Your Suitcase Is Full: Unpacking the Shame We Carry
Have you ever felt completely paralysed by something that should be simple? Packing a suitcase. Choosing an outfit. Showing up as yourself. If you’ve ever spiralled over what other people might think of you, this episode is for you.
I am packing for a six-month solo adventure, which sounds exciting, until Polly Packer showed up. Polly is that relentless inner critic who turns packing a bag into a full emotional workout. In this episode, I trace that anxiety all the way back to its roots: shame.
Through two wonderfully mortifying stories, I unpack how our brains turn moments of what should be just embarrassment into beliefs we carry for decades. I explore where shame comes from, why it has such a grip on us, and most importantly, how to loosen that grip with some honesty, a reality check, and a healthy dose of laughter.
Hey, everybody. Welcome to Laughter Revolution. I’m your host, Marla Simlett, and I built this podcast on the premise that while life can be heavy, getting through it doesn’t always have to be.
Now, today I’m going to be talking about baggage, both actual luggage and the kind of baggage that we lug around with us that keeps us stuck, sometimes really, really stuck.
So let’s get into it.
What’s the Sticky?
I’m actually packing a bag right now because, as some of you know, I’m getting ready to go on a six-month solo travel journey. And my mandate for this luggage is really strict because I’ve got some arm injuries, I’ve got some back stuff going on, so I can’t carry a lot of stuff myself.
And I’m leaving my personal pack mule, who also answers to Michel, my husband, home for this one, so it’s all up to me.
In theory, figuring out how to pack and what I need to take should be pretty easy. I could put a query into ChatGPT or any other AI platform, and it would bring out a list of what I need to pack based on the countries I think I’m going to in a nice, concise checklist. I could print that off, and Bob’s your uncle.
But the reality for me is a little bit different because I’ve always had issues with packing, and it’s more deep-seated than just what I’m putting in my suitcase.
What happens for me is this cycle starts where I start to ruminate and worry about what I’m going to take. I over plan, I overpack, I overshop. At one point I had no word of a lie, four pairs of black linen pants in my possession because I was trying to find the exact ones that were going to go with everything and were going to be the lightest.
So it’s an issue, and it’s really stressful for me and really hard on me. Because not only is that happening, that cycle of pack, take it out, take a look at it, rinse, repeat, pack, take it out, take a look at it, not only is that going on, I’ve got all this chatter in my head.
The first voice that comes up is always my father. God bless him, he was a judgy man. And anytime I would even think about packing, his voice comes in. “Jesus, Marla, why are you taking all this stuff? The only thing you need to go on a trip is a toothbrush and an extra pair of underwear.” I’m sure my siblings, if they’re listening to this, are nodding their heads because that was the party line.
The other things that keep coming up for me are, “Oh my God, you need to look just right. You’re going to look all mismatched. When people look at you, they’re going to judge you.”
And this chatter goes on, and on, and on, this internal dialogue. When I realized that this was happening for me, I started to do an informal poll with people I knew, and guess what? There are people out there who pack like it’s nothing. And maybe that’s you, and if so, giving you a clap ’cause I am in awe of that.
There are people who might make a little list, then they put it in a bag, and they zip it up, and they take it to the airport, and they’re gone. That’s it. It’s not me.
But I realize that because there is a different experience to be had, that this was more than just my carry-on luggage. I had already had a whole suitcase of shame that I was lugging around with me that was making this even more difficult.
So, hands up if you’ve ever experienced shame.
Now, if I could see through this camera, I would see pretty much everyone with their hand up because researchers actually believe that shame is one of the most universal, powerful, and painful emotions that we have. Just think about it. Has anyone ever said to you, “Shame on you”? Strikes fear into your heart because it is so powerful.
Have you ever wondered where shame comes from or why it’s so powerful? I do. So I did a little research, and I’m going to share that with you.
Did you know that shame actually showed up as a survival mechanism years and years and years ago? So it was used when we still lived in little villages or tribes or back in the caveman days when we needed to keep people connected, and if people were different or people didn’t belong, they would be cast out, exiled out into the desert or the woods or whatever, where being exiled meant certain death.
So literally keeping yourself in line, keeping yourself with the group was survival. And shame goes to our very core for that reason. It’s that survival mechanism, and what it tells us is this: Not like guilt. It’s not like I did something bad or different. Shame tells us I am bad. I’m wrong. I don’t belong.
And since as human beings we’re wired for belonging, little wonder it feels so big to us. Little wonder it has such an impact, and we carry it around with us to keep us safe, even though that’s not really what it’s doing anymore.
Some of you might know Brené Brown. She’s done tons of research on shame, and she interviewed hundreds of women, and what she found is that at the very core of shame is this question: “What will people think?”
Yeah. Now, I spent too long in the federal government not to make that an initialism, so I like to shorten that down to WWPT. And that’s what keeps us locked in that cycle and that suitcase of shame.
So here’s where I think shame landed for me.
One story I call Marla’s mortifying moments. Because my mom had four kids, my parents had one income, and my mom was really thrifty in making that income that my dad had from the air force stretch.
And one of the ways she did that was doing a lot of thrift shopping and secondhand clothes, which I love. I am the thrift shop queen today, but back then, not so much. She used to get clothes that were not what everyone was wearing, and I remember waking up and just dreading looking to see what was on the end of my bed where she would have laid my clothes out for the day.
Ugh. Still get that feeling in my gut when I think about it.
One day it was picture day, so I had to be dressed up really cute, and what did I find at the end of my bed but a brown plaid pantsuit. Like I was a little tiny businesswoman in the ’70s. All I wanted, God help me, was a pair of jeans. They were like the Holy Grail because that’s what my classmates were showing up in, jeans and T-shirts, and meanwhile, here I was in this little plaid business suit.
And it felt horrible. I remember going to school that day just so mortified to the point where I remember sitting at my desk, we were doing a colouring exercise, and I wouldn’t even get up and cross the room to get more crayons because I was so embarrassed and didn’t want anyone to see me.
I remember the physical sensation of that. I can feel some of that right now, that little sick feeling in my stomach, that heat that happens in your head and maybe around your neck. And there’s that feeling of trying to shrink, trying to become smaller. What it told me or what I believed then was that I was wrong, I was different, I was ugly.
And this is where my suitcase of shame first showed up, I believe.
Where it started getting packed was another episode that I call the majorette uniform story. I was a majorette a few years later. We had the coolest uniforms. It was this big white pom-pom hat with this blue dress, tights, and then boots with pom-poms on them, and our batons. I was rocking that outfit. I loved it.
We had a rehearsal every Tuesday, and one Tuesday we were meant to wear our majorette uniforms because we were getting our picture taken.
So I got myself all dolled up. I got into the gym, walked in and looked around, and not one other person had their uniform on. And on top of that, every pair of eyes turned and looked at me as I stood there dressed wrong, in the wrong thing, standing out like a sore thumb, and all I wanted was the floor to just open up so that I could disappear into it.
The other vivid memory I have of that is sitting backstage with the majorette instructor, bawling my little eyes out while she tried to reassure me that I looked really cute, and she bet everybody was kind of jealous because they didn’t look as cute as I did.
But I wasn’t buying it. I was mortified, and I can feel that feeling. And so that’s where my suitcase started getting packed. Where my child brain started embedding that memory and that lesson as truth. That I was wrong, that I was different, that if I didn’t look a certain way, it was going to threaten my survival because our brain, which isn’t very smart.
Being sent out from your village into exile and sure death and showing up Tuesday with your uniform on because you didn’t get the phone call that the photograph was cancelled — same, same. Same thing. That’s what I believed, and that’s what was embedded in me.
Unsticking the Stuck
So how have I started to unstick some of that stuck?
Obviously, it’s still a little sticky for me because I can feel those emotions. But that’s the first part. That’s the start. Because when I feel those emotions and when that negative track starts to run, I like to call her Polly Packer, when she starts to come in with all of that negative talk and all of those things, I recognize it as shame. And then I can work with it because when we name our emotions and name the feelings that we’re having, it starts to take away some of that power.
And one of the things that you may know about shame or may not is that it thrives in silence. The reason that shame can get such a hold on us is because we don’t talk about it. If we believe somehow that at our very core we’re wrong, we’re not going to share that with people. Holy camoly, that’s the last thing we’re going to do. And so shame, I like to liken it to a vampire who gains its strength in the dark and in the night.
And so what we have to do is bring that sucker out into the light and let it start to shrivel.
Where I started bringing this packing shame and Polly Packer out into the light is actually one of my favourite stories. When my husband Michel and I first met, we were long distance because I lived in Vancouver and he lived in Ottawa, here in Canada. And we were talking on the phone all the time, and it came a time where it was time for me to come to Ottawa and have a visit in person to see how this was going to go.
So we’re talking on the phone one night and talking about what I should bring for my trip, and I told him about Polly Packer. I told him about the shame I have with packing and where that’s come from and how it impacts the stress and pressure that I feel whenever I have to pack a suitcase.
And do you know what he said to me? He said, “Marla, you bring as much stuff as you want. You bring it all, and I’ll lug it around for you. No shame. No shame for you in that.”
Now I know what you’re all thinking, so let’s all say it together, “Aww.” ‘Cause yeah, sweetest thing ever. And what that did for me, I can feel the healing that that started to have for me around this particular issue. Because here I had brought out one of my deep, dark secrets, one of the things that was going to get me exiled, into the light. I shared it with somebody, and not only did they accept it and let me know that it was no big deal, they told me how they were going to support me with that.
And God bless poor Michel. So I showed up for five days with two big honking suitcases and, true to his word, he never said a word, and he lugged them around for me. He’s actually been lugging around my baggage for 20 years now, so thank you for that, Michel. I love you.
So bringing that out in the open is one of the first steps, and I hope you have a Michel in your life, somebody that can help you see your shame in a different way and help you start to heal that.
The other thing I like to do when Polly Packer comes up and I’m hearing those lists in my head of things that I need to worry about, I like to make what I call a ‘reality check’ list. So this list might look like countering the things that Polly is saying with the reality.
Polly will say, “You have to make sure you have the exact right outfit. You have to take so many things because you have to look right when you’re away.” Well, the reality of that is nobody cares what I look like. No one’s paying that much attention to me that they are going to be watching what I’m wearing and doing like a Project Runway judgment of it.
And quite frankly, if they do, I’m not going to know about it ’cause they’re probably not going to tell me. And if they are going to tell me, if someone is going to have the boldness and probably rudeness to come up to me and say, “Huh, that’s a bizarre choice. That’s what you’re wearing today? You’re going to put those pants with those shoes?”
They’re probably not somebody that I want to have around me anyway, or whose opinion I should care about. So there’s that reality.
Here’s another reality. Now, first, put up your hands again, another poll.
How many of you always wanted to have an invisibility cloak? Maybe when you were a kid, maybe it’s now. But something that you would put around you like a superpower, and then you’d be able to sneak in wherever you wanted to and listen to conversations and do whatever you could do if nobody could see you. Yeah. If you’re like me, you always wanted one of those things.
Well, here’s what I didn’t know until I turned 50, and other women of a certain age, or ‘mid-century modern women’, as my friend Linda likes to call us, might know this already.
When you turn 50, the universe sends you an invisibility cloak, wraps it around you because you basically become invisible the older you get. So that really helps when Polly Packer is bringing up all of her baggage around my luggage because I can tell her, “Nobody, nobody’s looking at you in the first place, and you’ve got your invisibility cloak on, so really nobody is looking at you.”
You women who aren’t of a certain age yet, that’s something you have to look forward to.
I also like to bring some more giggles in, because when you lighten that load around something that can feel really heavy, as we’ve talked about in other episodes, it lowers those stress hormones and brings in some of those feel-good hormones that helps your brain think more clearly and helps you bring in that positive energy.
So WWPT- What Would People Think? When that comes up in my head, I switch that over to WWPT, Weasels Want Pancakes Today What?
It’s a non-sequitur, and it has nothing to do with what I’m packing or wearing. But really, what will people think has nothing to do with what I’m packing or wearing either.
It’s just as ridiculous, just as nonsensical, and now I’m not thinking about what I’m going to pack, I’m thinking about where I’m going to get all the ingredients I need to make enough pancakes for all the weasels who apparently are coming over for brunch. So try a giggle reset or refocus, and hopefully that will help.
Laughter Toolbox
Those are my stories for today. Now I’m going to lead into the laughter toolbox section of our segment.
I’ve talked a little bit about my SMILE framework, which is the framework I’ve built around Laughter Intelligence, trademarked. And the M of SMILE in Laughter Intelligence is mapping. Really important to map our laughter signature.
And so today I want to talk to you a little bit about how often you laugh and at what.
There’s a stat out there, I’ve tried to look up the kind of original data around it, and it’s a little loosey-goosey, but it seems to be pretty solid that kids laugh more than adults. And one of the stats is that kids laugh, a six-year-old laughs about 300 times a day. An adult laughs six or 30. I guess it depends on what you’re doing or who you’re with. But it’s significantly less.
That doesn’t have to be. We can start to make laughter a bigger part of our lives if we are more intentional about it. But if we’re going to do that, we need to have a baseline so that we know where we are starting so that we can see how we’re increasing laughter in our lives, and being able to access all of the amazing physical and mental and social benefits that come with that.
So I’d like to challenge you or like to invite you, I guess, to start a laughter journal, either in your head or you can write it down. Bonus points for you if you make an Excel spreadsheet to help track it, ’cause God knows I’m an Excel spreadsheet girl.
It’s like a gratitude journal. I want you to start noticing when you laugh, how often you laugh in the run of a day, where you laugh, and the people you’re with or what you laugh at, so that you can start bringing that laughter more into your awareness.
What we focus on expands. The more you’re noticing it, the more you’re going to be able to do more of it so that you can repeat and repeat and repeat. And I’d like to put us all on the purpose or challenge of laughing 300 times a day, ’cause think about how happy most kids are compared to how happy most adults are.
A question that came up in a conference I was in recently was a simple A or B. What would you rather be, having fun, not having fun? No-brainer for me. So I invite you to try that.
Welcome to the Laughter Lounge
As we move into our laughter lounge, I’m going to invite you to share what you’re noticing. Where are you laughing? How often are you laughing? What are you laughing at?
I’ve got a friend here in the Laughter Lounge with me today. Her name’s Annie, and she’s from Nova Scotia. And she wanted to share with us something she’s laughing at.
Annie was training for a marathon. So one morning in particular, she’s up at 5 a.m. before the crack of dawn, and she’s getting ready to go out for a run. Now, in the process of her training, she had some injury or something in her leg, so she has to wear compression stockings while she runs. So this particular morning, she’s in the bathroom, sitting on the side of the bathtub and sleepily trying to get her compression stockings on.
And if any of you have ever worn compression stockings, you know they are difficult, to say the least. They’re tight, and they’re snug, and they’re really hard to get on. So Annie’s trying to pull one of these socks on, and as a result, she launched herself back into the bathtub and fell flat on her back, tweaking her back a little bit.
As she lay there first thing in the morning, she said she just started to laugh because she realized the ridiculousness of this, that she had given herself an injury by trying to treat an injury that she already had. Apparently, her sister-in-law asked her at one point, “If you’ve got all these injuries from running, should you be doing that?”
And that’s another episode. We’ll talk, Annie. We’ll talk.
Anyway, that was a way that Annie was bringing laughter into a situation that really could have kept her in the bottom of the bathtub for longer than that two seconds.
If you’ve got things you want to share or questions or comments, share them with me through my email, [email protected]. You can follow me on Instagram and put them in there or wherever else you can add comments, maybe on some of the podcast platforms.
I’d love to hear from you because as we’re growing our revolution, we need to know what’s happening with each other so we can become a community.
Just around the corner
And so what’s around the corner as we come to the end of this particular episode? Well, I’m happy to say that I am almost packed. I’ve just got a few other things to sort out, but that’s almost done. So I’m able to actually turn my brain to the actual trip and what I want to get out of this personal growth voyage that I’m embarking on.
One of the things that’s really clear to me is that I don’t want to be stuck in ‘human doing’ the whole time I’m away. I want to put myself more in ‘spirit being’. But as I’m thinking about how I’m going to make that happen, sure as Snap, Crackle, and Pop are going to be in your Rice Krispies, I’ve got another trio that’s coming up for me and causing some problems. I call them the Dastardly Das.
If you’re interested in knowing more about that, I invite you to come and listen in to the next episode. Hit that subscribe button on your podcast platform, so you’ll get a reminder when the next episode comes out.
That’s it for me today. I hope you enjoyed the episode. And if you think there’s other people in your life who would like to have some giggles with their growth and wants to join our community, please send on the link and invite them. When you got a revolution, the more the merrier!
You may also want to subscribe to my Laughter Revolution Digest, especially if you’re wanting to keep more close tabs on my travels. Because I will be talking about where I am and what I’m learning and laughing about every couple of weeks. I’ll also have some great travel pics that I can share with you. So if you’d like to follow along, you can subscribe on my website, marlasimlett.com .
Again, thanks for being here. Love that you’re listening in. I’m Marla Simlett, and this is Laughter Revolution. Until next time, remember: laugh more, be well, become your greatest you.
