Feeling Human

I’m one of those rare Indian people who actually turn red when I’m embarrassed.  And as a teenager, this was often.  I was an immigrant kid, who just wanted to fit in.  But it’s hard to fit in as a teenager when you coat smells like curry, your parents speak with accents, and you have to explain to all the kids at the Baptist school why you go to church on Saturday (The eighties were not a time of great cultural or religious diversity.  I was a double minority in high school).   

Somehow I didn’t die of embarrassment in my teens, but embarrassment continued to plague me through my 20s and 30s.  There was the time I got my period unexpectedly during step aerobics class, the time I threw up in the cycling studio at Lifetime Fitness, and every tear (sob) that I shed in the parking lot (hallway) when each of my kids went to kindergarten.   As an introvert, I think I feel embarrassment more than my extroverted friends.  It seems like extroverts relish publicity and smile when even their negative moments are on stage. When embarrassing moments come, I sink into a corner and wish the ground would swallow me up. 

I don’t know when it happened, but somehow after having three kids and all of the weird, embarrassing moments that come with that (the nudity required in the hospital alone is enough to make an introvert cringe), but now that I’m in my 40s, I try to lean into my embarrassment, and embrace the shame.  We all have embarrassing moments, and there is no reason that I feel like a loser or a bad parent when I occasionally forget to pick up my youngest at kids’ church, or someone wears two different shoes to the mall.   When I lean into the moments, sometimes I can laugh, or at the very least KNOW that I am not the first (or only) person to experience this feeling of shame.    

The other day, I was at a private doctor’s appt., when a teacher, Ms. K. *, from my new school comes in.  I was cringing (and texting Kumar), wishing I were not seen in this building.  Things got even worse, with a not-so-private exchange in the lobby, and I had to just lean into the conversation, without feeling anger or shame.  When I talked with Kumar later, tears fell, when I told him that I’m not made for these public displays of drama. I cannot prevent or avoid these moments.  They are just a   part of life.   The next morning I went in to work, wondering if I should acknowledge the awkward meeting with Ms. K or just hide in my office. Ms. K ended up dropping by my office, to tell me why she was at the doctor.  It turns out that she didn’t even notice my private/not private exchange because she was so worried about ME seeing HER! 

 Embarrassment and shame are part of all of our worlds.  We worry about what people think of us, when we live in our own heads rather than realize how these human moments and feelings are universal. The struggle, the pain, the mistakes are all part of a greater purpose, the universal experience of being HUMAN.  

*fake initial