I came to see that the core of all my problems was my sense of inadequacy . . . At that time I didn’t understand shame . . . in my grandiosity I was either superhuman (exceptional) or inhuman (wormlike.) I was never first human. If I tried to be more than human (shameless) I would end up less than human (shame-full)… To be shameless is to play God… The grandiose God-playing is a spiritual disaster. It is spiritual bankruptcy….To be human is to be essentially limited. It is to be finite, needy, and prone to mistakes. …
john bradshaw from healing the shame that binds you