Shame as the Master Lock: Why It's the Hardest Emotion to Feel

What if you've spent your entire life organizing it around not feeling a specific emotion?

For most founders, that emotion is shame.

Think about it: we've been taught to face our fears, express our anger, and sit with sadness. But shame? We don't even want to name it.

Because shame doesn't just say "I did something bad." It says "I am bad." That message cuts so deep that we build entire lives, careers, and leadership styles around making sure we never have to feel it.

Coaching hundreds of founders, I've watched this pattern in almost everyone. The paradox is always the same: in avoiding shame, we give it the power to control us.

It becomes the dictator of our choices, shaping what we pursue, how we lead, and how we relate to those we love most.

As Joe Hudson says:

“Shame is nature’s way of training us to fit into our culture and society. Like an electric fence, it outlines the contours of the identity we’ve grown into and discourages us from straying outside the lines.

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This boundary around our comfort zone is often a poor match for ourselves and the world we live in. When we feel shame, our emotional experience stagnates, dampening our evolution and our enjoyment. People often find themselves stuck in the same shame cycles for years...

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Shame is the locks that hold the chains of bad habits in place.”

So the real question is: what if allowing yourself to feel the physical sensations of shame is the key to the freedom you've been chasing all along?

How the Lock Works

Every destructive pattern I see in founders – the overwork, the people-pleasing, the need to have all the answers – has the same root.

We've built elaborate systems to avoid feeling inadequate. Endless metrics to prove our worth. Perfectionist cultures where no one can make mistakes. Teams that walk on eggshells around our need to be right.

But there's an even deeper reason shame feels intolerable. Our nervous system is wired for a world where rejection from the tribe meant death. When shame tells us "I am bad," our ancient brain registers this as a direct threat to our belonging – and therefore our survival.

Research shows that social threats activate the same neural circuitry as physical threats. So when shame attacks your identity as a founder – "I'm not good enough for this," "I'm a disappointment" – your body responds as if your life is in danger.

Other emotions feel manageable because they don't threaten your core sense of belonging. Fear says "Pay attention to this danger." Shame says "You ARE the danger – to yourself and everyone around you."

No wonder we'll do anything to avoid it.

After experiencing intense moments of shame, people often experience intense rumination and self-critical anger. This is the very pattern that holds together most other patterns.

This is why shame isn't actually the problem. The resistance to shame is the problem.

What you resist, persists. And shame becomes the lock that stagnates your emotions and keeps every other pattern in place.

Most founders have unconsciously organized themselves to stay within their comfort zone – avoiding certain risks, conversations, or decisions that might trigger shame. But growth lives outside that electric fence.

The founders who break free aren't the ones who've eliminated shame. They're the ones who've learned to feel it without letting it run their companies.

How to Break the Lock of Shame

The shift happens through five simple moves:

1. Notice when you're avoiding: Pay attention to moments when you skip important conversations, avoid necessary risks, or make safer choices because they might risk you experiencing feelings of inadequacy. That avoidance is the fence talking.

2. Recognize the signal: Shame shows up as heat in your face, sinking stomach, tight chest, hunched shoulders or sudden urge to avoid and do something like check your phone. Most founders have been avoiding these signals for so long they don't even register them anymore.

3. Name it without analyzing : Quietly acknowledge "This is shame" or "These are the sensations of shame" – but don't stop there to analyze or judge. The naming creates awareness without getting trapped in mental stories about what it means.

4. Stay with and welcome the sensation: Instead of escaping into your head to analyze, justify, or simply avoid, breathe with the feeling. Don't try to fix it or understand it. Just be with the sensations like a scientist intimately examining its subject without yet coming to any conclusions.

5. See the story for what it is: Shame comes with thoughts like "I'm failing" or "I'm not good enough." These are stories your mind creates, not facts. You're experiencing energy in your body, nothing more.

The goal isn't to eliminate shame – it's to stop organizing your life around avoiding it.

What Changes When You Stop Running Away

One CEO I work with was pulling 80-hour weeks, convinced that any sign of weakness meant he was inadequate. When he learned to welcome shame instead of avoiding it, he reclaimed fifteen hours a week and started delegating effectively for the first time.

Another founder had been avoiding a crucial board conversation for months. She realized she was more afraid of feeling incompetent than of the actual discussion. She had that conversation the next week.

What strikes me most is how much energy gets freed up. These founders weren't just avoiding an emotion – they were avoiding entire categories of decisions, conversations, and opportunities that might trigger shame.

The very emotion they'd spent the most energy avoiding became the door to their freedom.

Shame still shows up for me and every founder I work with. The difference is it no longer dictates our choices.

What would shift for you if you stopped organizing around not feeling those sensations? If you stopped letting that electric fence define the boundaries of who and how you're allowed to be?

Next time you feel that familiar tightness or sinking, try this: pause for thirty seconds. Breathe with it. Name it as shame.

Then ask yourself: what would I do if I weren't afraid to feel this?

The electric fence only has power if you believe it's real.

With love,

- Dave Kashen

P.S. I'd love to hear what you notice when you try staying with shame instead of running from it. Hit reply and let me know.