"I’ve heard so many stories in my life that I know I’m not alone. Everyone has a struggle. It’s what I say about empathy in my shame work. If you have a petri dish and you have shame in there, this pervasive feeling of not being good enough and not being ‘whatever’ enough—thin enough, rich enough, popular enough, promoted enough, loved enough. It only needs three things to survive in this little Petri dish and actually to grow exponentially and creep into every corner and crevice of your life and those are secrecy, silence and judgement. If you have the same amount of shame in a Petri dish and you douse it with some empathy, you share your story with someone who can hear you and look back at you and say you’re not alone, shame dies. You’ve created a hostile environment for those gremlins who keep saying to you ‘you’re not enough, you’re not enough, nothing you do is enough’. So I believe with my whole heart there are only two options; to let what scares us stay inside of us—and fester and grow and take over everything—or to share it. I think that we have to share our stories with people who’ve earned the right to hear them."
- Brené Brown
*taken from this interview with her
May I ask where you acquired this photo of Brene Brown?
ReplyDeletei can't quite remember, catherine. i'm sorry!
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