A two-part essay on shame: Part 1 In my previous essay on guilt and shame, I discussed their nature and differences, their impact on personal and social life, and their instrumentality in much of our individual unhappiness and communal dysfunction. If indeed shame is the common thread of the human condition — fraught as it…
Category: Psychology
Essays discussing aspects of psychology
1. The Engine of Shame
A wise friend — a man who helped me emerge from a period of considerable difficulty in my life — once taught me a simple lesson. In less than a minute, he handed me a gift which I have spent years only beginning to understand, integrating it into my life with agonizing slowness. It is…