Brené Brown

I've been intrigued with Brené Brown's work since I listened to her Ted Talk on Vulnerability. I finally got around to starting to read her books. I expected I Thought It Was Just Me (But It Isn't): Making the Journey from "What Will People Think?" to "I Am Enough" to be a reiteration of all the things I've heard her say in her talks and classes and in her interviews. It was that but it was also more. In fact, it was more than I expected or perhaps was ready for. I sat down intending to show more simply read the book and ended up deciding to take her advice and work through the exercises. I didn't always like the answers that arose for me, but it was worth the time it took. I Thought It Was Just Me (But It Isn't) pushed me to examine my thoughts and my attitudes toward shame and blame and vulnerability and strength. I started the book thinking that I'd already done this work, so this would just be me learning more about the topic. Brown breaks down shame and connection in ways that make her points highly relatable and highly relevant. As a writer, I found Brown's research also provides insight into writing characters who are mired in shame and those who aren't. I Thought It Was Just Me (But It Isn't) is a book based on research but written for every human, but particularly women and girls, who have ever been shamed into silence or into roles they didn't want to live. show less

I have never read a book I wanted to highlight so much of. There is stuff in here that touches on every aspect of my life, and on making every aspect of my life better. It wasn't an easy read... there were "aha!" moments every few pages that had me putting the book down and going outside to pace around until the thoughts sparked in my head settled down and integrated. I kept running out into wherever my family was and saying, "You guys! Listen to this!!!" and then reading them hunks of it. show more The tools of this book integrate seamlessly with, y'know, life, but in such a way that even kids can engage immediately with the accessible wisdom they present.

I can easily see re-reading this over, and over, and over, as a reminder of how I want my life lived. And I'll be tackling the rest of her books as fast as I possibly can. show less

This was a tough book to get through emotionally, but it was one of those I knew would be worth the effort. In order to become the better person I want to be, I need to be willing to confront myself in all my facets.

I Thought it Was Just Me is about shame. It's such a big, complex emotion; not easy to pin down or understand its many manifestations. Dr. Brown's research provided her with some commonalities in order to attempt to organize and develop ideas about shame and shame resilience.

The show more reader is presented with information about the many common shame triggers (twelve are listed) and ways to recognize the triggers and build what is called resilience. It's easy for even the healthiest of us to succumb to shame and fall into the downward spiral shame leads us into.

Since I'm at a particularly vulnerable point in my life right now, I didn't take notes or use book darts, I took what I could gather and didn't worry about what was being left out. Even then, I found information that made it easier to cope with the big emotions I've experienced from the time I got laid off in July 2013 through the darkness of 2014 'til now.

It's far too easy to believe that everything's my fault even when I know it isn't and to feel ashamed for so many things, some of which are pure nonsense. I'm grateful for Brene Brown's work on shame and vulnerability, it's helped me learn so much about who I am and what I'm experiencing. show less

Definitely not the book for me. I suspect there's some really good advice and counter-behaviors and -cognition for coping with shame in this, but Ms Brown defines shame so narrowly that I don't really fit her audience. ...And since I ended up skimming most of the latter half of the book because it was advising me to do stuff I already do, I probably don't experience shame in a way her research can help with.

Shame, she explains, is believing you deserve the feeling of worthlessness, hatred, show more contempt, etc. others (and you) level at you for something you do, think, say, or are. If you don't believe you deserve it—if instead you feel outrage or frustration or hurt or indignation—what you're experiencing is humiliation. (If you acknowledge those feelings might be rooted in some bad behavior, but that behavior doesn't make you a bad person, you're experiencing guilt, which can apparently be helpful to motivate you toward improving yourself.) What I experience, and dread, is definitely humiliation. And while I hoped this book would give me some assistance in being more resistant to that feeling, and more willing to risk instances when I might feel it, no such luck.

Humiliation, I think, can be just as paralyzing as Brown's depiction of shame, and so I can't help but wonder if, as well-founded in anecdotal research as her work is, it's too rigid in its framework, too bound by her own experiences and philosophies and perspectives. Certainly, there were moments when I felt her interpretation of the emotions in a scene wasn't quite accurate, and I outright flinched at some of her suggestions on expressing empathy. (Please don't ever respond to my expression of hurt or fear or guilt or humiliation with the words, "What can I do to help?" I guarantee you that instead of feeling you're on my side, I'll feel you want to rush me to the conclusion of my emotional crisis, the part where everything's fixed and you can stop feeling awkward and uncomfortable as I express pain.)

In any case, the quest to find a book to address the humiliation question continues! In the meantime, I hope this book proves helpful to those who do experience shame. show less