My forehead still resting on my knees, I realized that I needed to say it out loud. A decade of studying shame had taught me the value of doing the one thing that felt the scariest and most counterintuitive—I had to speak shame. I had to say this out loud: “I have such shame about mispronouncing words and things like that. I feel stupid and small and found out and ashamed and afraid and like an impostor and like someone who got caught pretending to be smart.”
