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Shame is a painful feeling of humiliation for something you have done

• Shame: A painful feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behaviour. Oxford Dictionary
• Shame: A feeling of guilt, regret, or sadness that you have because you know you have done something wrong. Merriam Webster
• Shame: The painful feeling arising from the consciousness of something dishonorable, improper, ridiculous, etc., done by oneself or another. Dictionary.com
• Embarrassment,  Humiliation,  Failure,  Guilt,  Self-forgiveness

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Shame is feeling bad about who you are; guilt is feeling bad for what you did

• The difference between guilt and shame is very clear—in theory. We feel guilty for what we do. We feel shame for what we are. Lewis B. Smedes
• The difference between shame and guilt is “I am bad.” and “I did something bad.” Brené Brown
• Guilt is “I’m so sorry. I made a mistake.” Shame is “I’m so sorry. I am a mistake.” Brené Brown
• Shame is guilt in overdrive. If it helps think of the difference between shame and guilt as this: shame says “I’m bad, I’m flawed”, guilt says “what I did was harmful to myself and/or others, and I can do better than that”. Thoughts of healthy, unbiased guilt are how you converse with your conscience, while feelings of shame don’t even let the conversation begin. Renee Bledsoe
• Shame is closely related to guilt, but there is a key qualitative difference. No audience is needed for feelings of guilt, no one else need know, for the guilty person is his own judge. Not so for shame. The humiliation of shame requires disapproval or ridicule by others. If no one ever learns of a misdeed there will be no shame, but there still might be guilt. Of course, there may be both. The distinction between shame and guilt is very important, since these two emotions may tear a person in opposite directions. The wish to relieve guilt may motivate a confession, but the wish to avoid the humiliation of shame may prevent it. Paul Ekman
• Guilt

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Shame is feeling ashamed of your feelings, needs and drives

• Ashamed: Embarrassed or guilty because of one’s actions, characteristics, or associations. Oxford Dictionary
• To be shame-bound means that whenever you feel any feeling, need or drive, you immediately feel ashamed. The dynamic core of your human life is grounded in your feelings, needs and drives. When these are bound by shame, you are shamed to the core. John Bradshaw
• Human needs,  Emotions

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Shame is a deep sense that you are not good enough …

• There is another part of us that receives the judgments, and this part is called the Victim. The Victim carries the blame, the guilt, and the shame. It is the part of us that says, “Poor me, I’m not good enough, I’m not intelligent enough, I’m not attractive enough, I’m not worthy of love, poor me.” The big Judge agrees and says, “Yes, you are not good enough.” Don Miguel Ruiz
• If we look closely, we can see that those shame-based thoughts exist on more than one level. The first level is an exhaustive list of our faults. The second level is an added message that those faults are permanent. In short, the first level is “I am not good.” The second level is “I’ll never be good enough.” Hazelden
• Self-worth,  Self-esteem

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… a sense of being unworthy of love and belonging

• Shame is the intensely painful feeling that we are unworthy of love and belonging. Brené Brown
• Shame is an intensely painful feeling or experience of believing we are flawed and therefore unworthy of acceptance and belonging. Shame creates feelings of fear, blame and disconnection. Brené Brown
• Love

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Where there is shame, there is always fear …

• Most of our fears are fear of failure, shame, or somehow not living up to the standards society has put up for us. Henri Junttila
• Where shame is, there is also fear. John Milton
• Shame is the fear of connection. IS there something about me, if others see it, I won’t be worthy connection. It’s a universal fear. Brené Brown
• Fear

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… especially the fear of humiliation

• Pride attaches undue importance to the superiority of one’s status in the eyes of others; And shame is fear of humiliation at one’s inferior status in the estimation of others. When one sets his heart on being highly esteemed, and achieves such rating, then he is automatically involved in fear of losing his status. Lao Tzu
• The basis of shame is not some personal mistake of ours, but the ignominy, the humiliation we feel that we must be what we are without any choice in the matter, and that this humiliation is seen by everyone. Milan Kundera
• Humiliation

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Shame comes from having a loud and judgemental inner critic …

• There is something in our minds that judges everybody and everything, including the weather, the dog, the cat — everything. The inner Judge uses what is in our Book of Law to judge everything we do and don’t do, everything we think and don’t think, and everything we feel and don’t feel. Everything lives under the tyranny of this Judge. Every time we do something that goes against the Book of Law, the Judge says we are guilty, we need to be punished, we should be ashamed. This happens many times a day, day after day, for all the years of our lives. Don Miguel Ruiz
• Criticism

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… that makes you zoom in on your imperfections and flaws

• Shame works like the zoom lens on a camera. When we are feeling shame, the camera is zoomed in tight and all we see is our flawed selves, alone and struggling. Brené Brown
• The hallmark of shame is a constant awareness of our defects. Without realizing it, we become continual victims of shame-based thinking. Every day, we focus on our failures. Every day, we re-convince ourselves that we are defective. Our thoughts become riddled with judgment, regret, and images of impending failure. Hazelden

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Shame is a weapon we use against ourselves

• In the quest for self-control, the usual weapons we wield against ourselves—guilt, stress, and shame—don’t work. People who have the greatest self-control aren’t waging self-war. They have learned to accept and integrate these competing selves. Kelly McGonigal, Ph.D.

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Shame often lingers no matter how much you achieve or get praised

• In addition, it doesn’t matter how well we perform in school, on the job, or at home. Shame-based thinking lingers. It colors the way we perceive everything. It leads us to automatically discount our skills and successes. Even if we receive recognition or praise, shame-based thinking forces us to explain it away: I don’t deserve appreciation. . . . If only they knew who I really am. . . . They don’t really mean what they’re saying. . . . They’re just setting me up for failure. Hazelden

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Shame can bring intense mental suffering and pain …

• .. is not just lots of pain but pain amplified by distinctly human emotions such as regret, self-pity, shame, humiliation, and dread. Michael Pollan
• What makes the pain we feel from shame and jealousy so cutting is that vanity can give us no assistance in bearing them. Francois de La Rochefoucauld

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… including depression

• Depression has a mind of its own. When you are depressed, you think in generalizations (nothing works out), you don’t give yourself credit (I can’t do anything right), and you label yourself in the most negative terms (loser, ashamed, humiliated). You set demanding standards that you will never live up to. You may think you need to get everyone’s approval, or excel at everything you do, or know for sure something will work out before you try it. Your thinking keeps you trapped in self- criticism, indecisiveness, and inertia. Robert Leahy, Ph.D.
• Depression often possesses the shame-bound person. Depression is the stuck place between anger and grief. The person who feels no sense of self-worth will not know how to get angry, for that would be too much aggression for him who was brought up with such a fragmented sense of being entitled to respect. On the other hand, the shame- possessed person cannot grieve, for it was much too disappointing and painful to dare to believe that he could be genuinely important to another, or vice versa. Depression is marked by alienation and no real opportunity to bring things back together. At the center of depression is the sense of loss, and the shame-bound person carries the greatest loss of all, the loss of a valued self.  Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.
• Apathy and depression are the prices we pay for having settled for and bought into our smallness. David R. Hawkins
• Depression

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Shame can eat at your soul and self-esteem, dragging you right down

• Shame is a soul eating emotion. Carl Jung
• Shame isn’t a quiet grey cloud, shame is a drowning man who claws his way on top of you, scratching and tearing your skin, pushing you under the surface. Kirsty Eagar
• At the core of the shame-bound person is a failure of self-esteem. As one feels dishonored and without belonging, then feeling good about oneself, feeling confident in one’s abilities is inevitably lost. With one’s boundaries mushy and one’s sense of oneself as “flawed,” one hardly has a self at all, let alone one to feel high regard for. Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.
• The soul,  Self-esteem

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Shame sends your true self into hiding …

• I believe one of our souls’ major purposes is to know, love, and express our authentic selves. To live the life and be the person we were created to be.  However, our true selves only emerge when it’s safe to do so. Self- condemnation, shame, and guilt send your true nature into hiding.  It’s only in the safety of gentle curiosity, encouragement, and self- love that your soul can bloom as it was created to do.  Sue Patton Thoele

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… and makes you put on a mask …

• Let others know. Depressives fear intimacy more than most people. We put on masks for the world, because we believe our true selves to be shameful, unworthy. But this belief is wrong. When we’re with someone we can trust, sharing our thoughts and feelings — even if they seem unimportant — is good for us. Richard O’Connor
• The shame-bound person clings to his image, after all it is the most positive thing he has going for him. He believes that within he has no real self, that he is not loved, or respected, or needed, so he must make himself loveable, appear respectable, and create the illusion of being indispensable to others. He works hard at it. He lives by his false-self, often bouncing between an over- and under-inflated presentation of himself. He does not strive for self-fulfillment, only for self- image fulfilment. Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.

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… blocking true love, connection and intimacy

• Love is not something we give or get; it is something that we nurture and grow, a connection that can only be cultivated between two people when it exists within each one of them – we can only love others as much as we love ourselves. Shame, blame, disrespect, betrayal, and the withholding of affection damage the roots from which love grows. Love can only survive these injuries if they are acknowledged, healed and rare. Brené Brown
• If we have anything kind to say, any tender sentiment to express, we feel a sense of shame. Ugo Betti
• Shame is the fear of connection. IS there something about me, if others see it, I won’t be worthy connection. It’s a universal fear. Brené Brown
• The shame-bound person has difficulty with intimate relationships. Feeling so bad about herself, she does not wish another to know her, expecting for sure that he will see what a shameful creature she is. So she puts up a false front, she pretends and postures and does all the things she believes others will be impressed by, but she can never do that which is the essence of intimacy, reveal herself to another in open risk taking. Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.
• Love,  Connection,  Intimacy

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Shames stops you from growing and changing

• We cannot grow when we are in shame, and we can’t use shame to change ourselves or others. Brené Brown
• Shame is the leading cause of death of the potential for actualizing giftedness. Maria Rocamora
• Shame corrodes the very part of us that believes we are capable of change. Brené Brown
• Growth,  Learning

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Shame increases the tendency to judge others

• We judge people in areas where we’re vulnerable to shame, especially picking folks who are doing worse than we’re doing. Brené Brown
• being highly critical of ourselves makes us highly critical of other people. We see our own faults mirrored in our family members, friends, and co-workers. We judge them, and in turn they perceive us as arrogant and self-righteous. The truth is that we see little of value in ourselves. Hazelden
• Judgement

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Shame creates a victim or offender mentality

• Victims may be defensive, submissive, over-accommodating to others, passive-aggressive in conflict, dependent on others for self-worth, overly sensitive, even manipulative. They’re often angry, resentful, and envious, feeling unworthy or ashamed about their circumstances. Have you ever felt or acted this way? David Emerald
• The shame-bound person may become either an offender or a victim, or, as is most likely, one who vacillates from one mode to the other. If his experiences cause him to access his shame, he may take out his hurt and rage on others weaker than himself in his present community of family and friends. For another person whose defense is less aggressive, if she is re-shamed, she may fall into her accustomed role of victim, as she is naturally adept in this guise, having been an actual victim in her original family. Having learned to make a “virtue” of necessity, she has mastered playing the victim for what consolation rewards there are– some sympathy, some self-righteousness. Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.
• When people experience shame, they may say to themselves ‘I’m to blame, it’s all my fault, all of me is bad, and there’s nothing I can do to change the situation. They identify so much with shame that it takes over their entire view of themselves. That leads to an overwhelming feeling of powerlessness. Jessica Van Vliet
• Victim mentality

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Shame hides itself in anger, blame, denial, workaholism, drinking …

• Your shame hides in many places – in anger, blame, denial, workaholism, perfectionism, drinking, and anything else you compulsively engage in to make yourself feel better. But if you could just learn to be vulnerable for one second, and open up to the pain, you would find there’s no place left for your shame to hide. Adam Appleson
• Blame,  Addiction

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… and crippling perfectionism …

• Perfectionism is a self-destructive and addictive belief system that fuels this primary thought: If I look perfect, and do everything perfectly, I can avoid or minimize the painful feelings of shame, judgment, and blame. Brené Brown
• Second, we become prey for perfectionism. Only an error-free performance can ever satisfy the demands imposed by shame-based thinking. Mistakes are disasters and cannot be openly admitted. The paradox is that we cling to perfection while remaining constantly aware of our imperfections. Hazelden
• Perfectionism

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… and in many other aspects of our lives

• And, while it feels like shame hides in our darkest corners, it actually tends to lurk in all of the familiar places, including appearance and body image, motherhood, family, parenting, money and work, mental and physical health, addiction, sex, aging and religion. Brené Brown

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Shame can make you reject the darker aspects of yourself, so you become a fragmented being

• Jung first gave us the term ‘shadow’ to refer to those parts of our personality that have been rejected out of fear, ignorance, shame, or lack of love. His basic notion of the shadow was simple: ‘the shadow is the person you would rather not be.’ He believed that integrating the shadow would have a profound impact, enabling us to rediscover a deeper source of our own spiritual life. ‘To do this,’ Jung said, ‘we are obliged to confront the shadow, to integrate the devil. There is no other choice. Debbie Ford
• Embrace your shadow

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We live in an atmosphere of shame, ashamed of so many aspects of ourselves and our lives

• We live in an atmosphere of shame. We are ashamed of everything that is real about us; ashamed of ourselves, of our relatives, of our incomes, of our accents, of our opinions, of our experience, just as we are ashamed of our naked skins. George Bernard Shaw
• You can find shame in every house, burning in an ashtray, hanging framed upon a wall, covering a bed. But nobody notices it any more. Salman Rushdie
• Shame is like everything else; live with it for long enough and it becomes part of the furniture. Salman Rushdie

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Refuse to bear the cross of shame any longer

• Some things you must always be unable to bear. Some things you must never stop refusing to bear. Injustice and outrage and dishonor and shame. No matter how young you are or how old you have got. Not for kudos and not for cash: your picture in the paper nor money in the back either. Just refuse to bear them. William Faulkner
• Strength isn’t about bearing a cross of grief or shame. Strength comes from choosing your own path, and living with the consequences. Jennifer Armintrout

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Transcend shame by realising it is always built on a lie

• Shame is the lie someone told you about yourself. Anaïs Nin
• Illusion

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Transcend shame by talking about your shame with others …

• Expressing shame and guilt, either privately or to someone who is trusted and understanding, decreases their power and may allow them to be “let go”. There is a long history of using self- disclosure to find relief from feelings of guilt and shame. Consider the practice of confession in some religious faiths. The transgressor acknowledges their wrongful acts to a spiritual leader or to their Higher Power and is absolved. Researchers have discovered there are even health benefits to certain kinds of self- disclosure.   Tracy Ochester
• Share whatever it is you’re ashamed about. You may think you can hide your shame by not talking about it, but in reality, it’s your shame that’s hiding you. Adam Appleson
• If we can share our story with someone who responds with empathy and understanding, shame can’t survive. Brené Brown
• Shame is always easier to handle if you have someone to share it with. Craig Thompson
• It is not the criminal things which are hardest to confess, but the ridiculous and shameful. Rousseau
• There is a great community of the shamed waiting to dare to trust others enough to be open and vulnerable. Sharing your shame with them will be a way of forming a strong and rejuvenating ties with others. Your sense of shame can be your channel of empathy and pathos to the hearts of others, and…it will help you laugh with the Woody Allen’s, Roger Dangerfield’s and Whoopie Goldberg’s of the world as they help you own the universality of your shame and both cry and lighten-up a bit about it.  Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.
• Vulnerability

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… for shame derives its power from being unspoken

• Shame derives its power from being unspeakable. BrenéBrown
• Shame cannot survive being spoken. It cannot survive empathy.   Brené Brown
• Shame needs three things to grow exponentially in our lives: secrecy, silence and judgement. Brené Brown

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However, make sure you share your shame stories with the right person

• If we share our shame story with the wrong person, they can easily become one more piece of flying debris in an already dangerous storm. Brené Brown
• Our stories are not meant for everyone. Hearing them is a privilege, and we should always ask ourselves this before we share: “Who has earned the right to hear my story?” If we have one or two people in our lives who can sit with us and hold space for our shame stories, and love us for our strengths and struggles, we are incredibly lucky. If we have a friend, or small group of friends, or family who embraces our imperfections, vulnerabilities, and power, and fills us with a sense of belonging, we are incredibly lucky. Brené Brown
• In true friendship, one can express anything and everything without feeling ashamed or afraid of being rejected.  Aparna Chatterjee

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Transcend shame by realising that your shame is not your fault

• Let yourself learn, through and through, that your shame is not your fault. Most of your shame-inducing experiences happened to you early in your life–when you were small and the world of parents and other caretakers loomed very large. Your fundamental feelings of insignificance, the “shame” that goes far back in your mind and soul, appeared long before you had any “choices” in the matter. Shame was your natural organismic response to the burdens and demands that were being visited on you by your family. Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.

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Transcend shame by realising there is a big difference between doing wrong and being a bad person

• You can do something wrong while still being a good person. A lot of guilt or shame can make you feel like there is something wrong with you. Realize, right now, that there is a very big difference between doing a bad thing and being a bad person. Even when you do something that you regret, you most likely had a valid reason for doing it at the time (even if that reason doesn’t make rational sense).  Michael Davidson
• When sufferers can identify external factors that contributed to their actions or situation (for example, discrimination or peer pressure) and differentiate between being a bad person versus doing something bad, they can begin to break the grip of hopelessness that plagues them.  Jessica Van Vliet

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Transcend shame by forgiving yourself for past mistakes

• Often, we are harder on ourselves than others are. If we cannot forgive ourselves, how can we forgive other people? Everyone’s lesson is to forgive ourselves for our mistakes, even those things we feel ashamed about, and learn to accept ourselves for who we are, knowing that we can always gently work on making improvements.  For me, the true experience of inner peace began only once I was able to forgive those around me, my parents, and myself. Patrick Wanis
• Mistakes,  Self-forgiveness

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Transcend shame by confronting your doubts

• Give me strength, not to be better than my enemies, but to defeat my greatest enemy, the doubts within myself. Give me strength for a straight back and clear eyes, so when life fades, as the setting sun, my spirit may come to you without shame. P.C. Cast
• Doubt is the brother of shame.
• Doubt

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Transcend shame by embracing all aspects of your humanness

• When I allow myself to be human and let go of my harsh judgements, I flower and bloom. My eyes are opened to my worth. Talents and gifts I never knew I had, begin to reveal themselves. Every part of me bathes in the warm glow of love and acceptance. Strengths, abilities, weaknesses and inadequacies. All things become new. No regret or shame. A life nourished from within. As the day accepts the sun and the night accepts the moon, so I accept myself. And so I become complete and whole. John Kehoe
• Self-acceptance

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Transcend shame by reflecting deeply on the source

• I need to be alone. I need to ponder my shame and my despair in seclusion; I need the sunshine and the paving stones of the streets without companions, without conversation, face to face with myself, with only the music of my heart for company. Henry Miller

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Transcend shame by no longer concealing your wounds

• In a futile attempt to erase our past, we deprive the community of our healing gift. If we conceal our wounds out of fear and shame, our inner darkness can neither be illuminated nor become a light for others. Brennan Manning
• It is the false shame of fools to try to conceal wounds that have not healed. Horace

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Transcend shame by acknowledging it and opening up to the pain, rather than repressing it

• This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival; a joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and attend them all! Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still, treat each guest as honourable. He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each guest has been sent as a guide from beyond.  Rumi
• As painful as shame is, it does seem to be the guardian of many of the secret, unexplored aspects of our beings. Repressed shame must be experienced if we are to come to terms with the good, the bad, and the unique of what we are. Robert Karen
• But if you could just learn to be vulnerable for one second, and open up to the pain, you would find there’s no place left for your shame to hide. Adam Appleson
• Exposure to oneself lies at the heart of shame. We discover in experiences of shame the most sensitive, intimate and vulnerable parts of ourselves. Brené Brown
• Pain

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Transcend shame by incorporating it

• Face shame, experience it, incorporate it. As you are your memories, your history, your joys and your talents, you also are your experience of shame. There is no escaping any part of yourself, your shame experiences are in your neurons and your body cells. What you can learn is not to deny or finesse them, but to face them, own them, and incorporate them into yourself. After all, they are only painful memories, not imperious demons. They cannot hurt you again as they did before–though you may believe they can–for you are not vulnerable as you were when you were small. Some things have changed and one of them is the perspective and position you have as adults to confront and not be done-in by the shaming experiences the world offers you. Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.

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Transcend shame by realising self-compassion can help you change far more than shaming yourself

• People are often very hard on themselves when they notice something they want to change because they think they can shame themselves into action – the self-flagellation approach. However, this approach often backfires if you can’t face difficult truths about yourself because you are so afraid of hating yourself if you do.  Thus, weaknesses may remain unacknowledged in an unconscious attempt to avoid self-censure. In contrast, the care intrinsic to compassion provides a powerful motivating force for growth and change, while also providing the safety needed to see the self clearly without fear of self-condemnation. Dr. Kristin Neff
• Shame corrodes the very part of us that believes we are capable of change. Brené Brown
• Self-compassion

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Create a healthy family for yourself

• Make new parents. You must learn from experience that you are not unworthy of belonging to the human community and that in order to heal your shame you must create a healthy family for yourself.  Perhaps this sounds strange, but you are already doing it–clubs, churches, professional societies are efforts; lovers, friends, marriages are efforts; even cliques, cults, and gangs are efforts. The success or failure of your journey to heal your shame will be crucially influenced by your ability to surround yourself with those who think you are lovable, who support you, who back you up in the way you lead your life, who can convey to you that they are for you even when they don’t like your behavior–and toward whom you can healthily reciprocate.  Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.

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If necessary, replace shame with mature guilt

• Replace shame with mature guilt. Guilt has often received bad press, and well it should–if, and only if, you are talking about neurotic guilt–guilt that self-flagellates and changes nothing. If you are talking about mature guilt, then guilt is one of the great inventions of nature. For mature guilt lets you know what is unacceptable, and offers you opportunity to do something about it. Shame, on the other hand comes to you as a feeling so deep and so incapable of your getting a grasp on it that it seems there is nothing you can do.  Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.
• Guilt

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In these ways, transcend shame and wash it away

• The next time you decide to unclutter your life and clean up your space, start with the things that are truly useless: Like regrets, shame, and anger.  Sandra Kring
• Soap won’t wash away your shame. Depeche Mode

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Recognise shame and its triggers

• Before we can overcome shame, we must be able to recognize it. says that we tend to first feel shame physically before our minds realize what it is. People describe a variety of physical symptoms such as nausea, shaking and heat in their faces and chests. Complete these statements to help you recognize your own physical reactions.
  I physically feel shame in/on my ________________
  It feels like ______________________
  I know I’m in shame when I feel _______________
  If I could taste shame, it would taste like ________________
  If I could smell shame, it would smell like ________________
  If I could touch shame, it would feel like _________________
  Source: Brené Brown, Ph.D.

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Identify your shame thoughts

• Shame develops as the slow, relentless accumulation of such thoughts–one self-insult at a time, delivered to ourselves over weeks, months, and years. Here are examples of such thoughts.
• I am defective (damaged, broken, a mistake, flawed).
• I am dirty (soiled, ugly, unclean, impure, filthy, disgusting).
• I am incompetent (not good enough, inept, ineffectual, useless).
• I am unwanted (unloved, unappreciated, uncherished).
• I am weak (small, impotent, puny, feeble).
• I am bad (awful, dreadful, evil, despicable).
• I am pitiful (contemptible, miserable, insignificant).
• I am nothing (worthless, invisible, unnoticed, empty).
• Source: Letting Go of Shame, Ronald Potter-Efron and Patricia Potter-Efron

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Transcend shame by challenging shame thoughts

• There’s a saying: “Don’t believe everything you think.” This is a core principle of cognitive-behavioral therapy. Instead of viewing your thoughts as absolute truths, see them as mental events to observe and evaluate. Be willing to challenge shame-based thoughts and replace them with more accurate thoughts. Hazelden
• Choose a specific thought that you’d like to work with, such as I’ll never find a job or If this relationship ends, I’ll never get over it. Then challenge this thought by asking any of the following questions:
  Is this thought really true?
  How do I know it’s true?
  What is the evidence for this thought?
  What is the evidence against this thought?
  Can I think of any times when this thought has not been true?
  Is this thought helping me or hurting me?
  Who would I be if I let go of this thought?
  What could I do if I let go of this thought?
  Am I willing to release this thought?
  What’s the worst that could happen if I let go of this thought? Can I live with that?
  Source:   Hazelden

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Beware of people who try to use shame to manipulate you

• Shame is an unhappy emotion invented by pietists in order to exploit the human race. Blake Edwards
• Once they know they’ve got a hold of your shame, they can shake it out and hold it up for the all world to see. And you become less than it. You become something disgusting. Kirsty Eagar

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Never use shame to manipulate others …

• What do you regard as most humane? To spare someone shame. Friedrich Nietzsche
• “Shaming” a person makes him as low as he can go. For a person who has been shamed has no way out, his is the feeling of there being nothing he can do to set things right. Something vague, but decisive, has shrunk his soul. Robert D. Caldwell, M.Div.

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… especially children for they are the most susceptible to it

• As children grow in environments in which their needs and longings for specialness and warm relatedness are consistently frustrated, they begin to turn away from their own needs in depression and shame. We can imagine the young children wondering, “What is wrong with me that I get so little response from my mother?  The two possible answers are I am too defective and unworthy of love, and there is something wrong with what I am asking for.” In both cases, there is something wrong, either with the children themselves or with their needs and desires.  This experience of unimportance or wrongness is the common relational backdrop for vulnerability and susceptibility to shame.  Andrew P. Morrison
• I never learned hate at home, or shame. I had to go to school for that. Dick Gregory

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You can’t shame others into changing themselves or their behaviours

• If we would induce others to act virtuously, it will prove more effectual to show them their capacities than to expose their weakness–to attract them by a fairer ideal than to terrify them by pictures of misery and shame. E.H. Chapin
• You cannot shame or belittle people into changing their behaviors. Brené Brown

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Some argue that shame has a role to play as a moral compass …

• A sense of shame is not a bad moral compass. Colin Powell
• Everyone needs a sense of shame, but no one needs to feel ashamed. Frederick Friedrich Nietzsche
• Shame may restrain what law does not prohibit. Lucius Annaeus Seneca
• Whilst shame keeps its watch, virtue is not wholly extinguished in the heart; nor will moderation be utterly exiled from the minds of tyrants. Edmund Burke
• Though honor might possess certain advantages, yet shame had others, and not inferior. Thomas Mann
• Shame is the turnkey that keeps our evil desires in jail. Austin O’Malley
• I regard that man as lost, who has lost his sense of shame. Plautus
• One of the misfortunes of our time is that in getting rid of false shame we have killed off so much real shame as well. Louis Kronenberger
• There’s shames a man can never reason away, though he looks back and piles up reasons over them forty dozen deep. And maybe those are the shames a man never should reason away. Ken Kesey
• Shame can prompt us to make changes that will help protect our relationships and also preserve the fabric of society. It’s important to emphasize that shame is essential and has value. The problem is when people get paralyzed with shame and withdraw from others. Not only can this create mental-health problems for people, but also they no longer contribute as fully to society.  Jessica Van Vliet
• Morality and ethics

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… that without shame, we’d be prone to misbehave

• He that is shameless is graceless. Thomas Fuller
• The only shame is to have none. Blaise Pascal
• I never wonder to see men wicked, but I often wonder to see them not ashamed. Jonathan Swift

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These are the usually the same people who rail against the shames of sin

• Whoever despiseth shame, despiseth sin. Benjamin Whichcote
• Sin and shame ever go together; he that would be freed from the last must be sure to shun the company of the first. Anne Bradstreet
• Sin hath the devil for its father, shame for its companion, and death for its wages. Thomas J. Watson, Sr.
• Not to be ashamed of sin is to sin double. German Proverb
• Sin

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Some argue there are valid reasons to feel ashamed at times

• It is more shameful to distrust our friends than to be deceived by them. Confucius
• The first and greatest victory is to conquer yourself; to be conquered by yourself is of all things most shameful and vile. Plato
• Be ashamed to die unless you have won some victory for humanity. Horace Mann
• There is nothing that wastes the body like worry, and one who has any faith in God should be ashamed to worry about anything whatsoever. Mahatma Gandhi

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Shame often follows after pride

• Let pride go afore, shame will follow after. George Chapman
• Pride will have a fall; For pride goeth before and shame cometh after. Proverb
• Shame is pride’s cloak. William Blake
• Pride gets into the Coach, and Shame mounts behind. Benjamin Franklin
• Pride

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Shame often follows after selfishness

• Glory built on selfish principles is shame and guilt. William Cowper
• Cowardice rightly understood begins with selfishness and ends with shame. Jose Rizal
• Selfishness

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Shame often follows after anger not restrained

• Whate’ers begun in anger ends in shame. Benjamin Franklin
• Anger

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Here are more things that can bring on shame

• Shame occurs when you haven’t been able to get away with the ‘who’ you want people to think you are. Carl Whitaker
• Unused creativity is not benign. It turns into grief, rage, judgement, sorrow, shame.  Brené Brown
• If, however, you take a moment to observe how you actually feel immediately after you criticise someone, you’ll notice that you will feel a little deflated and ashamed, almost like you’re the one who has been attacked. The reason this is true is that when we criticise, it’s a statement to the world and to ourselves, “I have a need to be critical.” This isn’t something we are usually proud to admit. Richard Carlson
• Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Randall Terry

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Hypocrisy is an outward expression of inward shame

• Hypocrisy is the outward acknowledgment of inward shame. Norman Macdonald

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Undue modesty can also be an expression of shame

• Because impudence is a vice, it does not follow that modesty is a virtue; it is built upon shame, a passion in our nature, and may be either good or bad according to the actions performed from that motive. Bernard de Mandeville

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There is no shame in not knowing if you are willing to learn

• … there is no shame in not knowing. The problem arises when irrational thought and attendant behavior fill the vacuum left by ignorance. Neil deGrasse Tyson
• Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn. Benjamin Franklin
• ‘How do you know so much about everything?’ was asked of a very wise and intelligent man; and the answer was ‘By never being afraid or ashamed to ask questions as to anything of which I was ignorant. John Abbott
• I am not ashamed to confess I am ignorant of what I do not know. Marcus Tullius Cicero
• Be not ashamed to own thy ignorance of some things. Edward Counsel
• Learning

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There is no shame in being wrong if you are willing to correct it

• Once we realize that imperfect understanding is the human condition there is no shame in being wrong, only in failing to correct our mistakes. George Soros
• No one should be ashamed to admit they are wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that they are wiser today than they were yesterday. Alexander Pope

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There is no shame in being different and unique

• I think everybody’s weird. We should all celebrate our individuality and not be embarrassed or ashamed of it. Johnny Depp
• Diversity,  Uniqueness

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There is no shame in your desires

• Desire is a teacher: When we immerse ourselves in it without guilt, shame, or clinging, it can show us something special about our own minds that allows us to embrace life fully. Mark Epstein
• Desire is what leads you through life until the time comes when you desire a higher life. So do not be ashamed that you want so much, yet at the same time do not fool yourself into thinking that what you want today will be enough tomorrow. Deepak Chopra
• Desire

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There is no shame in your thoughts, whatever they might be

• The secret thoughts of a person run over all things, holy, profane, clean, obscene, grave, and light, without shame or blame. Thomas Hobbes
• The Refinement of Shame. People are not ashamed to think something foul, but they are ashamed when they think these foul thoughts are attributed to them. Friedrich Nietzsche

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There is no shame in feeling negative emotions

• There is no shame in what you are feeling, Harry,’ said Dumbledore’s voice. ‘On the contrary… the fact that you can feel pain like this is your greatest strength. J.K. Rowling
• Most of us have gotten the message that some feelings are not acceptable, not polite, not to be experienced as part of the self. We’ve stuffed or denied or dissociated ourselves from those feelings, but the emotions underneath remain there, under the surface.  They can motivate our behavior without our awareness, and cause us guilt and shame that seems to come from nowhere.  The chemistry from those emotions is there too, flowing into our body with no outlet, contributing to the sense of perpetual stress.  Richard O’Connor
• We’re taught to be ashamed of confusion, anger, fear and sadness, and to me they’re of equal value to happiness, excitement and inspiration. Alanis Morissette
• Emotions

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There is no shame in being scared

• There’s no shame in fear, my father told me, what matters is how we face it. George R.R. Martin
• Everybody gets scared sometimes, May Belle. You don’t have to be ashamed.  Katherine Paterson
• Fear

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There is no shame in tears

• You can cry, ain’t no shame in it. Will Smith
• Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for they are rain upon the blinding dust of earth, overlying our hard hearts. I was better after I had cried, than before–more sorry, more aware of my own ingratitude, more gentle. Charles Dickens
• We need never be ashamed of our tears. Charles Dickens
• Don’t be ashamed to weep; ’tis right to grieve. Tears are only water, and flowers, trees, and fruit cannot grow without water. Brian Jacques
• Never be ashamed of honest tears. Jackson Brown Jr.
• When she cried, he would say, “There is nothing wrong with crying. Your feelings tell you who you are. They tell what is important. Don’t ever be ashamed of them.”  Terry Brooks
• Tears

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There is no shame in depression

• There’s nothing, repeat, nothing to be ashamed of when you’re going through a depression. If you get help, the chances of your licking it are really good. But, you have to get yourself onto a safe path. Mike Wallace  
• Too many people with depression take the same attitude; we are ashamed of and embarrassed by having depression. This is the cruelest part of the disease: we blame ourselves for being weak or lacking character instead of accepting that we have an illness, instead of realizing that our self-blame is a symptom of the disease. And feeling that way, we don’t step forward and challenge unthinking people who reinforce those negative stereotypes. So we stay hidden away, feeling miserable and yourselves for ourselves for our own misery.  Richard O’Connor
• You are wrong in thinking you are weak and should be ashamed of having this illness, you have got it because you are strong … a weak, cynical or lazy person faced with difficulties will quickly give up, so would never get depressed enough to become ill.   Tim Cantopher
• Depression

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There is no shame in illness or physical limitation

• My contention is that as long as you have other faculties–the emotional, psychological, intuitive faculties- – you haven’t lost yourself or even diminished yourself. Don’t be ashamed when you’re physically limited or dysfunctional; don’t think that you’re any less because of your condition.  In fact, I feel I am even more myself than I was before I got this illness because I have been able to transcend many of the psychological and emotional limitations I had before.  Morrie Schwartz
• Limitation

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There is no shame in the circumstances life puts on us

• Shame should be reserved for the things we choose to do, not the circumstances that life puts on us. Ann Patchett

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There is no shame in virtue or goodness

• Be not ashamed of thy virtues; honor’s a good brooch to wear in a man’s hat at all times. Ben Jonson
• Seek goodness everywhere, and when it is found, bring it out of its hiding place and let be free and unashamed. William Saroyan
• Virtue,  Goodness

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There is no shame in being poor

• Having been poor is no shame, but being ashamed of it, is. Benjamin Franklin
• Poverty

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• Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip. Will Rogers
• Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards. Robert A. Heinlein
• Humility: The ability to act ashamed when you tell people how wonderful you are.
• I hope I never do anything to bring shame on myself, my family or my other family.  Jack Handey
• The more things a man is ashamed of, the more respectable he is.  George Bernard Shaw

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