- Published on
Daring Greatly
- Authors
- Name
- Josh Haines
- @joshhaines
Introduction
I read Daring Greatly quite a while ago as it was recommended to me by my therapist after my divorce. The lessons in it were profound and had a big impact at that time. I was wrestling with all kinds of tough emotions around shame, guilt, grief, vulnerability, and reconciling a new direction for my life. I had never heard anyone talk about shame from a masculine lens before. She didn't spend a lot of time on it, but it was enough to help me through that point along with the therapy sessions. I always hoped she would write a full book on it sometime later. Later, Brené's work progressed and her two newer books Dare to Lead and Strong Ground are both more recent and more useful in my mind where I'm at now in my life.
At a high level, Daring Greatly pushes the idea of living with vulnerability, removing your armor, working through shame, and being brave enough to face challenges where failure is a real possibility. This applies to both personal and work life equally. She discusses how shame can exist in many ways based on cultural norms, secrecy, silence, judgement, and other forces. She uses the concept of wholehearted living as a modern antidote.
She also works through various other ways to manage the judgement, fear, and shame that can pervade our modern lives. She discusses not using common shields like substances or perfectionism. She recommends learning your shame triggers and finding healthy ways to handle them (very much in line with modern cognitive behavioral therapy style).
Recommendation
The book is great overall, but I feel like it was early in her journey and both Dare to Lead and Strong Ground take the concepts further and in a more actionable direction. Daring Greatly taught me lessons I desperately needed at a particular point in my life, but Brené refined those ideas so successfully in later books that it's hard for me to recommend starting here anymore. If you're thinking about her contributions from a work perspective I would start with those two newer books and skip over Daring Greatly. If you're wrestling with shame, guilt, judgement, or are grasping for something outside of work, then Daring Greatly is still likely the best place to kick off your journey with Brené.
