How Shame Can Affect the Single’s Heart: An Interview with Jill
In the following interview, Jill (49) talks about shame and how it can affect people’s hearts—especially if they’ve been single for a long time. If you’re in that place, this interview could have a dramatic effect on your hope! Jill is the author of The Fire of Delay: Navigating Seasons of Extended Waiting. Coming soon.
BTO: How can shame affect the heart of a single man or woman?
Jill: Shame is directly connected to our identity, which is directly connected to our heart. Guilt comes out of “I’ve done something wrong,” but shame tends to be this subconscious belief that “I am bad.” That is the difference between guilt and shame. A lot of people mix those up.
Spiritually, shame can cause a lack of faith. It’s very hard to have faith in that place, and there’s often a subtle distrust of God.
Mentally, shame can cause double-mindedness. You may know that you’re a child of God and that you’re righteous by the blood of Jesus, but you can find yourself being double-minded subconsciously. The grid of shame says, “You’re supposedly righteous and making good decisions, but…there’s evidence to show you’re not quite right with God. You’re how old? And you’re still single?” The grid of shame keeps you in double-mindedness.
Also, studies have found that a grid of shame can put you physiologically into what is called fight or flight. Shame can directly affect your nervous system. Because of that fight or flight, your body receives messages the same way it would as if you were crossing a road and saw a bus headed toward you. Your body would shut down all other focuses and go into self-preservation. Your blood would start flowing straight to your limbs in order to get you out of there. That’s how the nervous system responds when we are functioning through the grid of shame. We can remain in that place of fight or flight subconsciously—it’s just always there.
Jesus says, “Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” But somebody who is struggling with shame can’t do this very easily.
BTO: How can we calm our nervous system so we no longer respond to life with a “fight or flight” mentality?
One of the ways to calm the nervous system is through comfort.
Spiritually, Adam and Eve were naked and vulnerable in the garden but had no shame. Their spiritual eyes were open before they ate the fruit, but the moment Eve got deceived, ate from the tree, and gave some to Adam—their physical eyes were opened. Now they were physically aware that they were naked, and they knew shame.
On a spiritual level, we can recognize that what we see with our physical eyes and what we see with our spiritual eyes often can be different. The goal is to focus in with the eyes of the spirit and see what God is seeing. “How do You see my situation, God?” We can answer that question with the Word and from spending time with the Spirit, hearing His voice.
He might unwrap the answer through words somebody else gives you, through a dream, by giving you a picture of what He sees. He might give you a physical vision of your future, which is what He did for me, or He might also confirm that your desires are His desires and give you passages from the Bible so you can stay in the spiritual place of seeing from His perspective.
Having His perspective helps with the mental piece of being double-minded. When we’re double-minded, our nervous system gets wired up and we can go into fight or flight. But as we get used to seeing from His perspective, we might not see the answer completely with our physical eyes—but the physical answer is not what we lean on. We end up trusting the Lord in all our ways and leaning not on our own understanding. A lot of “our own understanding” comes from what we see with our physical eyes.
I know what God has shown me. Now what am I going to trust? Am I going to trust my physical eyes—or what He is showing me in the spirit?
We need to get used to focusing with what the Bible calls a single eye. Jesus said, “If your eye is single, your entire body will be filled with light.” If your eye is focused on one thing—and for us, it is what the Father is saying in the spirit realm—we can walk in His light.
That is where the nervous system can calm. That’s where we become able to rest our mind, coming to Him and giving Him the burden of the physical issue. As we do this, we receive from Him the spiritual rest and the truth that He is taking care of us. This affects our nervous system and comforts it, and our entire body is filled with light.
Check out a few of our other love-story interviews:
For more information on sex, marriage, and finding the person who is right for you, get a copy of Becoming the One by Salomé Roat. Click here to learn more. The book is also available in Spanish.