Um and you know, to the to the men and the women that are listening, you know, your your worth is not a spreadsheet, as we've talked about today. It's not your bank account, it's not your job title. Um you know, you're valuable simply because you are here. And so I think what what Charles is saying to you today, and certainly what I'm saying, is try to stop performing and drop the weight that comes along with that. Start living a life, you know, worth living. Um so, Charles, I again, my gratitude for your work, my gratitude for your friendship and for who you are in the world, the impact that you're making, I can only imagine it is far reaching, you know. Um, and for the men out there, uh you've heard me say this on other podcasts, you know, and Charles has echoed this today. Find a men's group, you know, find a place where men gather in your communities and try to find a group where men are just sharing their hardships and sharing their vulnerabilities. And uh, you know, as you can hear from Charles and I, you know, we're grateful for that work simply because it's allowed us to show up more presently and more authentically in our own lives. And we're really very, very confident that that'll be the same for you. So uh I want to thank you again, Charles. I want to thank all of our listeners. And until next time. All right.