i refuse to be embarrassed [video]

If you didn't get embarrassed, it would be weird. It's a fundamental part of being a human being. With that being said, I'm done with it, I, I'm not doing it anymore, I refuse to get embarrassed now, and.

I used to think that it was sort of out of my control. Whether or not I got embarrassed, something would happen that triggers me to be embarrassed, and my subconscious decides to just be embarrassed. And I fumble my words, I get red in the face, I get really quiet afterwards and it's just what happens. And it's out of my control. I am now aware that that it is in your control.

Okay, I think I've actually cracked the code. Am I the first person to crack the code? No, cracking the code is not unique to me. Okay, I didn't invent the cure for embarrassment, but I will say that my journey to almost completely curing embarrassment was very organic. And was not influenced by some sort of 10-step guide that I found on Google. You know, it all sort of happened within me, and today I'm going to be sharing with you how I don't get embarrassed anymore. That's kind of an exaggeration.

How I keep embarrassment to a minimum in my life. Embarrassing things still happen to me all the time. That cannot be prevented, but embarrassment, the feeling, can be prevented, and that's what I've learned to prevent. Before. I talk about how I stopped getting embarrassed for the most part, let's start this conversation out by learning why humans get embarrassed. Because I didn't really know. Thanks to American Scientist org.

What causes embarrassment? Rowland S. Miller found that what lies at the root of embarrassment is the anticipation of negative evaluation by others. We become embarrassed when we perceive that the social image we want to project has been undermined and that others are forming negative impressions of us. That definitely covers a large portion of embarrassment, you know, thinking that we did something that was embarrassing and everybody is looking at us thinking, what a loser.

Okay, pretty obvious. But John Sabini and his colleagues proposed that. Embarrassment is likely to arise when a person anticipates a disruption of smooth social interaction and faces a situation without a clear sense of the social expectations governing behavior. It's not that the person is worried about making a bad impression per se, but rather that he or she doesn't know what to do next. See, that really rounds it out. Those two explanations, both different, but both very valid for why we get embarrassed. Complete the picture. In my mind, embarrassment doesn't really exist without other people. You know, if you trip and fall at home when you're by yourself, you're not gonna get embarrassed.

You might be like, Oh my God, I can't believe I just did that. But you're not gonna get red in the face, you're not gonna be worried about how it's gonna impact your life moving forward. As long as you didn't get hurt, it just kind of comes and goes. Embarrassment comes down to the reactions from other people. All of this is pretty obvious, but, you know, I'm just laying the groundwork as I do.

Okay, I was curious about the biological function of embarrassment, you know, a lot of our behaviors are due to survival mechanisms that we needed in the past. And I wanted to see if there's a link between embarrassment and how we survived a long time ago. Here's what I found. Embarrassment seems likely to serve three basic functions First, it serves as an appeasement gesture to others by signaling that the violation was unintended and it will not be repeated. Second, the intense dread of experiencing this emotion.

Embarrassment likely deters us from repeating whatever behaviors triggered the state. Thus, embarrassment is seen as a social counterpart to physical pain. Just as physical pain alerts us to threats to our physical well-being, embarrassment alerts us to threats to our social well-being. Possible rebuke and rejection. Third, embarrassment motivates us to undo the social damage and restore the esteem of others. We're social beings we always have been, and embarrassment is a feeling that we experience to help keep our asses in line. You know what?

I mean, obviously it's like when you trip and fall in front of everyone, that's not your fault. It's not like you need to get your ass into line because you tripped and fell. But for the most part, I think we feel embarrassment to keep our asses in line. You know, if we say something that's kind of whack, or we do something that's kind of whack, we feel embarrassment. To make sure that we learn from that mistake.

If we didn't feel embarrassed, we would have no reason to change, and we'd have no reason to improve our social behaviors. So I do think embarrassment is a necessary feeling in some ways. When it comes to wronging other people, doing inconsiderate things, doing morally wrong things, I think embarrassment in shame is necessary. But when it comes to harmless things like tripping and falling, making a mistake during a speech in front of a big group of people, accidentally farting. When it comes to these innocent embarrassments, I think it's beneficial to learn how to make those moments less embarrassing, or, if possible, not embarrassing at all. Those are the types of situations that I'm talking about today, okay, those are the types of embarrassing situations that don't need to be embarrassing.

I do think it is kind of important to feel embarrassed when you fuck up in life. So I'm not really referring to that as much today, that type of embarrassment. So here's how I stopped getting embarrassed. There's two pieces to this, there's an external piece to this, and there's an internal piece to this, and both have to be in unison.

Okay, you can't have one without the other. They go hand in hand. Let's start with the external piece of it. It's about not seeming embarrassed to the outside world and not feeling embarrassed genuinely inside, right?

Maybe you get a little ping of embarrassment, but it goes away quickly. Let's start with how to seem like you're not embarrassed. When something embarrassing happens. The external piece of it. let's run through an embarrassing moment, something happens, it's embarrassing.

A lot of us, myself included, will just get filled with adrenaline. And we'll get super red. And we'll start talking really fast about God knows what to try to cover it up or whatever. And we'll seem frantic and all over the place. Some of us start crying, I feel like now that we're adults, maybe less, but still some people start crying or get really emotional when they get embarrassed. Everyone's a little bit different, but the first step is not rushing to do anything. Before you react at all, give yourself a second.

Okay, I'm not talking about like three seconds, I'm talking about like a second and a half. Okay, give yourself a little time to gather your thoughts, you don't need a lot of time. Let's give an example.

Let's say you trip and fall. Instead of rushing to get back up, slowly, start to get back up and just think for a second before you make your next move. The second that you start to feel yourself being embarrassed, slow down. no rushing. rushing leads to more embarrassment. I found step two.

Take deep breaths, keep it cool, do everything in your power to just.

Keep it cool, you can even lower your voice like this a little bit. I've done it when I've been embarrassed, lower my voice a little bit, talk super cool and calm, just relax.

Okay, now that you're slowed down, cooled down, it's time to make the next move. Now. There are a few options here, you can do all three, you can do two out of the three.

You can do one out of the three, it's up to you. Number one. Own it again. I'll use the tripping and falling example you trip and fall, you slowly, calmly get up and you say, whoops, you just own it.

What's another badass example? Let's say you say something embarrassing in a conversation, like you overshare a little bit about something, maybe you get a little TMI. You're talking about how you shit yourself last week and you can see that the other person didn't really like you bringing that up.

Like, they didn't respond well to that and now you're feeling a little bit embarrassed. What do you say? You say that was too much information, wasn't it? I'm really sorry.

That was just too much, you didn't deserve that, that was too much. Own it own. The fact that you just overshared, be like, you know what, that was a little TMI.

Wasn't it? I overshared again? The second you own it, you just diffuse the whole thing, like immediately everyone is disarmed. Number one, you feel good because you're like, I just got this off my chest.

There's no elephant in the room. Like, Oh, something embarrassing happened to me. It's off your chest, it's out there in the open, there's an open dialogue about it.

It doesn't feel like you have to tiptoe around it or cover it up or hide it. You just put it all out there and that allows you to just let it go and move on. On top of that, the people who witnessed the embarrassing moment or experienced the embarrassing moment will be like, Oh, they just made that not weird anymore. So now I don't think it's weird. And I actually kind of think that they're badass. They just owned it and then they just forget about it immediately. The second way to proceed is to turn it into a joke.

Okay, this is my default. Every time I get embarrassed, it's a joke. now, whoops, it's a joke. I trip and fall, I get up.

I take a bow. Is that really that funny? No, not really, but it's better than nothing, right? I say something embarrassing in a conversation, I somehow turn it into a joke.

I wish I had an example, I don't. But adding humor into it again immediately diffuses it. And the last way to proceed is to laugh with them. Something embarrassing happens, laughter erupts. You're the butt of the joke. Laugh with them, throw your fucking head back and cackle like you are the wicked witch. Cackle it up, laugh with them. Because I think sometimes you'll naturally just start laughing when something embarrassing happens to you.

But sometimes you might have to fake it a little bit, and that's okay too. Okay, sometimes the laugh is just the right way to go, and you'll know it, you'll feel it. You'd be like, I don't have a joke right now, I don't know how to address this head-on yet, just start laughing.

That doesn't apply in every situation, though. Like, if you're in a conversation and you say something that's weird or too much, and someone reacts weird to it. And then you feel embarrassed. It would be weird to just burst out laughing out of nowhere. So maybe don't use this method all the time, you'll know when it feels right.

After you've handled the initial blow of the embarrassment, how do you proceed? You want to know what I do. Move on immediately, like nothing ever happened now. Sometimes you have to fake it because sometimes you're still a little rattled.

Okay, the second, you see an opportunity to change the subject, to move on to something else, you do it. If there's no opportunity, you make the opportunity, something embarrassing happens.

You have your recovery, nothing's there to cling on to, to move on to. What do you do? You say something like, Have you seen Top gun Maverick?

The special effects in it are crazy. I don't know, I just thought about it. You just create something, okay, you pull something out of your ass, pull something out of your ass.

It might feel a little uncomfortable at first because you're like, Oh my God, I'm just brushing over this embarrassing thing that just happened. But don't worry about it, it's all about moving forward. Okay, leaving that shit in the past. And if you dance around it for too long, then it gets awkward and embarrassing again. You have to move past it.

You have to break the spell, you know what I mean, there's this embarrassment spell. You have to break it by changing the subject, moving on completely. And you have to do it as soon as possible. Or else you're setting yourself up for another embarrassing moment. Okay, now? All that is great for not seeming embarrassed on the outside, but none of that is possible without some internal work as well.

I think the internal work is the most impactful. But I will say that the art of playing it cool on the outside shall not be ignored, because that's in art in itself. I really saw a difference in my own life when I fixed a few things on the inside. Number one, my self-esteem. Now, listen, I'm constantly working on my self-esteem due to various factors. It's constantly getting better and then getting worse, and then getting way better, and then getting way worse. And then getting better, and then getting worse, then getting way better, and then getting way worse. There's no destination when it comes to working on your self-esteem.

You're never gonna get to a point where you're like, I am perfectly satisfied with where my self-esteem is that. But I will say, the better your self-esteem is, the easier it is to brush off an embarrassing moment. Because when your self-esteem is high, or as high as it can be, you don't really care what other people think. And at the end of the day, embarrassment comes down to what other people think of you. That's why we get embarrassed when we're anticipating a reaction from other people.

When we're more confident, we're less likely to be affected by what other people think. For me, my self-esteem is the best when I only have people around me who are on my team. Okay, they're rooting for me. I'm doing things in my life that make me proud in one way or another.

I'm doing good things for other people, I'm creatively satisfied in some way, I'm working hard and using a level of discipline. I'm taking the best care of myself that I possibly can while not being too strict, and I'm staying true to myself. Morals, values. Blah, blah, blah, shut up Emma.

I know, whatever, when my self-esteem is in a good spot, embarrassing moments are like, whatever, whatever. It's when my self-esteem is lower that it might take a little bit more effort to diffuse the embarrassment within myself. You know, that little flicker of embarrassment when something embarrassing happens, might linger a bit longer than when my self-esteem is high. When my self-esteem is high, I might not even get that flicker of embarrassment. Or if I do, it's so small and so short that it might as well have not even happened.

I've gotten to a point now where even when my self-esteem is low, I can still diffuse it. Because I've practiced not letting the embarrassment happen so much that now it's sort of muscle memory, so even when my self-esteem is a bit lower, I can still manage it, right, do you know what I mean? But it's just a little harder in those moments.

Number two, working on your ego and working on being as humble as possible. An inflated ego is so sensitive to an embarrassing moment like, imagine this, like, super cool person, right? Big ego, cocky. Seems like they have everything going for him. Imagine that person up on a stage in front of 500 people, doing a speech, and.

Accidentally forgetting their lines and in like looking through their papers, trying to figure out where they were completely losing themselves in front of everyone. That is going to be 50 times more embarrassing for that type of person than it would be for somebody who knows that they're just a human being. Okay, they're no superhero, they don't need to be the coolest person in the room at all times. It's easier for the person who's humble to recover from an embarrassing moment because their ego is tame.

It's so much better to approach every situation in life with humility and with no ego, or as little ego as possible. Because it sets you free, it gives you the room to go and embarrass yourself as much as you want. Because you see yourself as a normal, flawed human being, just like the rest of us. And you're not trying to prove to anyone that you're the most important, cool, badass person in the room. You've put yourself on the same level as everyone else and that keeps everything in check. I don't know, okay, so building on that, you got to drop the facade.

Okay, there are many facades that we put up, we put on a facade to protect ourselves, I think we can use these facades. When we're not confident in ourselves to our core. And we feel like, in order to be liked, we need to pretend to be something. I think we also use various facades to protect us from embarrassment. In a way, if we're portraying ourselves in a formulaic way that is proven to make people think of us a certain way, then there's no risk of being embarrassed.

Right when we put on a facade, we're copying something that we know works like. We know how we feel about the cool kid. So if we pretend to be like the cool kid, too, we can expect other people to react to us the way that we reacted to the cool kid. It's tested, it's well tested, whereas our unique personalities are not as well tested.

Do you know what I'm saying? Like, everyone is so different that it's more of a free-for-all. And it can be a bit scary. To be completely yourself, you don't know how people are gonna respond, you might get embarrassed, it might be embarrassing to be yourself, but here's what I've learned.

Okay, the hard way. When you try to be something you're not, you try to be the cool kid, you try to be the artsy kid, you try to be the hot person. You're creating an image that is impossible to upkeep because inevitably something will happen that will break that fantasy, right? And it'll usually come through an embarrassing moment.

Something embarrassing happens, and now your facade is broken. Because you put on this facade and think that it protects you from all things embarrassing. And you almost convince other people that you're indestructible. And then, when something does happen, the illusion is completely shattered, and you're even more embarrassed than you need to be. Because now not only did something embarrassing happen to you, but also your facade has sort of been shattered. Do you know what I'm saying? It's so much better to remove the facade and just be a human being who's dynamic and has flaws and has strengths, and who accepts both of those things about themselves.

Because when you portray that human side of yourself, people expect embarrassing things to happen, because embarrassing things happen to normal human beings. You're not setting an expectation that's too high, you're setting a very normal, healthy expectation. Like, yeah, I'm just a human being. I'm gonna have embarrassing moments and I'm gonna have really cool moments, that's me, I'm a human. Whereas the cool kid is expected to never have an embarrassing moment. Because they're the cool kid. And the hot kid is supposed to always be suave and cool and never fumble.

You see what I mean, okay? Next, you do have to try to let go of what people think of you. And this is like the worst piece of advice ever, because it's so hard to do.

I more like this. People who love you and care about you are not gonna judge you when something embarrassing happens. I'm not gonna stop loving you when something embarrassing happens. And those are the people that really matter, those are the opinions that really matter, and when you have that, it doesn't matter what anyone else thinks.

And so there's that piece of it, right? The most important people in your life will love you regardless, but that doesn't help with the rest of the world. Now, does it? The truth is, you can't control what other people think of you.

You can only control what you do. And I think when you're doing your absolute best doesn't mean perfect, but when you're doing your absolute best. To be a good person, to do the right thing, you don't have to care what other people think of you, it's very.

Hard to ignore what people think of you when deep down you don't feel good about yourself.

You don't feel confident in who you are, you're not proud of yourself. This world is so big, there are gonna be a lot of people that laugh at you, make fun of you. There are also going to be a lot of people who love you and adore you. And the only people that really matter are the people that love you and adore you.

Despite the embarrassing, cringy, weird, awkward moments, the other people don't really matter as much. Next, remember that the people around you are human, too. Okay, they've been embarrassed before, too. You're not special just because you got embarrassed. This time doesn't mean anything.

Everyone that just witnessed or experienced the embarrassing moment has also been embarrassed before. It's just your time right now. This has been so helpful for me to remember, like, wait a minute, this has happened to everyone. I'm not special and this is just part of being human.

And last but not least, I try to remember how iconic it is to do something embarrassing and then to recover smoothly. It inspires me when something embarrassing happens within a split second, I'm inspired to turn it into a win. Every embarrassment now is an opportunity to win. Whether I make it a funny joke, or I address it head-on and own it and prove to other people that I'm self-aware in some way. Or I'm just laughing it off with them releasing some endorphins with those who are laughing at me or I play it so cool that everyone's like, Wow, she's really comfortable with herself.

That's cool, it's iconic to have a smooth recovery from an embarrassing moment, so that's how I stopped getting embarrassed. Okay, now you might be thinking, Emma, you didn't fully eradicate the feeling.

You know, it still pops up a little bit here and there, it still has to be covered up a little bit here and there. Yeah, but overall it's gone. okay, it's gone. I. I refuse to be embarrassed.

I refuse, and so I almost never get embarrassed anymore. It's taken practice over time, like I've had to practice all of these things, internal and external, and over time I've gotten better at it now.

It just comes naturally, I don't even have to think about it anymore. In the beginning, a lot of it was sort of forced in a way. Because I had to teach myself how to not get embarrassed. But then over time, it became an instinct and now I just don't get embarrassed anymore as much. It takes time, it's a journey.

It's a process, you know, I imagine it works a little differently for everyone, but I think that it's an incredible skill to teach yourself. Because when you're not afraid of being embarrassed, because you know how to handle being embarrassed. Number one, it's easier to be yourself, which is the most charming version of yourself that you can be. Number two. It makes you more open to trying new things. Because you're not afraid of being embarrassed, and it just takes a weight off of you. Walking around, not being afraid of being embarrassed is such a relief. That's like a weight that we carry around when we don't have it figured out. You know, I can't tell you the relief.

I feel in my life now that I'm not afraid of being embarrassed because I know exactly how to handle it. There used to be a few key scenarios that really made me embarrassed, and now I know exactly how to handle them. For example, getting compliments I've always had a hard time with receiving compliments because I don't always believe that I deserve them. And I also don't know what to say, I don't know how to respond. And I used to get really red and respond chaotically and be like, Oh.

Like, no, no, like, no, like. Somebody would be like, you look really good today, and they're like, No, I don't know, I don't know, I don't. My hair looks like shit. I didn't wipe when I pooped this morning, like, nope.

Nope, nope, nope, nope, like I would freak out.

And now I try to take people's compliments to heart. And instead of, you know, responding the way that I used to, I just say, You know what? Thank you so much. And if I'm feeling uncomfortable and I'm like, I don't know what to say after thank you, I'll just compliment them back about something. And then I move on, I move on. I also used to get embarrassed about seeming like I'm trying too hard.

For example, a school dance would be coming up. I used to dread anytime I had to get dressed up because I was always afraid that I was gonna be the one that overdressed. And looks like they were trying too hard. Nowadays. What I do is I try as hard as I want in any scenario in life and I just own it if I want to. Go all out and get super dolled up to go out to dinner with my friends and they didn't get all dolled up and I did. And it's kind of weird, cuz it's like, Wow, she tried really hard tonight. Yeah, I did try really hard tonight because I was in the mood.

Who the fuck cares? why do you care? I wanted to get dolled up, so what? that's not embarrassing, that I wanted to get all dolled up. That's cool that I wanted to put effort into something. So I've sort of reframed it in my head. Where I'm like, I'm just gonna try as hard as I want and I'm just gonna own it.

And if I own it, then it's not embarrassing anymore. Because I think what was embarrassing about it was like, Oh, I don't want people to think that. I didn't get the memo. And I tried too hard because I'm out of the loop, but when you own it, then you're like, No, no, I'm in the loop, I'm in the loop. I just tried as hard as I wanted to try, cuz I wanted to do what I wanted to do.

You see, I'm saying next, I've always hated.

Tripping and people freaking out and being like, Oh my God, are you okay? are you okay? Always hated that. I mean, I think we all do, but what do I do now?

Make a joke out of it, make a fucking joke out of it. I might trip and fall on the floor and instead of getting up immediately, I do a pose on the ground. Or I get up and I say, take me to the hospital. You can only say that, though, to somebody who, like, has a sense of humor, because some people might be like, we actually. And it's now you're actually creating more embarrassment, so, you know, read the room a little bit. But it's that I've also always felt really embarrassed by being like, Oh, my God.

I don't know how to explain this. It's always been so embarrassing to me. It still kind of is actually, this is something I'm still working on. This is like the one thing that's still challenging for me.

Like all other things, I feel like I'm good, I don't get embarrassed. This has been the hardest thing for me to.

Stop getting embarrassed about sex, like anything with sex, or it's anything sexual, anything sex. Which is funny. Because it's not like I don't talk about it, or it's not like talking about it makes me uncomfortable.

Am I t am I about to overshare? Damn it, it's possible. I'm already like handling the embarrassment of me oversharing right now by being like, Oh, my oversharing, I'm addressing it.

I'm addressing it up front. Sex and being sexual can be very embarrassing. Okay, it can be embarrassing to me. Like, I'm pretty good at handling like embarrassing moments, like I feel like there are so many embarrassing moments during sex. And I think the reason for that is because we're dealing with two people who are trying to impress the other person. And that goes back to the whole thing with the facade, like a lot of times, you put on a facade when you're trying to court somebody else to have sex with them.

And I found that I'm less embarrassed in that situation when I'm just fully being myself, but here's the problem fully being yourself is like, not stereotypically hot. Do you know what I'm saying all the time? Like, there's a lot of facade going on with sex and like, that is. What we're sort of taught to do is like, oh, we're supposed to be like, hot and mysterious, and like crazy and like, freak, like what it's like a lot of times.

That's not genuine. I think that those traits can come out genuinely. But at least in my experience, it's like, in order for those things to come out genuinely, I have to be being myself across the board. And that's a little scary, right? Because, again, as I mentioned earlier, it's much safer to have a facade, especially in romantic situations. Because you want the person that you're courting. To think that you're hot, you know what I mean, or to think that you're cool. And so the most obvious way to convince them of that is to put on a facade that you are. That then the problem is when you have that facade up. Then anytime anything goes wrong, it's like, Oh, it's breaking the spell, you know? It's shattering this illusion if you go into these types of situations being completely yourself.

It is a bit scarier because you're like, Oh, my god, I'm not all hot, cool, mysterious. Across the board, you know, I'm much more dynamic than that. When you enter a situation being full yourself, it's scarier, you know? But I will say that it eliminates a lot of the embarrassing moments because something embarrassing happens. And you can just kind of laugh it off and like, it's fine. Do you know what I mean?

Because no facade is being shattered. But even beyond that, like beyond an actual sexual situation, even just me thinking about myself in a sexual context is embarrassing to me. Or was I'm getting better about it again? This has been the hardest one for me to to figure out. This is like the one outlier like. This is the one thing I've not cracked the code of, because there's more work that needs to be done with this one.

Okay, I think it's because it's such a deeply vulnerable.

Thing that is so personal that it's embarrassing. Like you really let your guard down when you have sex and like, you, you know what I mean, like, you just you let your guard down. And so then, in retrospect, it can be so embarrassing. You're like, Oh my God, I can't believe I did that.

Like, what, what did they think of that? We really put the opinions of people that we have sex with on a pedestal. A lot of times, not always, but a lot of times, because I don't know. We usually think highly of these people, that's why we're having sex with them.

If we did not feel that way about them, we might not do that. But the thing is like, there's nothing to be embarrassed of. Again, it's so human to have sex and to be a sexual person. There's nothing cringe about it, there's nothing embarrassing about it. Yes, it's deeply vulnerable, deeply personal, but it's what we do.

Okay, it's what we do. That's all I have for today, you guys, that's it, that's fucking it, that's all I have to say. I hope that you all enjoyed this episode and if you did, let me know.

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I just hope that you're all having a phenomenal day and you're feeling good, and if you're not, I hope that you have a phenomenal day and feel good soon. And as always, it's such a pleasure to spend time with you. And I'm so grateful to all of you who tune in and want to hang out. Because you don't have to do this. And you do, and that means a lot to me. And I just love us, I love us and I love you, and I'll talk to you soon. New episodes every Thursday and Sunday, so I'll see you when I see you.