Someone said, 'We compare our insides to other people's outsides.'

Since you have recorded this you're followers etc have bounced up - but here's a thought for you to tuck away in your morning routine for yourself. You may not have 1 million followers - but to this itty bitty one follower right here - your videos mean the world to me and are helping me more than any other treatment ever has. I NEVER honestly thought Id find that help in a you tube channel - but I have. Your genuine, practical, calming and honest approach makes a huge difference to my life. I am not just saying this to get a reaction or like or anything like that - I mean this sincerely from the bottom of my heart - thank you so much.

Those teachers who ruthlessly criticized us as failures are total failures themselves. Their job is to look for the good and encourage it.

Dear Scott, thank you so much, from Australia. I'm 25 years old and I've been through so much trauma that I feel like an old man. It's been just over 2 years now living on my own since I escaped nearly dying from domestic violence, homelessness, addiction, poverty, malnutrition, hospital admissions, court dates and arrests that nearly cost me my life, and I've been hurt abused betrayed lost everything I have multiple times. been living the safest healthiest Today, I have a roof over my head, I'm safe, employed, sober, engaging in normal life. The best life I've ever had, except that I'm completely broken inside. Your content is the only thing right now that seems to speak to me in that I finally feel like someone understands just how bad severe depression and anxiety really is at its absolute worst, or what it's like been living with it for over a decade. I have no friends, I don't know how to have fun, I don't laugh, I don't feel like I'll ever be a normal person because of what I've survived and yet I get up and go to work every day and continue this 'normal' life trying to deal with being so damaged from complex trauma and constantly experiencing severe depression and anxiety. You genuine give me hope and make me feel somehow kind of normal, for what I am. You make me feel like there is someone out there who knows how bad it can really get. There is no triumph or breakthrough in this story, in just so incredibly glad that I have you in KZfaq algorithm to be there and put words to what it is that I'm experiencing. I wish I had a therapist like you, to trust in and work through my stuff with and I say that having been through the mental health system many times for over half my life. I appreciate you for speaking to me and it gives me comfort in a very lonely place of suffering that I often wonder if I'm destined for for the rest of my life. Please keep making videos and doing what you're doing because it's so comforting to listen to you and just not feel alone in a surface level mental health friendly world where the real deep and the dark depression is both unseen and unheard, taboo and unknown, terrifying to society and therefore never talked about because of how bad it really is and nobody wants to breach the subject. I hope that wasn't too vague and that it makes sense. You give me so much light and encouragement, thank you for helping me get through my life when I literally have nothing and nobody else.

Dr.Scott, you are saving my life. I have been in a mental prison for 2 years and have been desperately trying to understand why I feel no joy anymore. Your content is better than any book I've read (I haven't read yours yet) and I am so incredibly grateful for you. You are authentic and real and it's like you are inside my brain knowing my thoughts. Please keep shining your light. The world needs your light. Namaste 🙏

You're a breath of frash air. Most therapist dont share anything about their personal lives. I trust your advice because you have lived or gone through what im going through right now. Your wisdom comes from experience not from text a book

Our parents used guilt and shame to control us The same way their parents did to them Thank you for this video!video

My in person therapist so far appears to be so useless that I'm considering firing her. In the meantime I'm listening to one video of yours a day. I could not do what you do (yet) and I'm SO grateful for your free assistance. Related, our culture places emphasis on the wrong things for its definition of success. You are FAR more successful in your purpose than many billionaires.

Chronic parental shaming and belittling toward a child is damaging to that child for life. I have been dealing with it for 68 years . Combine that with living in a domestically violent home as an elder daughter expected to be her mother’s protector and it creates life-long PTSD. I have spent my life trying to overcome this.

seeing a professional like you talking about mental health in an empathetic and relatable way, that makes me feel understood and safe hearing it rather than defensive, has been really nice. i've been watching your videos regularly during my shitty depression mood of the last few months, and sometimes the understanding and care i feel from you for your profession and your audience just makes me have a good, cathartic cry. thank you for making content, i hope all my engagement recently does your channel some good.

I'm very grateful for your channel. I've followed a lot of other psychologists on this platform, some with tens or hundreds of thousands of subscribers, but none have been as reassuring and convincing as this one. I thought positive manifestations were just a weak online trend, but now I see how it could help... Gonna try out with more conviction now

I've tried to listen to other doctors that had hundred thousands, even millions of subscribers - couldn't follow or listen to any (either their diction is not good enough, e. g. too much filler words, too much scientific/medical terms, speaking too quick, long introduction into the subject, or too much ads). There are only few psychologists I've subscribed to and all of them have not really much subscribers, however their content is truly helpful and how they put it out is best. This shows that popularity doesn't matter, quality and sincerity does. We don't have to compare ourselves to others. If we're able to help at least one person with an advice - this is enough. That's why I want to express special gratitude for your channel, because your recommendations help me to fight against my anxiety and stress.

Dude. It's a matter of time. You've gotten bigger since you recorded this, and you are going to have way more followers. You are amazing and you will be amazing.

I appreciate you. I struggle with BPD and really appreciate that you have gone through the things that you talk about. You talk about topics that resonate with us and no one else talks about. Listening to you is like listening to a good friend who has been there and wants to help me out. It's like we're talking be the fireplace talking after the kids have gone to bed. You touch people and make a huge difference in lives. You might not be big time, but you have quality that makes struggling people feel like they have a friend. A lot of what you say is hard and goes on the back burner as it works it's way into practical reality.

You are doing a great job with your videos! Just need to say it! I am suffering since a longer time from depressions and anxieties and my anxieties also keep me away from getting help, as I really struggle to talk to people, doing phonecalls, or any else… if I dont feel I like that person. I tried several times watching youtube videos depending to depression and anxieties, but I cant rememeber I watched any of them to the end. But after I accidentally came along ur account (through the passive suicide ideation video, whats fits me totally, next to many others) I cant stop watching/listening to them. And I am a german living in sweden, so its not even my mother or living language. You definitely should got much more likes at it! ❤ thank you!

I had this thought the other day .. that maybe what i have is actually good enough . The wanting more or being more really robs us of the now

I've been in therapy for the last few years for anxiety and depression I had a recent loss and fell into a deep depression a feeling guilt I have been listening to your broadcasts you have made me a new person you have taught me how to move forward in my life I am in a financial bind but I will soon become a subscriber God bless you you are amazing if you only knew the bad shape I was in after listening to your broadcast I am a totally a different person with a direction thank you thank you thank you

I don't care how many copies your book has sold, that doesn't make it successful in my opinion, it spoke to me in a BIG way! It's wonderful! That's what really makes it good. I recommend it to everyone I know ❤️

Thanks. I am a huge mental health advocate. I formerly heald a license in professional counseling and have a Master's degree in Guidance and Counseling. Guilt and Shame were and are always on my radar. I think I ruined my career with self sabotaging thoughts that led to self sabotaging behavior. Regardless of how others seemed to think I was good and sometimes great at my job I always operated in a guilt/shame cycle. I would love to be a Transitions Life Coach. In practice I am well qualified however I know I must move to a better space first. Thanks for this video.

I just tried this while watching this video. I am full of grief and crying. I’ve been in therapy for many years and shame and feelings of failure are some of my biggest challenges. Every time I try and make any kind of list or journal entry I feel like I am already failing. One reason I decided to share this comment is because the idea of doing this daily (and especially in the morning) feels so overwhelming and I cannot imagine doing that. It’s frightening. Whenever I strive to start these kind of exercises, I am so afraid of falling apart that it becomes a huge block. Perhaps it’s because I am envision a giant wall that needs to be torn down. All at once. And with it, my ability to get through the day. Have I made progress and had achievements in the last decade? Absolutely. But I do judge myself on my “inability” to tear down this wall. I’m not sure how to end this message so I’ll just say that I appreciate this content and am curious if anyone reading this can relate to this.. shame of shame?

I am so grateful for this. I was looking at only the things in my life that I hadn’t finished yet and I was ignoring my past successes. THANK you!

You are so articulate. Keep it up. You get it. I can tell you get it. You are helping people with what you do. You are so honest it’s the best I’ve found from a personal perspective on KZfaq

Again, thank you. Each video of yours to which I listen lifts me a bit further out of the hole I allowed myself (unintentionally) to fall into over many years of listening to others' voices, many from childhood. Do not doubt that you are doing immeasurable good....

Thank you for being so genuine and open about your struggles. I love the way you bring a way that helps me and others resonate everyone is human. I’m grateful to have found your channel. I have been binging your videos that are helping me more than any therapist I have had. I have not been able to find many others in a long time that have gave me more hope and tools to navigate my life. I thought I knew so much from studying many modules, working with different therapists, etc. You bring insight and inspiration that sheds a whole other layer to therapy. I’m sure you will grow and have so much to offer!!!! I am looking forward to more content from you as it is helping me have hope again!

Don't think quantity but quality. And your videos are real quality, meaning they are worth listening to because they go deep into a person's soul(me) I sometimes tear up when listening to your words because they resonate. I feel understood, even though you're not talking to me directly. You must be a fantastic therapist❤

I’m working my way through a prolonged depressive episode. Your videos are so incredibly helpful. Keep challenging those thoughts of your own because you’re helping so many people (including me).

Even though I know it’s not true, all the things that were told to me in my formative years, I consciously understand that it’s not true, but the subconscious program is still running my life and every day the struggle is real for me to override it

I feel a lot of embarresment after i come out of a depressive episode, some days i just feel unclouded and unweighted down and i remmeber how i was behaving the day before and feel so much embarresment. And durring my depressive episodes i feel so much guilt that im just burdening everyone around me with my mood. Espeically when i have someone in my life trying desperately to help i feel like im just a burden. I cant get to the second half where im supposed to challange that belief

As an adult I’ve matured enough to know I need to question some of the reasons for my anxiety and depression. I would argue with myself about why I shouldn’t have low self esteem but it wasn’t in a structured way as you’ve explained here. Nor was it productive. I like this approach where I list all the thoughts reinforcing why I am not good enough, then counter each one as you explained. Thank you and I mean from a very sincere and appreciative place. The way you explain and speak is very calming and helpful. This a helpful video❤️✨

This is powerful information. It’s complex and simple at the same time. It will take practice to unravel it all, but this is a tool that can start the healing process. Thank you Dr.

Thank you for being so vulnerable and honnest. Just that in itself makes your videos ao effective. Of course it doesn't hurt that your content is full of advice on how to keep our emotions from constantly hijacking us. Much gratitude

You offer so many bits of information that are so helpful in understanding ourselves! You have a true gift for putting these bits together in a way that makes so much sense! Love the way you use lighthearted examples to explain concepts ie: "I invented cheese"😂 Love so much that you can be both lighthearted and professional at the same time! Love that you don't resort to using harsh words (namely the"f-bomb) to make a point like so many others! The positive words you use are infinitely stronger! I predict your channel will grow by leaps and bounds because of who you are and the way you are conducting yourself! Don't ever change! You are making a huge difference! What I know for sure is that you have already helped me so much! I am so grateful!

Subbed when you talk about numbers and how that can weigh on you. I've been watching your videos and they have really been helping me with my anxiety and imposter syndrome (my depression has luckily subsided when I discovered you). I just started a new job in a new and challenging language, so I was stressing out about it, but from you I learned some techniques that helped me not worry that much. Just wanted to thank you

94.5 thousand subscribers....must have jumped up since u last checked You will have all that u deserve, and more, within 2 years. Why??? Because you are the Best at what u do and your desire to help us. Every day I watch and listen and my life is improving. Thank you.

I got to the step where you challenge the evidence and I can’t think of any way to challenge these elements. For example: I can’t hold a job. My only challenge to that is that I have overwhelming anxiety and debilitating depression. But those don’t sound like valid challenges to the evidence. It sounds like excuses.

my mother raised me to feel constant guilt. to feel shame. so many times in my life she would tell me that when i stood before her grave to remember that i put her there. my daughter estranged me 3 years ago and i have never given up hope. but the guilt that i carry has become more than i can handle. but i still keep on going. the worst thing about this is how in the end my daughter, whom i had a beautiful relationship with, became extremely verbally abusive. and i took it because i know she must feel pain and she was projecting that pain that she felt to me. so many mothers are experiencing this. my daughter delights in making me feel guilty. i just don’t know anymore.

Auspicious Timing! God Sent! Managed to get So Low Down & Out because of Something mean someone told me, and haven't been able to snap out of it, my heart is hurt, and Your Wisdom, stories, explaining, & kind tone has Soften my wound 💔 😢 and revitalize me. Huge Gratitude & Respect, Thank you So very much for sharing your wisdom 🙏🏻 🙌 ❤

Isn't it amazing that since you recorded this you now have 152k subscribers and I think your own practice and business now. Your achievement is an encouragement. Working my way through all your videos. Thank you

I have been in and out of therapy for most of my 83 years dealing with MDD and you are the greatest! Please keep doing what you are doing. You are a winner!❤🎉

I LOVE his videos. Hes authentic and vulnerable. He definitely has helped me.

You and prof. Sam Vaknin are the best sources for information about mental health and personality disorders. Seriously, you are awesome!

Thank you. I really find your videos helpful. I was talking about this with my therapist the other day. As an INFJ I tend to want to protect my therapist from my depression/anxiety so I don't "bum her out." I do feel a lot of shame about being depressed. However, I can't in anyway relate to your measures of "success." In this end-stage-capitalist dystopia, how can we even begin to unpack what "success" even looks like? Being "healthy" in an insane culture is no measure of health.

This is amazing. I thought it was a secret feeling that only I felt. Thank you for spending time teaching us the truths of life and our brains so we know that we are not alone and how to make our lives better. ❤️ We really appreciate and love you ❤

This is a wonderful, hands-on lesson that could be life changing with practice. Your talks are a saving grace a critical depressive episode. They make sense. Great job and thanks 🙏👍

I really liked this. It was good to see you before you started your own practice, and how you have grown the social media work. Thank you. This was very valuable to me. 😊

Dr Scott....thank U. You are so bloody real . ❤

Thank you for being real Dr Scott.

I feel guilty because I think I'm not being the mother my kids deserve. I am able to force myself through the motions of everything, but I'm just not mentally present and I know they need me to be.

I have been following you since a month or so, maybe watched 10 videos or something. Your videos helped me to the extent that i can't even explain here. I'm really really grateful for your work. Thanks a lot.

Your videos are saving my days. Thank you.

Please keep this up...really helpful and appreciated by so many! Thank you! Thank you!! Thank you!!!

I recently started watching your videos, and wow, they really resonate with me, especially this one. Thanks for sharing your insights and contribution. I've noticed a pattern in myself: I often judge and compare myself to others, then feel bad about it. I think I should be perfect and the best, but then I feel like I set myself to fail; The hardest part is the strong desire to get rid of these negative thoughts, as if they're a pimple I can just remove. But this just starts the cycle again: feeling imperfect, incapable, and flawed. Accepting myself is tougher than I expected.

Thank you for being there for us all ❤

Thank you. I needed to hear this

Very nice, so profound. Very well presented, with every word carefully chosen, slow and easy to follow. Appreciated from Namibia 🇳🇦 🙏

🎉This was very helpful to me. Thank you. I have repeated this and plan to take notes and write some of this for my own use.

Thank you for the content. ❤❤❤

Thank you for sharing these insightful videos. Each one gives me something to think, and some way to try to improve my own inaccurate black and white thinking that I have of myself. At the same time, I give others plenty of leeway. I am the worst judge and jury of my own life. I have been trying to figure out where all these negative thoughts and depressing ones towards myself have come from, and I couldn't figure it out either. Now I realize some bad beliefs I have about myself were probably developed over time from things I felt and experiences even if I was not directly told "I am worthless, stupid, a failure," etc. It's very difficult for me to challenge my own thinking, and I constantly seek validation from others, despite knowing this will not help me either. It's a daily struggle, and I am a social worker, so my life's work is to help other people. It seems ironic, and it is frustrating at the same time. Your videos do make a difference. You do not know if your video reached the right person at the right moment who was in a very dark place! So, thank you.

Wow this is amazing!!!!! I REALLY love your honesty and clear explanations. This video answered my forever question… I don’t know what to say Thank you so much 🙏🙏🙏🙏 please keep it up!!!!

You give me hope!

Thank you.

Thank you for this content!! Just found you on youtube. Excellent video, and I look forward to watching more.

"Guilt and shame are learned," and earned

School, hit home! At least 12 different schools, moving every time 1 iof 7 siblings got in trouble, we moved!

I am recommending you, there will be more, you are so helpful

This sounds alot like Byron Katies The Work witch helped me alot. This stragegy is so good, question whatever ur thinking that is causing you pain or stress. Good job!

I'm watching this video and much of it is resonating with me. I've suffered from low self-esteem for most of my life. There's any number of possible repetitive "messages" I'm sure I received when I was younger, from internalized homophobia over my sexuality and feeling that, even in today's more tolerant climate, is still something that will cause me to be "othered" by people and somehow (though I'm not sure exactly why) I'm still supposed to be feeling shame over, to messages from my father who was an authoritarian and pretty old-fashioned with his ideas of gender roles and did sometimes call me lazy because I had found it to usually be easier to not try than to put myself out there and fail. But, in any case, as much as I'd like to be challenging what you're calling the foundations of my guilt and shame, I feel like I don't know exactly what it is. Rather, it just feels like a vague, generalized sense of not being worthy but for no real specific reason (like, I don't have those kinds of messages you mentioned constantly playing in my head like, "I'm a failure" or "I didn't accomplish enough in my life"). So I'm curious to know how to dig in there and figure out just what ideas are stuck in there that I need to challenge. Would appreciate any suggestions/insights you might be willing to offer.

Thank you!!!! The basis of this exercise feels really familiar, like some cbt type of thing (maybe?) - but seeing it spelled out and you demonstrating it is so helpful. I’ll be practicing it in the morning. Question though- how does one catch a brain in the midst of the unhelpful belief stories? I feel like my brain comes up with these horrible stories and piles on all the evidence and I just roll with it until I catch it- sometimes hours or even days later (I’m sure there are plenty of unconscious ones just rollin in the background too). Any tips on catching the brain telling us these stories in the act? I really appreciate your work here! It’s invaluable to me. I can’t thank you enough!

I gave an example to a friend recently that with anxiety sometimes it’s llle if you take a pencil and gently rub across the surface of a wooden table. At first there is no mark on the table but the more you trace around the outline with your pencil the deeper the groove that starts to appear. And so it is with anxiety and rumination. The idea whether right or wrong gets etched into your mind and then it becomes even more difficult to shift. I have my anxiety and it’s held me back through my life. Whilst I can’t change my life to date, knowing why these anxieties have existed and have a much better understanding of my mind does make me feel more accepting and fight less and hopefully this can help to mitigate the extent of my anxiety.

"Comparison is the thief of joy". Theodore Roosevelt. External sources of validation rely on someone else's measurement of "success". Internal validation is so valuable because you know yourself better than anyone else ever will. "Success" is relative and may be as simple as waking up, being in good health, having a friend, being a good person or being grateful for anything positive in your life. We need to be kinder to ourselves and be less concerned with external measures of "success". Find your own definition.

I think you're AMAZING

Great video.

i wish i were a failure like that. "no job, no family, no friends, no health" is a failure

It's going on 3 years but I still have lingering guilt over how I handled my mother's sudden physical and mental decline and then death during the pandemic. I've written out a lot of arguments about how little control I had and how messed up trying to get care was at that time--I won't get into it here. Every time I start to feel better I think well good for you, bitch, you're still alive and your mother is dead and it's your fault. Congratulations on your self-actualization. I understand what wrong with this kind of thinking on an intellectual level, but I really don't know how to move past it for real. Shame is one thing, but guilt involving a loved one's death just feels impossible.

Great stuff doctor Who was it that said whether you think you can or you can’t you’re right sometimes we need to step back and look at another perspective

Thanks for the videos. I appreciate the time you put into these. What if the only thing I've accomplished is that I'm still here? And that's not a positive for anyone but my kids. And I wouldn't even call it positive for them. I am their mom and that is the only reason I matter to them. This video makes me realize what a true failure I am. F***!

0:14 I don't understand why depression should have a overwhelming umbrella underneath the word shame. We can't control what we can't see no more than a physical ailment such as someone trying to call control cancer. It's okay when people have a physical ailment that can be seen on an MRI but it's not okay when it's a issue be it hormones , chemicals in their brain ,or impending feeling of Doom... etc. IMO, I equated to the unfairness if you will, of a overwhelmed PTA mom I see you nurse who just lost their spouse and their father Etc standing at the counter at a pharmacy being told they can't have their medication one day early and being looked at with such shame versus the guy who just walked into the liquor store for the fourth time today who also ordered a case of rum that got delivered to his house and just left a restaurant with his Margarita to go. The latter is perfectly acceptable in society, but that prescription from your doctor makes you have to sit under a totally different umbrella of judgement in society

I did the judgement exercise intuitively on my own but I never used the phrase, "most people" to emphasize the positive. Wondering if that will make the difference since a lot of shame is inherently comparative. After all being brave or attractive has to have some sort of tribal standard attached to it. So other than the repetition- Maybe that part of the phrasing has relevance? Or maybe my perfectionism is taking over in this idea too

4:55 oh… 🤯

I cannot find my happiness in the flow of life. Ramesh Balsekar. I was in the eyes of society a very successful man …. I had everything then my mother died and not one person including my GP recognised I was having a breakdown. I lost nearly everything, it’s a

This makes sense. Only, it doesn’t makes sense in the whole kids & teens can decide their gender and go on blockers and have surgery. How does that work?

I love this skill tool. This tool would be beneficial for people who were parentally alienated by a narcissistic parent....especially after a divorce ensues. Soul damage is done to that innocent , naive child that is brainwashed to hate the other parent. This is more and more prevalent in societyvtoday than ever, considering that half of marriages end in divorce. I am glad that PARENTAL ALIENATION SYNDROME is being added as an official diagnosis in the DSM. It is a horrible thing to do to a child!....It is a deliberate, intentional, evil thing...I am so sorry I was unable to save you from that. The consequences of it are never ending and hurtful to the children even as they grow older. My children . May God help heal my oldest and may my youngest find eternal rest and peace on the other side of this earthly realm.

"KZfaq subscribers... I have, uh, 250"... THOUSAND, before you know it!

❤

I don't understand how can people like Scott be depressed..He has a family,is a doctor,no financial issues..I don't have any of that so I'm depressed but you don't get to be Scott..

So you are saying it won't hold up under scrutiny until it does?

this just making me think im a victim

For those who made predictions. Wouldnt want to be like them. I dont act like them. They do not help people achieve. They dont have the skills.

Religion has a part in this I believe. I remember how I felt going to Confession as a child , talk about shame. Also, the whole concept of mortal and venal sins as tenet of religion, is so destructive to some children’s sensitivities.

A's are not going to take up much room on my sheet.

What if you truly don't _know_ (or believe) that you're accomplishing anything, are moving forward on anything, or doing anything right? Don't get me wrong; what you're saying makes a ton of sense (hence why it stings), but I keep running into variations of this problem and can't figure out how to get around it...

Ok. Now talk about legitimate, warranted guilt and shame. What I did was very wrong and has had a lifelong negative impact on myself and the other person.

I wonder if your fear of failure comes not from “failing” so much as maybe just not winning? Maybe you observed winners getting love and praise and awards and you decided that was what you would work for. But you just kept not winning… aka: failing. All or nothing.

FAIL - first attempt at learning SAIL - second attempt at learning

Get to the point and start addressing your topic!

You're the best

This was awesome and helped me a lot! Thank you! I’m sure I’ll come back here in a year and you’ll be having a 1 million followers. Your content is absolutely worth it! Just give it some time and don’t stop! 🥰 P.S. Also you look hot as hell, this may influence the amount of female followers for sure 😅🫶🏻