Women & Shame: Reaching Out, Speaking Truths and Building Connection

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Summary: A Must-Read for every teen.
Review: Althouh this book doesn't apply to every woman, every woman should read it. Two therapist friends who happen to be male found it very enlightening as well. It can provide courage & confidence for the teen approaching womanhood.

Rating:
Summary: Thought Provoking, Honest, Empowering
Review: As a mom to a young daughter, a researcher, clinical social worker and educator; I appreciate the courage of the over 200 women who shared their stories with Dr. Brown so she would be able to get their voices heard. The tools that the women identified and were articulated in this book provide a base for empowerment of both women and men in our society who are challenged with feelings of shame. The integrity of Dr. Brown's research is sound. I applaud the efforts of this author. It is going to be a great gift for many of my friends, family, and colleagues for the holiday season.

Rating:
Summary: An Epiphany
Review: For me, reading this book was like an epiphany. The knowledge I gained from this book has allowed me to be more open with those that I am close with and more understanding to those who are reaching out. I realized that many of my struggles stem from issues related to shame. Dr. Brown makes this complicated topic easy to understand by providing personal stories from her life along with stories from women who participated in the research. I believe there is something very useful that each of us can gain from reading this book.

Rating:
Summary: Honest and Insightful
Review: I once heard a theologian say that we should "keep the cookies on the bottom shelf"- in other words, keep the good information accessible to everyone. This is exactly what Dr. Brene Brown has done. This is a book with excellent content that is for normal women rather than academics only. It takes the very nebulous and personal topic of shame and gives us practical ways to think about it and to deal with it in our own lives. Her personal stories and humor really make the book.

Rating:
Summary: Something for Everyone
Review: Shame can be a very powerful and painful topic to explore. I think the book does an excellent job of helping us understand why it makes us feel so alone. We are inundated with messages about the importance of being liked, being accepted and being perfect. Sometimes we know that we have turned a part of ourselves over to those messages, but sometimes we don't really understand why we feel so inferior. This book helps us understand this phenomenon. More importantly, it helps us understand what we can do about it. As I read this book I thought about my sons as much as I thought about my daughter. I thought about all of the messages that teach him what "a man is."

I think the book is well written and the research is well done. I appreciate the author's numerous references to the Stone Center at Wellesley. I think their work tackles many of the same issues addressed by Brown. Brown also references Harriet Lerner, Jean Kilbourne and the research team of Tangney and Dearing. Based on the author's suggestions, I tracked down several of these books and found them to be very informative. Kilbourne's work on the media is excellent.

If I could change one thing about the content, I wish it included Brown's work on men. Based on the lecture I attended, she seems to believe that men and women are more alike than they are different. I also think it might be helpful to have an index. I found myself wanting to go back to certain sections and having to flip through the book to find them. Last, it might be helpful to include the academic references as an appendix in the book. I was interested in the research so I downloaded them from the author's website, but I only knew about that because I attended her lecture.

I think we can all benefit from understanding how shame works and how it changes our beliefs about ourselves. Reading this book is a powerful start. It's based on research but written for everyone. I'm using it everyday in my work as a therapist and I've also recommended to my neighborhood book club.

Rating:
Summary: A new context for understanding shame...
Review: This book has provided me with a new context to consider the power of shame in my own life and in the lives of my therapy clients. Dr. Brown illuminates the impact of shame in the lives of the women she researched and honors their diverse struggles, journeys, and strengths. She makes this often overlooked and usually painful topic accessible by weaving her own insights and struggles in with the poignant stories of the women she studied and the result is an authentic, moving, and powerful read. She also shows the healing power of laughter and humor in the presence of this heavy topic. This book drives home the need for empathy and connection as the tools for transcending shame in women's lives and actually shows us how this can be done by sharing our stories with other women. Thank you, Dr. Brown for giving me this amazing gift for my personal and professional life!