As You Work Toward Emotional Healing
Survivors of abuse often have to deal with feelings of shame. There is an important difference between shame and guilt, and that is the key to dealing with shame effectively . Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary defines shame as "the painful feeling arising from the consciousness of something dishonorable, improper, ridiculous, etc., done by oneself or another." And yes, it is a painful feeling, and is very common among survivors of abuse . For our discussion, we'll make some simplifications. Guilt is an emotion and a legal concept that belongs to the perpetrator, the initiator of an act of abuse . Shame is an emotion that afflicts the victim, the recipient of an act of abuse. Obviously, the perp should feel shame as well as guilt, but often feels neither, so we'll leave that out of this discussion. We'll talk about how victims can deal with shame. Even if you have worked hard to deal with guilt, and have assigned guilt to the person who abused you...
