Two Quotes: Guilt vs. Shame

Here are a couple quotes about guilt vs. shame from Soraya Chemaly and Lewis Raven Wallace


You know, just in case you were wondering.


Women feel shame more than men, who are more inclined to say they feel guilt. Guilt is the response of a person who feels he had some control but failed to exercise it properly. Shame, on the other hand, reflects no expectation of control. It is a feeling that you, your essence and being, are wrong.

from Rage Becomes Her: The Power of Women’s Anger by Soraya Chemaly


and


Importantly, guilt and shame are also generally interpreted as meaningfully different emotional experiences from one another: guilt typically focuses on a specific action or event for which we feel we can take responsibility, while shame is a generalized sense of humiliation at who we are, or how we measure up to our own and others' expectations.

Guilt is about something we did wrong; shame is the feeling that "I am wrong." And guilt tends to focus on the private and personal need to change, while shame tends to assume an audience even if this audience is just an imagined person or group judging us.

from Radical Unlearning: The Art and Science of Creating Change from Within by Lewis Raven Wallace

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