Good Life Project: "Healing Shame, When Nothing Seems to Be Working"

Host: Jonathan Fields
Guest: Dr. Zoe Shaw
Release Date: December 15, 2025
Podcast Theme: Exploring the pursuit of a good life through conversations on health, science, mindset, relationships, and meaning.

Episode Overview

In this episode, Jonathan Fields welcomes Dr. Zoe Shaw—psychotherapist, author, and podcast host—to discuss the rarely talked about but deeply pervasive subject of "complex shame." The conversation explores why traditional approaches to healing shame sometimes fail, what distinguishes “complex shame” from other forms, its impact on identity and achievement, and a realistic pathway for release, healing, and moving towards a healthier self-concept.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Shame and Complex Shame Defined

• Distinction between Guilt and Shame
  • Guilt: Related to actions ("I've done something wrong"). Motivates amends.
  • Shame: Linked to identity ("I am wrong/unworthy"). Causes hiding, not change.
  • "Shame is an emotional state and physiological state and a message that says, I am wrong, I am unworthy. It's attached to our identity." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [11:42]
• Complex Shame:
  • Built over years, often through repeated or layered experiences.
  • Not relieved by simple vulnerability or external validation.
  • Common among marginalized or highly self-critical/high-achieving individuals.
  • "Complex shame is shame that is not alleviated by being, by talking about it and then having somebody else validate you, give you external compassion, which works for most shame." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [12:33]

2. Personal Narrative: Dr. Shaw’s Story

• Childhood experience as a Black girl in a predominantly white town—early racial shame.
• Teenage pregnancy in a strict religious family; compelled to surrender her child.
• Achieving high levels of success (athletics, academics, career) did not resolve shame:
  • "I did a really great job of pushing it down with accomplishments...this didn't fix any of that." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [11:35]
• Realization that shame followed success, only intensifying feelings of isolation and self-doubt.

3. The Dynamics and Impact of Complex Shame

• Internalizers vs. Externalizers
  • Internalizers: Take blame, become high achievers, tend toward codependency.
  • Externalizers: Project blame, less prone to complex shame.
  • "People with complex shame tend to be internalizers...we tend to take on the blame and the burden, tend to also be very high achievers." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [13:37]
• Avatar of Success vs. Inner Reality
  • The gap between public success and private pain actually deepens shame and increases isolation.
  • "It creates this chasm that's steeped in isolation and a deep sense of unworthiness." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [17:39]

4. Toxic Shame: Relation and Differences

• Toxic shame as an extreme, often stemming from severe early abuse.
• Tends to show up as projection and underpinning certain personality disorders.
• Complex shame can be seen as existing on a spectrum, between "simple shame" and "toxic shame."
  • "Most people don't have toxic shame...many people who may think they have toxic shame actually have complex shame." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [24:23]

5. Codependency and Relationships

• Complex shame often leads to codependent dynamics—seeking validation, abandoning oneself, attracting emotionally unavailable or narcissistic partners.
  • "You are often trying to prove yourself and control your own emotions when it comes to shame; we can get into these codependent relationships where we spend all of our time abandoning ourselves..." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [25:55]
• Danger: Losing authentic connection and becoming susceptible to manipulation and unhealthy cycles.

6. The Path to Healing: Dr. Shaw’s Eight Steps

Outlined stages and their function in moving from shame to acceptance.
Stages of Healing Complex Shame:

1. Initial Shaming Experience
   • Often pre-verbal and difficult to pinpoint; shame can start as early as 18 months.
   • "You will see the physiological response...children as young as 18 months feel shame." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [50:45]
2. Self-Hate and Self-Harm
   • Manifestations range from addiction, sabotage, to relationship dysfunction.
3. Self-Awareness
   • Recognizing the presence of shame; not equivalent to healing.
4. Deconstructing Blame
   • Identify and untangle all sources of self-blame, without judgment.
   • Prompt: "What do I blame myself for?" [55:03]
   • Begin with writing; best supported with a therapist or trusted confidante.
5. Vulnerability (after deconstruction)
   • Safely sharing with others to receive compassion; test trust with small disclosures (“microdosing vulnerability” [56:28]).
6. Forgiveness
   • Accepting the impossibility of a different past.
   • "Forgiveness is giving up all hope of a better past." – Lily Tomlin, quoted by Dr. Zoe Shaw [27:43]
   • Focus is on self-forgiveness, regardless of culpability.
7. Acceptance
   • Allowing the reality of the past; choosing to focus on creating a healthier future.
8. Maintenance
   • Shame, like trauma, lives in the body; requires ongoing practices to release it.
   • Physical movement, mindfulness, and awareness techniques.
   • "The healing happens in the forgiveness and the acceptance part...Yet shame will never go away. And so you need to create a maintenance process that includes body purging, physically purging shame from your body." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [59:00]

7. Grief and Shame: Interwoven Experiences

• Grieving for the lost “ideal self,” past opportunities, or lives unlived is central to healing shame.
  • "We grieve this idea of a self that is accepted. Right. Of a past that is accepted. And so grief is absolutely a part of it." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [44:36]
• Emphasis on weaving grief into daily life, rather than "getting over" it; acceptance and movement forward is possible with both.

8. Risks and Realities of Healing

• Changing longstanding shame-driven patterns may threaten existing relationships and communities, especially those built on your “avatar.”
• "As we heal...if our counterpart, if our partner, you know, if our friends are not on that same journey with us, then the relationship cannot often tolerate the health that you are experiencing." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [62:15]
• The reward: unexpected freedom, peace, and the reclamation of authentic self—even if it requires letting go of some connections.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On The Nature of Shame:
  "Shame is an emotion that makes us hide and it is always unhealthy." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [12:25]

• Paradox of Success:
  "We run and we run...until eventually it does catch up with us." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [11:38]

• The Avatar Gap:
  "The more successful that avatar of you is...there's got to be a voice inside you that says, the more people really don't know who I am." – Jonathan Fields [18:09]

• Forgiveness Redefined:
  "Forgiveness is giving up all hope of a better past." – Lily Tomlin (quoted by Dr. Zoe Shaw) [27:43]

• Shame as a Bodily Experience:
  "Shame is both a mental, psychological, and physiological state." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [29:56]

• Identifying Shame:
  "Wherever you are hiding, that's where shame is." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [31:06]

• On Community Loss:
  "The longer we sit in shame and the longer we sit in unhealthy relationships, the less health we have over time. It doesn't get better, and it doesn't even plateau. It gets worse." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [63:29]

• Living a Good Life:
  "Living a good life is honestly allowing yourself to release the burden of shame, to talk and say the things that you've been taught not to say." – Dr. Zoe Shaw [63:54]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• [06:40] Dr. Shaw’s personal journey with complex shame
• [11:35] Why achievement does not resolve shame
• [13:37] Internalizers, complex shame, and codependency
• [17:39] The pain of the widening gap between success and shame
• [23:03] Toxic shame vs. complex shame
• [25:55] Complex shame as a root of codependency
• [27:43] The necessity of forgiveness (Lily Tomlin quote)
• [31:06] How to recognize when shame is at play ("Where are you hiding?")
• [42:37] Differentiating self-sacrifice from self-abandonment
• [44:36] The unavoidable grief linked to shame
• [50:37] Stages of healing complex shame
• [55:03] Deconstruction of blame: practical exercises
• [56:28] "Microdosing vulnerability" for safety
• [59:00] Maintenance: purging shame from the body
• [62:15] Relationship changes during healing
• [63:54] Dr. Zoe's definition of a good life

Tone and Language

The episode is compassionate, honest, and encouraging, with both host and guest frequently inviting listeners to reflect on their lived experiences and to hope for genuine healing. Dr. Shaw brings vulnerability and clinical clarity, sharing lived experience and professional expertise. Jonathan Fields’ questions are probing, empathetic, and often serve as a reflective mirror for listeners’ own patterns.

Final Thoughts

If you’ve ever felt a quiet, persistent sense that you’re not okay—despite outward markers of success—this episode offers a grounded, warm, and actionable guide for facing, untangling, and transforming shame. Dr. Shaw’s framework offers hope without false promises: healing complex shame is possible, but it’s an ongoing process of self-inquiry, acceptance, and sometimes, courageous change.

For further exploration: Dr. Zoe Shaw’s book, Stronger in the Difficult Places: Heal Your Relationship with Yourself by Untangling Complex Shame and the recommended adjacent GLP episode with Lori Gottlieb on emotional narratives.