Links

• Website: Brenebrown.com

• BreneBrown.com/event-schedule

• SpeakersOffice

“I believe that what we regret most are our failures of courage, whether it’s the courage to be kinder, to show up, to say how we feel, to set boundaries, to be good to ourselves. For that reason, regret can be the birthplace of empathy.”
― Brené Brown, Rising Strong
 
“Shame is much more likely to be the cause of destructive behavior than the cure. Guilt and empathy are the emotions that lead us to question how our actions affect other people, and both of these are severely diminished by the presence of shame.”
― Brené Brown, Rising Strong
 

Brené on Shame and Accountability

July 1, 2020
In today’s solo episode, I share my thoughts about why accountability is a prerequisite for change, and why we need to get our heads and hearts around the difference between being held accountable for racism and feeling shame and being shamed. I share my personal stories of being held accountable and holding myself accountable, as well as my strategies for pulling my “thinking brain” back online when I’m experiencing the flight and fight energy fueled by shame.
 

2012-04-15 - Take a risk and put your true self out there

(CNN Video) -- Authenticity has become one of those buzzwords that we love to hate. Like many other words that have met a similar fate after being co-opted, misused, and overused, authenticity entered the popular lexicon because it tapped into something powerful in our culture.

2012-04-02 - Shame, Empathy, and the Wholehearted Journey

"I called both my husband, Steve, and my good friend Karen. They gave me what I needed the most: empathy, the best reminder that we’re not alone. Rather than judgment (which exacerbates shame), empathy conveys a simple acknowledgment, “You’re not alone, I’ve been there.” Empathy is connection; it’s a ladder out of the shame hole. Not only did Steve and Karen help me climb out by listening and loving me, but they made themselves vulnerable by sharing that they too had spent some time in the same hole."

2012-05-16 - Shame Resilience Theory By Steve Safigan

"Shame resilience theory (SRT) was developed by researcher and author Brené Brown in 2006.

Forming mutually empathetic relationships that facilitate reaching out to others: When we reach out for support, we may receive empathy, which is incompatible with shame and judgment. We recognize that our most isolating experiences are also the most universal. We recognize that we are not defective or alone in our experiences (we normalize).

 Brown asserts that empathy and shame are on opposite ends of a continuum. Shame results in fear, blame (of self or others), and disconnection. Empathy is cultivated by courage, compassion, and connection, and is the most powerful antidote to shame. Brown references Theresa Wiseman’s four defining attributes of empathy:

• to be able to see the world as others see it

• to be nonjudgmental

• to understand another person’s feelings

• to communicate your understanding of that person’s feelings

• Brown defines empathy as a skill, and so she stresses actively practicing giving and receiving empathy."

“When we start losing our tolerance for vulnerability, uncertainty, for risk — we move away from the things we need and crave the most like joy and love and belonging, trust, empathy, creativity.”  Brené Brown

"If you put shame in a petri dish, it needs three ingredients to grow exponentially: secrecy, silence, and judgment. If you put the same amount of shame in the petri dish and douse it with empathy, it can't survive." From Tedtalks, Brene Brown

An interview with Brené Brown, Ph.D. Author of "Women & Shame"
"Let me say a little bit about empathy and strategies of disconnection—both of these concepts are critically important pieces in building our understanding of shame. Building shame resilience is about reaching out to others and building connection. When we do this with people in our support systems, we often develop relationships that are built on a foundation of empathy. This is incredibly important because, based on this research, I found that the opposite of experiencing shame is experiencing empathy. When we tell our stories or share an experience with someone and they respond with empathy, most of our shame loses its power.

Expressing empathy or being empathic is not easy. It requires us to be able to see the world as others see it, to be non-judgmental, to understand another person’s feelings and to communicate your understanding of that person’s feelings (Wiseman, 1996).

When we talk about high vulnerability areas like motherhood because it is exchanges within these areas where our hopes of finding connection and empathy are often dashed and we find ourselves instead feeling attacked, shamed and disconnected. Many of us have developed strategies for dealing with shame and our unmet need for empathy."
 

RSA Talk: The Power of Vulnerability - Brene Brown

"Influential author and speaker Dr Brené Brown tackles the myth that vulnerability is a weakness. Instead, she argues, it is the clearest path to courage and meaningful connection, and has the power to transform the way we engage and educate."

• What to be afraid of and who is to blame?

• scarcity culture: never enough - never good enough

• self protection: against judgment, etc

• needs for love and belonging - painful not to have it

• vulnerability is path to joy, love, trust,

• What is empathy? and why is it different than sympathy

  • empathy fuels connection - feeling with people

  • sympathy drives disconnection

• Empathy is this kind of sacred space

• Sympathy gets in the way of empathy

• Blame

• Shame - I am bad - focus on self

• Guilt - I did something bad - focus on behaviour

RSA Shorts - The Power of Empathy
"What is the best way to ease someone's pain and suffering? In this beautifully animated RSA Short, Dr Brené Brown reminds us that we can only create a genuine empathic connection if we are brave enough to really get in touch with our own fragilities."

Brene Brown - Boundaries, Empathy, and Compassion
Mar 7, 2016

Jan 7, 2013 - Brené Brown - Embracing Vulnerability

• How many of you would agree that we are in a serious empathy deficit in our culture today?

• Not vulnerability - no empathy

• In a culture where people are afraid to be vulnerable, you can't have empathy.

• Empathy is not a default response.

• If you share something with me that's difficult, in order for me to be truly empathic, I have to step into what your feeling, and that's vulnerable.  So there can be no empathy without vulnerability.

• Story of bullying and shaming.

 08/26/2013 - Brené Brown: "Shame Is Lethal"

"Dr. Brené Brown: "Shame Is Lethal" Shame and vulnerability researcher Dr. Brené Brown says shame is the intensely painful feeling that we are unworthy of love and belonging. It's the most primitive human emotion we all feel—and the one no one wants to talk about. If left to its own devices, Dr. Brown says, shame can destroy lives. Watch as she reveals the three things shame requires to grow—and the one thing that can stop shame in its tracks."

• Shame - the intensely painful feeling that we are unworthy of love and belonging

• shame related to sexual abuse

• shame is deadly and lethal and we are swimming in it deep.

• shame - The less you talk about it, the more you got it

• shame needs three things to grow in our lives: secrecy, silence and judgment

Brené: "You put the same amount of shame in a petri dish and you dowse it with empathy, you've create an environment that is hostile to shame. Shame cannot survive being spoken. It can't survive empathy. If I call you and something very shaming happened to me, and I call you... and I tell you, and you express empathy, shame can't survive it. Shame depends on me buying into the belief that I am alone, "
 

Brené: When I say I study shame, people say either "I don't know what you're talking about" or "I know exactly what you're talking about, and I'm not talking about that." But the less you talk about it, the more you've got it. Shame needs three things to grow exponentially: secrecy, silence, and judgment. So if something shaming happens to me and I call you and say, "Oh, Oprah, you're not gonna believe what happened," and you express empathy—shame can't survive that. It depends on my belief that I'm alone.... 

Oprah: You say that we need friends who will respond with empathy, not sympathy. "If you want to see a shame cyclone turn deadly, throw one of these at it: 'Oh, you poor thing.' Or the incredibly passive-aggressive, Southern version of sympathy: 'Bless your heart.
 

Oprah: You have such a beautiful definition of connection. I actually put it on my iPad, in the place where I keep quotes. "Connection is the energy that is created between people when they feel seen, heard, and valued; when they can give and receive without judgment." That made me weep.
 

08/26/2013  - Oprah and Brené Brown, Parts 1 and 2
"6 Types of People Who Do Not Deserve to Hear Your Shame Story
When something shameful happens in your life, shame and vulnerability researcher Dr. Brené Brown says, there are six types of people with whom you shouldn't share the story. Watch to find out who they are. Plus, hear why she says everyone needs just one "move-the-body friend."

 

 May 15, 2013The Wholehearted Life: Oprah Talks to Brené Brown
"Brené: When I say I study shame, people say either "I don't know what you're talking about" or "I know exactly what you're talking about, and I'm not talking about that." But the less you talk about it, the more you've got it. Shame needs three things to grow exponentially: secrecy, silence, and judgment. So if something shaming happens to me and I call you and say, "Oh, Oprah, you're not gonna believe what happened," and you express empathy—shame can't survive that. It depends on my belief that I'm alone.... 

Oprah: You say that we need friends who will respond with empathy, not sympathy. "If you want to see a shame cyclone turn deadly, throw one of these at it: 'Oh, you poor thing.' Or the incredibly passive-aggressive, Southern version of sympathy: 'Bless your heart.'" "

 

January 24, 2011 - Whole-hearted Living  By Steve Safigan

2012-03-00 - Brené Brown: Listening to shame

"Shame is an epidemic in our culture. And to get out from underneath it, to find our way back to each other, we have to understand how it affects us and how it affects the way we're parenting, the way we're working, the way we're looking at each other....

If we're going to find our way back to each other, we have to understand and know empathy, because empathy's the antidote to shame. If you put shame in a Petri dish, it needs three things to grow exponentially: secrecy, silence and judgment. If you put the same amount of shame in a Petri dish and douse it with empathy, it can't survive. The two most powerful words when we're in struggle: me too.

And so I'll leave you with this thought. If we're going to find our way back to each other, vulnerability is going to be that path..."
 

2010-10-16 - TEDxHouston - Brené Brown - Shame  

• unravels connection, shame and fear.

• fear of disconnection - something about me that is worthy of disconnection

•  I'm not rich enough, thin enough, rich enough,

•  vulnerability - for connection we have to allow ourselves to be seen - rally seen

•  worthiness - focus groups

• worthiness - or struggle for worthiness - they believe they are worthy of love and belonging

• fear that we are not worthy of connection

• embraced vulnerability - is necessary -

•  live in a vulnerable world - we numb vulnerability

• blame - a way to discharge pain and discomfort

• let ourselves be seen

• believe we're enough

2010-06-00 - Brene Brown: The power of vulnerability

"So very quickly -- really about six weeks into this research -- I ran into this unnamed thing that absolutely unraveled connection in a way that I didn't understand or had never seen. And so I pulled back out of the research and thought, I need to figure out what this is. And it turned out to be shame. 

And shame is really easily understood as the fear of disconnection: Is there something about me that, if other people know it or see it, that I won't be worthy of connection? The things I can tell you about it: it's universal; we all have it. The only people who don't experience shame have no capacity for human empathy or connection. No one wants to talk about it, and the less you talk about it the more you have it. What underpinned this shame, this "I'm not good enough," -- which we all know that feeling: "I'm not blank enough. I'm not thin enough, rich enough, beautiful enough, smart enough, promoted enough." The thing that underpinned this was excruciating vulnerability, this idea of, in order for connection to happen, we have to allow ourselves to be seen, really seen. "

2008-02-02 PBS Interview 1st of 2

• Shame - primitive emotion

• We're wire to have connection

• Shame is fear of connection

• fear - threatens connection

• Wanted to study human connection

• quality that unraveled  connection - shame

• shame body heart emotion

• Shame is an intensely painful feeling or belief that we are flawed ands somehow inadequate and unworthy of connection.

• Our culture

  • will not have dialog about it

  • reality tv, entertainment is about it.

  • still not having honest conversation about it.

2008-02-02 PBS Interview 2nd of 2

• perfectionism - if I do it perfectly, I will be accepted and loved

• if people really see what is happening, I won't be accepted

• How do we reconnect

  • it is our imperfection that connects us, our share humanity is imperfect

  • find courage to talk authentically

• 4 things people have in common dealing with shame

  • 1. physically recognized when they are feeling it and what triggered it

  • 2. practice critical awareness

  • 3. reach out - talk about it.

  • 4. use the word shame

• How do we learn the attributes of empathy

  • What I found in my research is that the opposite of experiencing shame is experiencing empathy.  Shame cannot survive empathy. I think empathy is tough, I think we have some natural tendencies to care for our fellow humans, but we kind of unlearn empathy, as a way to survive almost. So being empathic is about connecting with your experience,.... If I can dig deep and connect to what it is your feeling, and express that back... so you know your not alone.  Empathy is hugely important, as an added plus it's highly coordinated with everything from leadership skills, family functioning, good parenting, - it's just the essential emotion...

2007-04-17 Shame & Empathy by Dr. Brené Brown
In an excerpt from her new psychoeducational shame-resilience curriculum, University of Houston researcher and educator Brené Brown discusses the destructive nature of shame and the healing power of empathy.
 

• Why Shame and Empathy?

  • what is it,  how does it work?

  • what is empathy and how does it work?

• talked to hundred of people about shame

• talk a lot about connection  - is making meaningful-authentic relationships with people

  • connection is the essence of the human experience

  • gives meaning to our lives

• a continuum - Empathy on one end  < ---> Shame on the other end

  • Empathy

    • moves us to meaningful relationships

  • Shame

    • it unravels connections with others.

  • Connection

  • Vulnerability

    • high vulnerability higher empathy

    • low vulnerability more shame

    • shame - can't show these pieces of me because I fear it will cause disconnection - others will with draw empathy.

• Courage

  • etymology - speak your mind with your heart

  • how to do that in a culture of fear

  • shame breeds fear, blame, disconnection

  • we are wired for stories - how to share our stories

• Compassion

  • where do we find the compassion to hear other's stories

  • just listening to shame can fee shame

• Connection

Dr Brené Brown, “Blame”
 

"And blaming is very corrosive in relationships. and it's one of the reasons we miss our opportunity for empathy.  Because when we hear a story we're not really listening,...making the connections as quickly as possible about who's fault something was"
 

"Empathy is connection; it's a ladder out of the shame hole" Brené Brown
 

'If we can share our story with someone who responds with empathy and understanding, shame can't survive.'  Brené Brown