Love In The Hard

Breaking Free: Transforming Guilt and Shame into Growth and Potential

• Cindi and Patrick Pistelli • Season 1 • Episode 3

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Have you ever felt trapped by the suffocating weight of guilt and shame, unsure of how to break free? Join us, Patrick and Cindi Pistelli, as we candidly explore these powerful emotions and their profound effects on personal and entrepreneurial journeys. We'll share intimate stories of confronting inadequacy in roles that define us, from parenthood to partnership, and even the trials of unmet educational ambitions. By distinguishing guilt from shame, we aim to transform guilt into a catalyst for growth while shedding the harmful identity that shame creates. Discover how acknowledging these feelings can dismantle the barriers holding you back, allowing you to fully embrace the life and business you are destined to lead.

Together, we tackle the complex challenge of valuing oneself in business, especially in those early stages when self-doubt often stifles potential. Cindi opens up about her own experiences in the massage industry, illustrating how undervaluing her services was a manifestation of deeper insecurities, a narrative familiar to many entrepreneurial couples. We delve into the importance of rewriting these stories, releasing guilt and shame to unlock dreams once thought unattainable. By setting boundaries and harnessing faith, inspired by the comforting words of Romans 8:1, we encourage listeners to take actionable steps towards growth. Let's celebrate victories, big or small, and shift focus from past missteps to the exciting possibilities of future potential.

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Cindi:

Hey friends, welcome to Love in the Hard, where we share our journey of resilience, faith and transformation, diving into raw real-life challenges like overcoming past trauma, self-doubt and building a strong, loving family, all with the hope of inspiring others to seek God's hand in their own stories.

Patrick:

We are Patrick and Cindi Pistelli, and we are here to remind you that you are not alone. There's hope even when life feels tough, so grab a seat and let's get real.

Cindi:

Hey everyone, welcome back to Love in the Hard. We are super excited for today's episode, episode three. If you've been tuning in, you know we've been diving deep into some real, some raw conversations. So, last week we shared some of the past traumas that we've gone through and how those experiences shaped us. And today we're going to take it a step further, talking about guilt and shame and how those experiences shaped us. And today we're going to take it a step further, talking about guilt and shame and how those impact relationships and entrepreneurship and, most importantly, how to overcome them.

Patrick:

Yeah, because here's the thing Guilt and shame don't just stay in one area of your life. If you're carrying guilt about something in your past, it's going to show up in how you approach your relationships, your decisions, your business, every aspect of your life. So for me, guilt and shame came from feeling like I didn't measure up, and those thoughts made me question my worth in every single area of my life.

Cindi:

That's so real. And for me, guilt came from feeling like I wasn't doing enough, whether it was as a mom, a wife or even just in business. And shame, that is the heavier stuff. That's the voice that says you are not enough. But the good news is, guilt and shame don't have to define your future. So, whether you're driving or whether you're at home, settle in and let's talk about how to release those feelings and step into the life and business God called you to. So let's start by talking about what guilt and shame actually do to us. So, as I said earlier, for me guilt was like this constant nagging voice that said you are not doing enough. So, whether that was with the kids or with you, or just even in the business, I felt like I was always falling short of something. Shame that is deeper. That's not just a you know, hey, I messed up. That is more of a hey, I am a mess up. So it's taking on that persona of, this is who I am, Not just this is something that I did.

Patrick:

I think it's important that we kind of define the terms of guilt and shame a little bit so that we understand what we are talking about and you touched on it some there that guilt has more to do with an action, whereas shame becomes a part of our persona, becomes part of our character, if you will. So I think that guilt can actually be productive for us, whereas shame is detrimental Guilt. If we will take an opportunity to look at the things that we did and learn from them, then that is a good thing. But shame, though, I think, is when guilt is unresolved. Guilt is unresolved, so we do something, we don't take the opportunity to resolve that within our minds, and then it becomes part of who we are.

Patrick:

For me, I dealt with shame because I never finished college. It made me feel like a failure. So there's a difference between failing and being a failure. I didn't finish college. That was something I did, but it didn't define who I was. In my mind, though, I was a failure, because I never finished college Made me feel like I wasn't good enough really to do anything. I'm not good enough to run a business. I'm not good enough to be a husband. I'm not good enough to run a business. I'm not good enough to be a husband. I'm not good enough to lead a church. I'm not good enough to be a father, because I had convinced myself that I was a failure, instead of just simply the fact that I had failed.

Cindi:

Yeah, I think that's so true. Guilt and shame both can paralyze you. So in relationships they tend to make you pull away because you don't actually feel worthy of a connection, which is interesting because you know, shame is a fear of disconnection, and so, and then in business, they can keep you playing small, so they can cause you to not take any risks, not go after what you really want, because you don't actually believe that you deserve success. So, but the truth is, those feelings aren't from God, those are lies that are meant to just keep you stuck where you are, and as long as you just keep believing that, you're never going to grow and you're never going to push forward and see what you really can do.

Patrick:

So for you, hon, what are some areas in your life where you carried shame? And then, what are some areas or what are some methods you used to let go of the shame? I'm really showing restraint because I really want to break out into a song and just sing Let it Go right now, but I'm not going to. What are some areas or some ways that you were able to let go of the shame?

Cindi:

So I think, for me, guilt and shame weren't really tied to my past relationships but, honestly, more to the expectations that I put on myself. As you know, a mom, a wife, an entrepreneur I would think you know, am I doing enough? Am I enough? It was the constant pressure to constantly be everything to everyone, kind of just a yes person, so, you know, always trying to please everyone else. So, and when I couldn't meet those standards, I'd completely beat myself up.

Cindi:

So, like you, not finishing college, I also didn't finish high school, and so I ended up getting the GED, and so that stuck with me throughout everything, because here I am wanting to be an entrepreneur and I feel called to that, and that's just what resonates with me. But yet then the back of my mind there was always like, well, you know, you didn't finish school, so are you going to, you know, pursue this? Now, if you know the backstory on why I didn't graduate from an actual school and I had to get a GED, it's due to an illness that I had not, because I just decided to, you know, give up and quit. So but that is something that has held me back. So a turning point for me was realizing that I didn't have to carry that weight. I started giving myself grace and just reminding myself that God doesn't call us to be perfect, but he does call us to be faithful.

Patrick:

I think you touched on something really, really important there that we tend to overlook, and that is you talked about the expectations that you put on yourself. I think a lot of the times, the guilt and shame that we feel, it may be because of something that we've done, but more often than not, I think it is probably a result of the fact that we did not meet expectations that we had set for ourselves, and that leads to a sense of shame. I'm not whatever because I didn't whatever. I didn't meet this expectation that I had set for myself. For me, that plays into the fact that I had set this expectation for myself, and not only me, but I felt like everybody else had set this expectation upon me, To graduate from college. I was going to be an engineer and I was going to have this great life, and when that didn't happen, I felt like a failure because I didn't meet my own expectations, but I also didn't meet the expectations that I felt like other people had for me. So in order for me to overcome that, I had to accept that my past does not define my worth. I used to think that if I couldn't finish college, then what does that say about me? Well, it says that I'm a failure. It says that nothing I do is going to be good enough and I'm not going to be able to finish anything. But I had to come to the point that I realized that God does not measure me by my mistakes. He sees my potential and, honestly, a big part of that entire journey was you reminding me to stop seeing myself through the lens of my past and to start seeing myself through God's grace my past and to start seeing myself through God's grace, and that's the key really right there is.

Cindi:

o know, these things lose their power when you bring them into light. So for me, I was so embarrassed of the fact that I didn't graduate from high school from, you know, avon High School is where I went and that I didn't graduate from that place. I allowed that to consume me for most of my life, and so it was when I finally just took power over that and said, you know, it's not like I just gave up, you know it's because of an illness. But when I finally decided to claim that and just own that, then you know I was able to talk to other people through that. So you know, whether it's through, you know, prayer, conversation or even journaling, somehow you've got to get those feelings out of your head.

Cindi:

Journaling, for me, was huge. I've mentioned that before. So you know I just write down the things that I was going through or what I felt you know were holding me back, and you know I would really kind of look at things and say, is is this actually true? So you know, we we put it out there and we say is this actually true or is this just a lie that I'm believing.

Patrick:

So now let's talk a little bit about how guilt and shame show up in business.

Cindi:

Yeah. So this one for me is a really big one. For me it really looked like parts of it were just undercharging for my services. When I opened my massage business, I remember the prices that most people charged. I looked at and I thought, well, who am I to ask for that kind of price? I'm brand new at this. Like, why would I feel comfortable charging for that? You know, because at the time I felt like it was about the money.

Cindi:

But what it was actually about at that time is not valuing myself. So I saw all these prices and I saw what other people could charge. But in my mind I would say, well, that's because they've been doing this a while, that's because they're really good at this, that's because, you know, insert whatever excuse you want to give. That's what I was doing. And so I remember in the beginning it was almost like I would ask them a question, like they would. They would come in and I would work on them and then I would say, okay, that to charge that. But that has tied into every business I've been in. It's almost like I have to believe it for myself before I can be confident in it, versus just, you know, going into it full confidence.

Patrick:

Yeah, and even though the confidence in your abilities grew, I think the confidence to charge never really caught up. And I'm just going to tell you guys that Cindy is the best there is when it comes to massage. Her hands are magical when it comes to taking away your pain, relaxing all of those things. And I don't know how many times you had people tell you you do not charge enough for what you do. And I think also and we've talked about this that you also you covered that by saying well, I want people to be able to afford to have the help that they need to feel better, and I think that was true. I think you did want that, but I think the underlying cause of that was you just didn't value yourself the way that you should have, and I'm no different in that, and in my home inspection business, I've always felt like maybe there were people out there that were better than me and they could charge a certain amount, whereas I couldn't.

Patrick:

So I know exactly what it's like to feel like you're not enough. I really feel like guilt and shame and imposter syndrome are very, very closely related when you carry shame from your past and you feel like you're not worthy enough, or when I feel like I'm not worthy or I'm not good enough, or how can I help people. It's hard to imagine yourself being successful in anything, whether we're talking about business relationships, in any facet of your life. But the truth is those feelings don't have to hold us back, because the reality is shame and guilt and even imposter syndrome we'll talk about that later. They're all built on a foundation that is a lie, or at the very least it is a partial truth. A lie, or at the very least it is a partial truth. So they don't have to hold you back and we do have the ability, we have the right to rewrite the story.

Cindi:

I feel like a lot of entrepreneurial couples can kind of relate to this. I know for me I would basically try to make up for things by working a lot. I was definitely a workaholic. I don't necessarily think I am now, but for a long time it was just like I would dive into work. Honestly, I would dive into work for whatever thing.

Cindi:

You know, if I was going through something traumatic, if I was going through something you know it was, work for me was really like an escape and to get away from. So on one hand, you know you have this, I don't feel like I am enough, I shouldn't be charging these things, and on the other hand, you just completely throw yourself into it. So I think sometimes you have couples that you know one person is like that. They completely dive into work and it consumes them. I think you have couples where maybe they see the other person working so much and then they feel guilt or shame for maybe feeling like they're not contributing as much. Maybe that's financially, maybe that's just creativity, you know, whatever that is, I just feel like it creates this cycle of guilt and resentment that can come when you're working with your partner. That can hurt both of you know your relationship and the business.

Patrick:

Here's the thing, though when we let go of guilt and shame. Here's the thing, though when we let go of guilt and shame, we free ourselves to dream bigger. And and for me, letting go of guilt and shame, it freed me up to dream. Like you and I have had the conversation, like you've asked me what are your dreams? And? And you've had to say I want to know what your dreams are, not, don't just tell me that your dream is to to do whatever your dream is Like.

Patrick:

You want me to have my own dreams, and I've never been able to do that because of the fact that I've always felt like I wasn't worthy, worthy, and so the idea of having a dream to me, just it seemed just like that. It was a dream that was never going to to take place. So, starting a business, having a podcast, putting all of this out there, that wasn't even in the realm of possibility for me. But once you were able to encourage me and that's a huge part of this for me is the encouragement that you have given me that I am capable and I'm not a failure and you believe in me At that point I was able to stop worrying about what others think. I was able to stop worrying about what I've done in the past and I was able to start focusing on what is possible, and that that's when real growth happens.

Cindi:

So I'm just going to piggyback off of that for a little bit, because you mentioned just the portion about dreaming, and I think that is so important, not just for entrepreneurship but just for couples, because I think we get to a point in our relationship or even in our business where we stop dreaming, we stop believing that we can have, you know, specific things, because a lot of times we just feel like it's so far out there. But when we're able to really do the work to get past the things of our past, it opens us up truly to be able to see the bigger picture and finally start to say you know, hey, I would like to, you know, do XYZ, and I can actually see myself doing that. So I think that's so important Because in you know, whether you're in a relationship or a business, especially when you're a couple working together in a business, it can become very much all work and no play and all work and no dream, really, because you start just okay, what, what should we talk about for the next episode, or what should we? You know, how do we tie the kids into this, or how do we do this? You know it becomes very much where we are just business.

Cindi:

All the time and I know, at least for us we have had moments where we're like, no, let's stop. Let's figure out this dream that we want to create and then reverse engineer it and figure out how we can go about doing that, because I think the first step in that is being able to really go through the healing process and be able to let go of the things that are really holding you back, because that's all it really is in reality. We don't dream and we don't put ourself out there because we're scared. We have a fear of what are others going to think or how is this going to affect us or anyone else.

Patrick:

So how do you let go of the guilt and the shame so that you can move forward and live the dream that together you've put out there?

Cindi:

I think here are some practical tips that you can try. One of them is you need to reframe the narrative. Um. So, instead of saying I failed, say I learned, because you know when we, when we put things out there, we start believing them. So if you, if you get to a point where you say I get to do this, versus I have to do this, or oh gosh, I failed, no, you didn't fail, you learned from it, because you know we're all going to fail. Every, everyone's going to make mistakes. That's just a part of life. We're going to make mistakes, mistakes.

Cindi:

But one of the terms I really like is fail forward, because, yeah, you're gonna mess up sometimes, but take what you've learned from that and move forward. The other thing, too, is to communicate honestly. So, whether it's with your partner, with a mentor you know whoever that might be talk about what you're feeling, because if you hold things in, that's only going to make your guilt and shame stronger. So get those feelings out, just really talk about them and set clear boundaries. You need to balance your time and your energy so you're not constantly feeling pulled in different directions.

Patrick:

One more thing I would add is that you may hear me say this a lot, because this is kind of the way that I approach this is that we have to recognize the lie or the mistruth that has caused us to think the way that we do. Then we have to release that lie or mistruth, we have to let it go, and then we have to replace the lie or the mistruth with the actual truth, and don't forget to lean on Christ. One of my favorite scriptures is Romans 8.1. "There is no condemnation than for those who are in Christ Jesus. So whenever I feel the guilt creeping in, I just have to remind myself that God's grace is so much bigger than any and all of my mistakes.

Cindi:

And also take things one step at a time. Our brains can't actually focus on a really big picture, so we have to break it down into little, bite-sized steps, letting go of these things. It's not going to happen overnight, so don't beat yourself up if, if you know you're, you're making all this progress and then you maybe get a setback, don't don't focus on that, because as long as you're moving the needle forward, as long as you're taking one small step forward, then you're doing great. So celebrate those little wins and give yourself grace along the way. So, guys, we hope today's episode really encouraged you to start just letting go of your guilt and shame. You know whether that's in your relationship, whether that's in your business, whether that's in both. I just want you to remember that your past doesn't define you. You are not your past. You were made for bigger things. So and remember that God's grace is bigger for bigger things. So and remember that God's grace is bigger.

Cindi:

You're worthy of love and you're worthy of success

Patrick:

And, if you're struggling to navigate all of this, just know that we're here to help. Our coaching is all about helping couples overcome these things that are impacting their relationships, their marriages, their families, their businesses, all across the board so that they can thrive together in life and in business. So feel free to reach out to us anytime on Instagram or Facebook. We are happy to help.

Cindi:

Guys, thank you so much for listening. Don't forget to subscribe and share this episode with somebody who needs to hear it and remember. Thank you so much for listening. Don't forget to subscribe and share this episode with somebody who needs to hear it and remember you are not your past, you are made for more, so until next time, keep growing, keep going.

Patrick:

We'll see you back here on Love in the Hard. And remember love is worth it, even in the hard.

Cindi:

God bless.

Cindi:

Hey friend, thanks for listening. If you got something out of this episode, be sure to follow or subscribe to Love in the Hard on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen, so you never miss a new episode. Please take time to leave a review, especially if you listen on Apple Podcasts. This will help more people access honest conversations about building lasting relationships, resilience through life's hardest moments and mindset shifts to overcome self-doubt and if you're really feeling it, go ahead and screenshot this episode on your phone and share it on social media.

Patrick:

Tag us at Love in the Hard on Facebook and Instagram and we'll be sure to reshare your post. Thanks again for listening. We'll see you next time.