Even though, I have never been a very religious person – my parents never took me to church on Sundays and I, rarely if ever, prayed – the “ 7 sins” also known as pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony, and sloth, have had an unconscious impact my entire life. It recently became crystal clear how those unconscious beliefs around those sins created a pattern of shame and fear in my life.

• Don’t put your desires before others’
• Wanting more is being greedy
• Refrain from showing anger
• Don’t be jealous of others
• Sexual pleasure is to be ashamed of
• Over-indulgence is bad
• And laziness is to avoided at all cost

Those 7 behaviours have been conditioned as “bad” in most of us- whether we were aware of it or not. In most instances, the so-called “sins” are not the issue, the unconscious shame they create is. Shame is a trigger for the conscious mind. Left unaware, it will be placed directly in your subconscious mind and create a all-pervasive sense of wrongness, being flawed & unlovable. This limiting belief system is keeping you from accepting yourself as a whole and thus from living life to its fullest.

This article’s purpose is not to dismiss or discredit any religious teaching or person. It is however my hope for you, whether you are a religious person or not, to take the time to look at what beliefs and conditioning have been programmed in your subconscious. My purpose for this article is to bring an alternative view and perspective on these 7 behaviours – one where we move away from labelling behaviours and emotions as good or evil and liberate ourselves from shame.

Pride is known to be the most demonic of all 7 sins. It describes a person’s pattern of putting their own needs before others’ needs. Most of us are unconsciously scared to be seen as selfish and accordingly are conditioned to please others first. Somehow being selfless has become a synonym for heroic. We refrain from creating healthy boundaries, we over give and feel depleted.

However, we cannot give from an empty cup. I will spare you from sharing the analogy of mother Teresa but I will share this: Isn’t it much easier and loving to give from an open and full heart than from an empty, exhausted and scared one?

Is selflessness so heroic when it comes from a place of fear to be seen as selfish? Do we necessarily take from others when serving our desires? Do our desires and needs always negate the ones of others?

I believe that we are most inspiring and from/of light when we live fully. I believe that if I serve my desires, I serve others automatically too. I believe if I shine, others will shine too. I believe that finding the balance between our needs and those of others is possible and the key to a true selfless life.

Greed caused me the most unconscious shame recently – How can I wish for more in life without being/seeming greedy? The second sin stands for a person’s selfish desire to want more than what is already acquired.

There are three aspects I would like to point out.

Selfish desires tie back to the above – I believe if a desire comes from the heart, it can never be selfish and will always serve others too. Remember, if you shine, they shine.

Wanting more – Let me ask you this question: Does the desire for more (love, freedom, fun, fulfilment, you name it), automatically mean one is not grateful for what is? NO! Additionally, the fastest way to manifest any deep desire is to be grateful for the present. Let’s normalise wanting more AND being proud & happy for what we already have. One does not negate the other, they come hand in hand.

Last but not least, the universe is abundant, you are abundant. Abundance is a birthright, we ALL share. If you truly believe this, you can never take away from others, because there is always more than enough for everyone.

Wrath is described as an uncontrollable feeling of anger and rage. Although I have never considered myself as a specifically angry person, I have dealt in the past and in my childhood with some anger issues.

It is an uncomfortable emotion to experience and it is even more uncomfortable to witness. However, anger is an important message from our inner-self. Something doesn’t feel right inside. Something doesn’t feel heard. Something feels a sense of injustice. When interpreted correctly, listen to and understood, anger passes through us without a lot of resistance.

However, if we believe consciously or unconsciously anger is a deadly sin, we tend to keep it inside. We tend to hide it and keep it trapped. You might have guessed it, that emotion has to go somewhere. When we ignore the anger, it most likely bubbles up and explodes, leading to potentially problematic situations

Let’s normalise anger. Let’s learn to handle it in a healthy and holistic manner. Let’s normalise letting anger out in a controlled way. Anger is not the issue, how we interact with it is.

Envy is a so-called insatiable sin and is characterised by a feeling of resentful jealously towards someone else’s possessions or traits according to lovely Wikipedia.

Want what they have? Wish you were more like them?

GREAT! It means you have a desire and a goal to achieve for yourself. If they achieved it, so can you!

Again, an abundant universe means there is enough for everyone. It means by having something or wanting something we are not taking it from others.

Let’s transmute a feeling of envy into fuel for passion. Let’s be inspired by our role models and their path.

Lust is often defined as an intense and inappropriate sexual desire. Even though it is seen as the least deadly sin, I find it the hardest to write about.

I believe lust has never been the issue, where the lust comes from is – Sexual desires originating from a place of discomfort can be problematic. However coming from the heart – I don’t necessarily mean love in a traditional way, but a more inclusive way of living and acting from the heart- lust and sexual experiences between consensual adult human beings is a beautiful and amazing expression of love and light.

Whatever we do, when coming from a place of love, is always aligned.

Gluttony is synonym over overindulgence usually assimilated to drinking and eating. As a woman affected daily by the diet culture, I have experienced shame around overeating and over-drinking a lot in the past.

While I do believe overeating and over-drinking can become an issue if indulged in regularly – especially a health problem– I choose to not be ashamed of eating too much or drinking too much on some occasions.

Again, what I see most problematic is the shame attached to the behaviour rather than the act itself.

This especially goes to all the women out there who feel uncomfortable in their skin and feel ashamed of having eaten too much. Although I am not trying to make a wide assumption, I rarely see a man feeling ashamed for having indulged in too much drinking or eating. However, I believe it also goes to every human being who has indulged too much of anything – binge-watching Netflix for example.

Let’s normalise having eaten so much we have to unbutton our pants, let’s normalise partying and having fun, let’s normalise binge-watching Netflix because it is all we can handle.

Let’s leave the shame out of it and just move on with our lives after overindulging for a moment.

Sloth is most known as laziness. The last of 7 “sins” hits quite personal. I was called lazy a lot when I was younger. I always felt ashamed for being lazy. Was I really lazy?

It took me a long time to get over this shame. It took me a while to find a new perspective.

I don’t believe in laziness anymore. Hear me out.

I see laziness as a cover-up for either a health problem, a feeling of being inadequate or procrastination, sometimes even a combination of all of them.

Let me explain and go into more details. Like I said, I was called lazy a lot when I was younger. And yes, I was. I was so tired most of the time – after all I could sleep 12 hours at night and still take a 4 hour nap. This year, I found out through my health practitioner that I still had symptoms from glandular fever, I had as a teenager. (Can you believe the amazing woman cured it in one session?!)

Furthermore, what seems to be laziness is a trick of our subconscious mind to hide from taking the scary action we actually need to take to create the life of our dream. So rather than writing that book we want to write, we watch a whole season of friends and tell ourselves we will do it tomorrow.

So whether you are feeling lazy and some shame because of it or you know someone who seems lazy, ask yourself what is the laziness covering up?

I am of course not talking about the rest, our body, mind and soul need to function properly.

Let’s normalise being so scared of taking bold action to move towards our even dreamier life that all we can do is nap. Let’s normalise taking rest. Let’s normalise enjoying down time.

I cannot stress this enough, there truly is no need for shame when it comes to those behaviours. I believe we are all doing our best to live from a place of love! Shame is an all pervasive negative experience causing us to feel wrong, unlovable and unworthy. It is safe to let go of the shame now.

If you have read so far, I imagine something is this article resonated with you and encourage you to share this article. If you feel the 7 sins haven’t affected you and still made it all this way, please share it too – I believe there are more people out there that need to read this message so they can free themselves from the shame they are feeling.