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"An addict needs shame, like a man dying of thirst needs salt water,"
Terrance Real.
Our culture continues to heap shame on people for the failures. How's that working for us?
I just watched this video on the CNN website with Brené Brown.
You can watch it here:
Here's the rest of their article CNN -
I just received this notice that Brené Brown will be participating in an online video presentation on April 21 @2:30pm ET. I'm registered!
The organization is new to me. This is a free event. You can sign up here.
You are invited to join Dr. Brené Brown, one of today’s most exciting and provocative voices, for a free online event live from the Women & Happiness conference at Omega NYC, featuring an introduction by author Elizabeth Lesser.
By exploring the relationship between joy and gratitude, Dr. Brown guides you through the process of navigating your feelings of vulnerability and shows you how your sense of worthiness impacts your ability to be happy in every area of your life.
What You'll Receive
Dr. Brené Brown’s presentation on The Anatomy of Joy will broadcast live on April 21, 2012, 2:30-4 pm Eastern Time, from the Omega Institute.
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, handsome, talented and fabulous?Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God.Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do.We were born to make manifest the glory of God within us. It is not just in some; it is in everyone.And, as we let our own light shine, we consciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our fear, our presence automatically liberates others.
A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of "A Course in Miracles"
"Vulnerability is our most accurate measurement of courage." -Brené Brown
Brene' said that TED Talk is about people who have failed and kept on trying until they got it right. They overcame their shame voice and did it anyway.
How is that shame voice holding you back?
You know the one that says:
"You're NOT good enough."
or when you do it anyway, it says:
"Who do you think you are?"...still not good enough.
Yesterday, I was part of an email exchange. Yes, email exchanges invite interpretations on both the sender and receiver sides. It is always a challenge to just read the words without adding your own meaning to what the other person is saying.
And, I'm guessing many of you have participated in this kind of exchange at one time or another...and you may have been on either side of this exchange.
An email invitation was sent out to a group asking if people were available for an impromptu meeting. An explanation was given for this unscheduled board meeting. A simple yes or no was all that was required. Instead, what followed was an exchange of emails reminding the board president of how subcommittees are supposed to operate by siting the board guidelines. The person never said "no" I'm not making myself available. This was followed by another person affirming the accuracy of what the person had said about impromptu meetings. Neither of them said the word "no" I am not coming.
My first reaction as one who was part of this email exchange was annoyance. Then, I wanted to respond (but didn't), in my own inauthentic voice. As I slowed my emotions down and examined what was happening, it came back to "me feeling like" neither of these individuals were authentic in expressing their own feelings nor clearly stated "no".
Was that true?
On the wall, next to my computer, is Brene's lovely statement about Authenticity. Here is what is ringing in my ears,
Authenticity is a daily practice, choosing authenticity means: cultivating the COURAGE to be emotionally honest, to set boundaries, and to allow ourselves to be vulnerable...."
Besides wondering what is going on for the other person that she thinks "no" is not a safe or adequate response, I am left wondering three things about myself:
1. was this all a story created by my other self?
2. when do I not say my authentic "no"?
3. when does my silence collude with others inauthentic behavior?
Someone recently asked me, “What’s the difference between blame and shame?” I wasn’t prepared to give a thorough answer, so I struggled to articulate how they are the same but different.
In her book, “I Thought It Was Just Me (but it wasn’t),” Brene covers this topic well. Having re-read this chapter several times, I’m left with this: it’s complicated and I'm not 100% sure I've got it yet. But, I do think we all know when we are blaming others or even ourselves. (Chapter 8 pgs 212-240)
Taken from page 212 of this book, here are a few things Brene’ has to say about these emotions.
“We are a culture obsessed with finding fault and assigning blame. Holding ourselves or others accountable is a good thing, but blame and accountability are very different. I think the difference between accountability and blame is very similar to the relationship between guilt and shame. Like guilt, accountability is most often motivated by the desire to repair and renew – it is holding someone responsible for his/her actions and the consequences of his/her actions.
On the other hand, we often use “blame” to discharge overwhelming feelings of fear and shame: “this is painful – who can I blame? I’ll blame you! You are bad and this is your fault.”
When we move from holding another accountable for their actions and commitments to blaming them, we move from a healthy response to an unhealthy response that says the other person or even ourselves are a bad person.
Blame puts us in conflict with others and ourselves. Blame directs anger and fear toward who a person is rather than focusing on what the person did or not. Likewise when we self-blame, we are saying we are flawed rather than our actions/behavior were flawed. We have a culture of stereotyping and labeling each other which all are ammunition for blame.
Blame harms your relationships. Here is a very simple example how blame looks vs. accountability.
A husband and wife have agreed they are going to do a better job of keeping the house de-cluttered by always cleaning up after their selves when they finish a project or by the close of the day. The idea is that each person is responsible for their own projects and clean-up. This works well for several weeks until one evening. It is near bedtime and the wife discovers in the family room that the husband has left his tools scattered on the floor next to his toolbox.
Blame: She is angry that he left the tools scattered all over the floor and the toolbox is not put away in the garage. What does she say to her husband about his failure to honor their commitment? Most often, she starts with blame. Herself talk might begin with saying, “isn’t that just like a man (labeling/stereotyping), he leaves things for me to pick them up. He is so selfish and inconsiderate”. By the time she says anything to him, she is very angry and winds up attacking (blaming) him for being a selfish man and not being a team player.
Accountability: instead, she might have gone to him to tell him she has noticed that he had forgotten to put his tools and toolbox away for the evening. She could remind him they had agreed earlier that they would always pick up after themselves at the end of each day to meet their agreed upon goal of de-cluttering the house. She then could ask if he would take care of that before going to bed, and maybe, even offer to help.
Consider this. Every time you blame someone for whatever they did or didn’t do (because of your own feelings of anger, frustration, fear, loneliness, shame) , you are not holding them accountable for their actions or honoring commitments. In fact, when you are blaming them, you are letting them off the hook. Blaming and shaming are not good tools for bringing about the desired changes you are seeking in yourself or your relationships.
And I'm still sitting with this because there is more to this than I have posted here.
The suffering thing struck a chord with me this morning. It caused me to pause and wonder if I am carrying a stone in my pocket...touching it throughout the day to remind me of my suffering...keeping it alive and leaving no space for gratitude and compassion.
Suffering – there is a story of two Buddhist monks who had taken a vow of no physical contact with women – came to a river that they needed to walk across. As there was no bridge, they would need to wade across. The river was deep and came up to their chests.
Standing on the bank of the river was a small woman who needed to cross but was afraid of the fast current. She knew she was too short to walk across. Not knowing how to swim, she asked the monks if one of them would be willing to carry her across.
The one monk looked at the river, looked at the woman and her size, picked her up, carried her across and put her down and continued on his way with his fellow monk.
When they had walked about 5 hours, the one monk stopped the other monk and asked, “why did you carry that woman across the river? We have taken a vow not to touch a woman. The other monk looked at his fellow traveler and said, “I only carried her for the few minutes it took me to cross the river. You have been carrying her for the past 5 hours.”
What is the connection between suffering, gratitude, and compassion for me?
As with Shame, suffering keeps me fixated on a past grievance - something someone said, something someone did - something I "should" have done, but didn't. I cannot change the past. I cannot undo what someone said or did to me, nor can I go back in time and say something different.
I'm reminded of the day I spent suffering with thoughts of what I might have said to the dental hygienst who said something so hateful about a group of people that I was left speechless. As I left the dentist's office, my brain began to go into over drive thinking of what I could have, should have said to her to defend them and to enlighten her. I was sure I had that power. And these thoughts interfered into my day until evening when I put the stone down.
As with the monk, if I have given my energy and thoughts to my suffering, I have no energy left for living in the present.
When I can acknowledge my pain, put down the stone, it opens up the possibility that I will also be able to experience gratitude and compassion for myself and others. I have much in my life to be grateful for, don't you?
Only the truth of
who you are,
if realized
will set you free.
...Eckhart Tolle
In the fall of 2010, I watched these videos for the first time. They were very powerful for me. They gave me language to understand the heart work I had begun more than 30 years ago. I realized that as I have worked on my heart wounds, I have been helping others do their work. The power of Brene's work is that it says you are normal and you can find a way to a "wholehearted life."
The first video, "The Price of Invulnerability" doesn't get as much exposure as "The Power of Vulnerability" - but I found that it completes the other. If you don't count the cost of staying stuck where you are, things don't ever get better. They just don't magically heal.
When I find myself stuck, I remind myself how miserable I am. Then, I explore, "how much hsa it cost me and is costing me to stay stuck in this place?" Usually, that is enough to make me risk to try even a baby step of change. And, I have not been sorry for taking any of my baby steps to find another way. Each step has brought me closer to wholeness.
After you have had time to watch these videos, respond to this questions, "what surprised you about what she has to share about vulnerability?
thx Elaine
When I ran across Richard Rohr's post this morning, I knew I had to pass it on to you. I love how the universe opens up to show you how many other people in the world are pondering and exploring the same ideas that are working on you and me.
Here is some of what Fr. Rohr had to say:
"...I think that many of us...are very afraid of intimacy. I would define intimacy as the ability to mutually share one’s needs, one’s wounds, or one’s weaknesses with another person...But I am going to make a rather absolute statement: people who risk intimacy are invariably happier and much more real people. They feel like they have lots of “handles” that allow others to hold on to them, and that allows them to hold onto themselves!..."
I was struck by how much his description of "intimacy" sounds like Brené Brown's vulnerability.
And his people with "handles" as those who live wholehearted lives.
And in the full post, he goes on to say that people who avoid intmacy may be afraid of rejection...and then he takes it a step further and adds another reason to avoid risking self-disclosure, "It might change our self image."
What price are you paying to continue to wear your mask?
Thx Elaine
