Shame Resilience

Continuing in the same vein with QPR and raising awareness for suicide prevention, I wanted to bring to light the concept of shame. Shame can play a significant part of someone experiencing suicidal ideation. Shame ultimately drives people toward disconnectedness resulting in isolation that often reinforces upon itself, much like the snake eating its own tail. Normalization of behaviour to establish expectation in society does lend stability onto the construct, but how does society draw the line such when what is considered 'normal' actually becomes harmful to some. Often, the individual pieces in society may impose punishment or something of that nature on those who do not 'fall in step' with Behaviour A. In the punishment, perhaps at a young age, one may develop shame which could have disastrous consequences in the child's self-esteem and perception. Rather than focusing on punitive action for deviations of the norm, could perhaps (much like the school with the lunchbox/peanut butter jelly sandwich lessons) the focus be drawn to look introspectively at the choice in the behaviour, the motives, the action, and the results or consequences in a way that helps the child learn reasoning early rather than impose Draconian social fines that could negatively impact a individual's life? Brené Brown puts it best in describing shame as "..the intense painful feeling that we are unworthy of love and belonging..." For most humans, it is important to have that connectedness where shame pushes us toward isolation. Her writing and studies demonstrate that perhaps rather than being a society that generates shame in social deviants, perhaps we can build shame resilience and empathy with a goal of personal growth in ourselves and humanity.


I have been witness through many levels of education of a certain 'education through intimidation' which in previous years has been and, to some degree, still is considered acceptable behaviour. Through my own personal experiences of feeling shame in such environments and hearing from others who go through similar experiences, the negative impacts these experiences provide keep learning environments hostile. Not only do these hostile environments disrupt learning, but individuals incur the results of those emotions stunting growth and keeping individuals from reaching their full potential much like drought on young plants trying to grow. I can't help but wonder if in some instances in the medical education world that these shame-generating environments foster the culture we have toward mental health and suicide in the medical field today- just some food for thought. Thankfully, significant steps have been made in medical education to denormalize this methodology of teaching and create a more nurturing environment.