Brene Brown, Shame,Vulnerability and Enjoying Life

When I asked you through a questionnaire about the essay and video topics of primary interest to you, “enjoying life” got the most votes by far. In this article, where I draw on Brene Brown’s work on vulnerability, I’ll answer the question why we cannot find joy in life, besides giving you tips that will help you savour life.

When we enjoy life we experience positive feelings and feel we lead a meaningful life. When we look at our child, his presence and everything about her give us pleasure, play comes naturally; we work because we enjoy, not because we need money to pay the bills; we give a present someone because we value them rather than acing out of a social requirement; we can accept our spouse’s and our own quirks and talk about them ina calm way.

Brene Brown’s research on shame and vulnerability yielded important results that show that not being able to be ourself in our relationships results in the loss of pleasure in life. Which means life’s colours begin to fade when toeing the line ceases to be optional. Sometimes we bury our wishes and desires so deep under the pressure of what we have to do and to be that we end up not knowing who we really are.

Have you ever painted a perfect picture of your family life when talking to friends even though you are not happy with yourself as a parent? Or made a secret of your child’s lying to you? Shrunk from touching your spouse or sweetheart in the presence of others? Fought back your tears because your father was there? Brene Brown maintains we need to bond, we need to share our sincere stories, and to feel we belong because of our nature. Yet all these situations show that we hide ourselves and as a result we fail to establish true and meaningful relationships with those around us.

Shame gets on the way of nurturing bonds

Why do we do this? Because we fear, if we let our imperfections show, we might lose the bonds we need, be excluded, criticised and judged. Shame means we do not feel worthy of other people’s interest.  As I decsribed in detail in my video / article titled ‘Three Common Mistakes Parents Make, Their Effects and Corresponding Correct Behaviors’ children are often expected to perform beyond thier years and often crticised, judged and compared. In return  they internalize these feelings of inadequacy and worthlessness. It’s a very heavy burden.

According to Brown, the feeling of shame in our culture is like a contagious disease that stops us from reaching for each other. We are all ashamed, we all avoid talking, and by doing that we let the disease take its toll.  All research show that the feeling of shame is related to serious problems such as addictions, suicide, depression, violence, eating disorders and bullying. When we try to dull the unacceptable feelings we cannot cope with, with drugs, addictions, or activities, we are in fact dulling all of our feelings.

Vulnerability as  Strength; Key to Happiness

Brene Brown finds that it’s dangerous to see vulnerability as a weakness. She asserts that a meaningful life is based on making real bonds, which can only be achieved through vulnerability. We are vulnerable when we talk about our weaknesses, inadequacies, anxieties and fears; when we shed the armour we developed to fend off adverse comments from others. In this state of vulnerability we take an emotional risk, we enter a zone where we don’t know how we’ll be met. How vulnerable/defenseless we allow ourselves to be is the real measure of our courage.

We are in a cultural process where nothing is enough, we’ve been led to think we are inadequate by the commercials, the TV series, the competitive environment at school and at work. We feel we’re not good enough, not pretty enough, not safe enough, not determined enough, not successful enough, not industrious enough, and all of these these inadequacies we feel we have to hide. The society’s culture glorifies a perfection that’s not possible to achieve, failing which our shame grows. The more standing defenseless and vulnerable is perceived as a weakness, the more our capacity  to be vulnerable as a society decreases. This in turn brene Brown’s research shows leads to increase in mental health problems. It is not surprising that the society seems to be addicted to its psychiatric drugs!

Another way we cope with emptiness of hiding ourselves, is filling our days with activity.  We struggle to be extraordinary and exceptional in the eyses of others.  As a result we end up with an image that hardly goes beyond producing nice pictures and enviable experiences that can be posted in Facebook. We completely miss the meaningfulness and pure bliss of what’s ordinary and quotidian in the process. When we finally realize we don’t enjoy life we feel that something is seriously wrong.

Start Enjoying Life Today

The path that leads from shame to empathy, from loneliness to bonding, from not enjoying life to a deep sense of happiness goes through being able to stand defenseless and vulnerable in our relationships. Here’s the action plan that I’ve put together, inspired by Brene Brown, to help you enjoy life:

• I suggest you take your focus away from how others view you, away from feelings of shame and guilt and decide to boldly expose your true “imperfect” self.
• Encourage and support your children to do the same.
• Make the commitment to refrain yourself from judging, this will in turn help you not fearing others’ judgement.
• Decide, no matter what, to control your conditioned self to take humiliation out of your interactions , especially with your children, as humiliation and the shame it evokes cerate disease that robs life of its colours.
• The antidote to shame is empathy, which means approaching each other’s and one’s own inadequacies, deficiencies, and difficulties with compassion and tenderness, without blaming or judging. Embrace empathy.
• Be aware of your conditioned thoughts and aspirations and take time to be grateful, do this regularly on a daily basis.
• Open your eyes to see the outstanding in the ordinary.
• To enjoy life, embrace and share your imperfections without shame and without defense, willing to be vulnerable – start today.
• Approach your child’s, your spouse’s, your boss’, your employee’s, and your own imperfections with compassion and tenderness, making sure you do not perpetuate the cycle of shame and humiliation so many of us suffer.

Please share your thoughts, experiences, questions and feedback in the Comments section below. I read each comment and reply.

Fotoğraf: David Amsler
Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0) via Flickr