Wellness Book Club: Author Brene Brown

Join us the first Wednesday of each month for our Wellness Book Club, where we will introduce readers to great books or author profiles that can help you along your wellness journey. Have a book we should review? Send us a comment and we will add it to our list.

Sometimes when we self reflect with honesty we will recognize certain flaws within ourselves.
Maybe it’s the recognition that we could have responded to a friend more compassionately. Perhaps it’s the realization that we are partly to blame for the dissolution of a relationship. Sometimes we recognize that our actions were not aligned with our values, and other times we recognize that perhaps we have failed at something important to ourselves.

While recognizing our challenges and failings can be difficult, that awareness is also the first step towards growth and improvement. If we are not honest with ourselves how can we better next time?

Author, therapist, and speaker, Brene Brown often speaks of the importance of embracing vulnerability in order to be braver, more creative and more successful. She often discusses the importance of our desire to belong and how this can be conflicting with the need to fit in. She also shares how our failings in this regard can lead to shame and the impact this has on our ability to navigate our relationships with others and ourselves.

Knowing and understanding our shame may mean apologizing, taking a chance and opening up about something embarrassing, or acting in alignment with our values instead of expectations or norms. Letting shame hold us captive, however, isn’t helpful. We need to forgive ourselves and commit to being better next time. Brene has published many books, hosted Ted Talks and recently came out with a Netflix special called “The Call to Courage” that all touch on different aspects of these themes. I think that all of Brene’s work is worth checking out, but a great deep dive is her writings, and our book of the month, Braving the Wilderness (CLICK HERE to view on Amazon). If you are looking to ease yourself in to her work, consider checking out her TED Talk or Netflix specials.

Undoubtedly, like many you will be hooked and will want to binge on all of Brene’s work. Be compassionate and realistic with yourself, however, and try applying one of her principals. Once that gets integrated in to your day to day, why not revisit her work again and see what the next step is for you.

Image used under Creative Commons license. CLICK HERE for the source. The original image has been removed, despite being used under license, due to concerns regarding the primary ownership rights to the image. Initial agreement with BK, but secondarily sourced to rawpixel.