How self-improvement culture reinforces systemic shame (Especially for those socialised as women)

Almost all self-improvement, self-regulation, self-development courses are actually the puppet masters of systemic shame. (Especially for those socialised as women.)

Buckle up, grab a cuppa, and let’s take a look at this load of crock together.

Self-improvement often begins with a hidden assumption

The assumption is “You’re the problem.” Most courses don’t say this out loud, but the vibe is very much: “Just fix yourself and everything to fit in.”

Which sounds empowering… until you realise it trains you to internalise every struggle. Especially if you were socialised as a woman, where the soundtrack of life is basically:

• Be nicer

• Be calmer

• Be smaller

• Be more “polished”

It’s not self-improvement. It’s self-blame with a vision board.

They pathologise completely normal human responses

Tired because you’re doing 400 invisible tasks? → “Work on your mindset.”

Irritated because someone crossed a boundary? → “Have you thought about getting better regulation?”

Burnt out because the system is… the system? → “Have you tried journaling?”

i.e. Let’s sell you a way to shame your very human, and often intelligent responses to the patriarchal system.

Odd that? Well no because shame is the foot soldier of the patriarchy. It depends on shame to survive.

Women are handed the biggest “self-regulate or else” memo

From childhood, many of us learn to keep the peace, minimise our needs, be pleasant and not rock the boat. And if you need it, there are some research papers beginning to recognise this:

• A 2020 paper on self‑silencing and women’s mental health described how women are socialised into “silencing the self,” defined as suppressing their own needs and anger to preserve relationships and keep the peace.​

• A 2024 quantitative study of young women in heterosexual relationships found that girls learn from early on that “being quiet” and compliant is labelled as good behaviour, setting up later patterns of self‑silencing in intimacy.​

• A 2025 study of Black women’s self‑silencing and self‑neglect concluded that early socialisation to become “silent sufferers” of physical and emotional pain is a major barrier to seeking help and naming their own needs.

So when a course tells you to “be more emotionally regulated,” it often translates to:

“Please continue being effortlessly calm, endlessly accommodating, and never ever ‘too much’.” And before you know it, you’ve paid for another online course that now gathers dust… offering the same message society provides for free. Every. Damn. Day.

It turns systemic problems into personal homework

Feeling overwhelmed? Make a better morning routine. Feeling unsupported? Work on your inner child. Feeling exhausted by capitalism? Have you tried positive affirmations? Instead of asking “Why is the system like this?” These courses ask “Why aren’t you coping better?”

That’s not empowerment. That’s outsourcing systemic accountability to your Notes app.

Self-improvement culture becomes self-surveillance culture

Track your emotions. Track your habits. Track your productivity. Track your reactions. Track your nervous system. Sounds organised. Feels like… self-surveillance.

For people socialised as women, this reinforces the lifelong lesson: “Monitor yourself constantly so you never make other people uncomfortable.”

Which is basically shame dressed in matching loungewear.

Most of these programs never say

“You’re allowed to be fully human.” Instead, they push optimisation, control, consistency, pleasantries, tidiness and emotionally “comfortable.”

Self-growth becomes about being palatable. Compliant.  A “better version of yourself”… for someone else’s comfort. Being palatable can go f*** itself. Give me a gobby, unoptimised woman any day of the week.

The empowerment aesthetic can be sneaky

A lot of it looks like wellness and sounds like empowerment. But the subtext is still regulate more, feel less, shrink a little, apologise internally, be grateful even when you’re exhausted. It’s shame… wearing a cute linen set and holding a green juice.

And to a degree, none of that is wrong. Let’s not shame shame. All of these things can be useful. But what I am pointing to and illuminating here is the way that these are sold and held inside Western, individualised containers that fail to recognise one thing:

All of this was never fucking ours to hold alone.

Never has been. Never will be.

Want to go deeper? If you resonate with this, you may want to explore my work on shame, embodiment, and somatic healing.

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