Discover a proven pathway for transforming shame from a self-punishing emotion into a powerful ally for your health and happiness.
Why do we feel shame? Given how painful and destructive shame can be, it’s easy to see this emotion as an inner demon that turns our own mind against us. Yet shame is a universal emotion—and it serves an important purpose. “While toxic shame can keep us stuck in a self-defeating vortex,” say Bret Lyon and Sheila Rubin, “there is a healthy expression of shame designed to protect us, help us change, and actually build our self-esteem.”
With Embracing Shame, these expert teachers share an invaluable guide to an emotion so volatile that most of us—including therapists—avoid talking about it. Here this husband and wife team, cofounders of the Center for Healing Shame, examine the dynamics of shame, the reasons it arises, why it causes such harm, and how we can heal its negative effects. Through case studies, creative tools, and body-based practices, they invite you to explore:
While no amount of self-talk, personal success, or therapy can eradicate shame, we can transform shame into the supportive, health-promoting force it was meant to be. Created as a go-to resource for laypersons and healing professionals alike, Embracing Shame offers an achievable path for reclaiming the true potential of this vital emotion to help us grow, connect, and find a new confidence in the way we move through life.
| Paperback Book | eBook | |
|---|---|---|
| Contents | Paperback Book (224 pages) | eBook (224 pages) |
| Dimensions | 6 x 9 inches | |
| Product Code | BK06610 | BK06610W |
| ISBN Number | 978-1-64963-046-9 | 978-1-64963-047-6 |
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Bret Lyon, PhD, SEP has devoted almost two decades of his life to healing shame. Along with his wife and colleague, Sheila Rubin, he is a founder and codirector of the Center for Healing Shame, and cocreator of the Healing Shame–Lyon/Rubin Method. Through their popular workshops, they have taught thousands of psychotherapists, coaches, and other helping professionals across the world how to more effectively identify and work with shame. Bret holds doctorates in both psychology and drama and has taught at Tufts University, Pomona College, and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, as well as writing and directing plays in regional theater and off-off Broadway. For more, visit healingshame.com.
Author photo © Lea Delson
Sheila Rubin, MA, LMFT, RDT/BCT, has been researching shame since she was five years old. Along with her husband and colleague, Bret Lyon, she is a founder and codirector of the Center for Healing Shame, and cocreator of the Healing Shame–Lyon/Rubin Method. Through their popular workshops, they have taught thousands of psychotherapists, coaches, and other helping professionals across the world to more effectively identify and work with shame. Sheila is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, a Registered Drama Therapist, and has taught at JFK University and CIIS, as well as being the eating disorder specialist at a hospital and directing Embodied Life Stories performances. For more, visit healingshame.com.
Author photo © Lea Delson
Straightforward, easy-to-comprehend, informative. Integration exercises that really synthesize the reading/learning b/c we know that shame is somatic, so experiential integration is key. Recommend!
Lyon/Rubin clearly have a lifetime of experience in working with their own and helping others with theirs. In this book they have, with the tenderness of a caring friend and with the wisdom and insight of a trusted expert, explored and explained shame with clarity and depth that can be accessible for all. For anyone working on understanding their own shame, or even what shame truly is, for anyone working with others and their shame, and for therapists/helping professionals working on their own shame to better work with shame in others - this book is an essential resource.
Reading and doing the exercises in Embracing Shame feels like an internal massage where everything relaxes. Though it's not an easy subject to address, the authors are so compassionate and have such a deep understanding of shame and how to help others, that the book is extremely effective in healing it. As a licensed marriage and family therapist, I highly recommend Embracing Shame.
A Highly Effective, Gentle Way To Heal Shame
While most still shy away from even saying the word shame, Bret Lyon and Sheila Rubin have found a gentle and highly effective way to name it, embrace it, and bring light to this primary emotion that otherwise keeps so many stuck in less adaptive behaviors, beliefs, cycles, and emotional states. By sharing their expertise, personal stories, and anecdotes from clients, along with helpful exercises, even the uninitiated can gain a greater ability to consciously shift their shame and responses to it. Unconscious shame affects all of our decisions, relationships, and even our health. Embracing Shame is a well-thought-out and proven roadmap to changing our relationship to and the effects of shame on our lives.
I've got to say this is a powerful book! I appreciate the level of understanding from Sheila and Bret and all of their experience coming together to create this book. It's an incredible read from beginning to end and makes a lot of sense in an area that often doesn't make a lot of sense. Shame is a real tricky emotion and imagine that therapists and clients alike will really benefit from this book!
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