Amy Swift Crosby

Many years ago, early in my career, someone sent me a note that made me feel really bad about myself. I didn’t know what I had done to this person, someone who meant so much to me, but she was upset — and she felt wronged.

The note was vague and accusatory — with no specific incident cited — but it positioned me as “shameless” and “opportunistic.” I still remember how my stomach dropped, and truly, how my heart broke, mentally reviewing what I could have done to inspire these hurtful words.

I’m still thinking about it.

I don’t mean I’m actively still thinking about receiving the message itself, but the feeling it left, from a person I deeply respected and loved, still lingers in the corners of my mind, informing the decisions, feelings and interpretations going on in my life today. It’s in here …somewhere. I can feel it.

This is confounding. And, if I am honest, maybe even embarrassing, considering all the self-help experience I’ve accrued. But when I drill down to why it still feels so active in my psyche, I see that it’s because of a single feeling related to it that I can’t fully shake: I feel shame. I feel shame for being me — and in doing what was normal or natural — for committing a “crime,” in her mind.

Shame is the quietest emotion, and what it often turns into is resentment.

It’s the secret we keep about the wrongs we experience in private.
It’s the voice that says you deserved it, because whatever they said was true.
It’s the thing you might secretly think of yourself, that someone else just confirmed.

For me, it shows up as a grudge against self-promotion, success and ambition, because the contents of that note were about mine.

I don’t want to go backward, investigate, narrate or otherwise unearth the information. I don’t think that will resolve it. But I do want to stop asking for forgiveness, and permission…(from who, I don’t know).

None of us knows how we hurt people, unknowingly, over the course of a lifetime. But each of us likely does it. And it’s terrible to inflict pain, as much as it is to receive it. Ironically, shame can have a place in both roles.

What an insidious and malignant emotion.

And according to anyone who studies it — from Esther Perel to Cheryl Strayed to Eve Ensler –  it festers and grows when left in the dark.

Realizing it still existed, for me, has been healing in and of itself.
Writing this blog, and exposing it to the light of day, is a possible salve as well.

All I know is that I want to let the light in… on it…and anything like it.

Re-sent-ment (noun): Bitter indignation at having been treated unfairly.

I want to be free.

A few weeks ago, on a Friday afternoon, just as I was powering down for the weekend, I found myself on the receiving end of a client termination email. And not just with me, this start-up had also ended its agreements with a dozen independent contractor team members, roughly ¾ of its day 1 working group, in order to re-org. Despite two years of working together, hours spent caring, crafting, cajoling (sometimes on Sundays), the mechanism (email) was perfunctory; the language cold and antiseptic. Each letter was identical.

It reminded me of the real estate developer who renovates, and then hikes rents, without providing any notice. Or the partner who critiques the deal, before supporting it, in order to demonstrate value.

While at first glance dissimilar, in all of these situations, the right thing to do isn’t what is in question: Companies need to reorganize or close, buildings need to be updated and rents (incrementally) raised, and ideas call for critical thinking before deployment. But there is almost always more than one way to do anything.

How we say no, give difficult news or cut ties often says more about who we are than the action itself.

Assuming most sane humans don’t fire people via Twitter or national news (!), the medium – phone, email, in-person, text — matters. As does the substance, tone and timing.

HR recommendations aside, having a human interaction with someone, even for a minute or two, goes a long way to preserving whatever goodwill exists. Yet some people fear opening a door into another person’s feelings or experience, because they won’t know how to shut it in a compassionate way.

But this reduces us to assets, talents and contractors, not teammates and people …who, among other sacrifices, missed putting their kids to bed or going out to dinner in order to help fulfill a last minute request.

My dad always said, as I was getting out of the car to go to school, “Goodbye sweetheart. Be nice to everyone.” Turns out, that’s not the collective rule of thumb out there.

But it’s really not such a reach when you try.

Almost everyone has waited on test results, a response to a big proposal, a return text from an important person. The mental wheels that begin to turn in these moments of vulnerability – the instant the wait seems too long ­— are often the lingering byproducts of insecurity, doubt and worth (Brené Brown has established an entire niche on this topic).

These days, I’m trying to see these moments as opportunities — as yardsticks — to gauge how I am doing. Maybe they could offer me a chance to check in.

I recently exchanged emails with a CEO about rates and scopes of work, not unlike other emails asking about “what would XYZ look like, and how much will it cost?” There was some surprise at the cost, and then a long pause. It was in this silence that I went inside for a minute, and checked myself: How comfortable could I be, standing in my value? How do resist reverting to doubt?

It’s an interesting test. I toggle between forgetting about it, remembering it, worrying for a minute, and then justifying myself. But in the moment, the mental gymnastics can be exhausting.

In this case, the value of the work the company does interests me more than the financial compensation. It wouldn’t be hard to work out a number of scenarios to work with them, because I believe in what they do.

Then why do voices still emerge in the quiet? Even after years of successful projects, happy clients, consistent work flow, things that should build confidence and establish a certain security, there’s occasionally fear that I’m not as good as I was, or think I am. That basically, my talents don’t merit what I think.

Maybe there’s humility in this interior dialogue. Perhaps it keeps my ego in check. In this way, maybe it’s valuable… to question our value… now and then.

Maybe it’s okay… not to feel okay… 100% of the time.

Or maybe that’s just being human.