David McElroy

As soon as Brené Brown started talking about shame, she had my attention. I had been told that Brown was talking about vulnerability and connection to others, but to get there, she started in a much uglier place — one I could identify with.

Brown is a researcher in social work at the University of Houston. In a 20-minute TED talk more than a year ago, she talked about her research into love and human connection — and those things inevitably lead to vulnerability, authenticity and (for some of us) shame.

I had been told that her talk was about human connection — and how her work had convinced her that’s why we’re living this life — so I was curious what she had to say about it. It was easy to see it as interesting academic research when I first heard about it. What I got from listening was far more than academic. (I’ve embedded Brown’s TED talk at the bottom of this article, and I hope you’ll take the time to listen to her.)

Brown said her research showed that shame and fear are the things that keep connections from happening. We don’t connect when we feel shame about ourselves — and we’re afraid that others won’t see us as good enough if they see who we really are. That’s the part where she really had my attention.

I grew up in a family where shame was a common thing. I grew up feeling as though I could never be good enough. No matter what I did, I didn’t feel as though I was loved and accepted for who I was. There was always another hoop to jump through — emotionally — in order to be “good enough.” And I could never jump through enough hoops. My father would swear that I imagined it all, but both of my sisters grew up feeling the same way. We’ve carried it into our adult lives and it’s reflected itself in different negative ways for all three of us.

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When I added the donation button last week to allow people to contribute toward buying more bananas for the monkeys, little did I know how literally some people would take it.

Not only have cash donations through PayPal come in, but one smart — or smart aleck — fan of the monkeys sent this donation through the mail. Despite the trip of about 800 miles, this bunch of bananas arrived in pretty good shape.

Just after the picture was taken, the bananas were split up and eaten by hungry monkeys, who would be happy to swear that I never feed them. So they would like to thank their anonymous benefactor for keeping them alive another day. If this person wants to “out” himself as the one behind this act of charity in the comments, he’s welcome to do so.

In the meantime, the monkeys will be scouring the web for Tuesday’s news.

If you’re ever optimistic about our odds of changing society through persuasion and voting, take a look at what people outside of your own circle of friends believe. In some cases, even those in your own circle are scary enough. Sunday, I ran into a guy who’s convinced that the way to get rid of illegal narcotics in this country is to have a “10 to 20 year war with Mexico.”

For me, there’s no issue that touches on as many infringements of personal freedom as the “drug war” does. It violates people’s right to decide what to consume. It costs everybody a tremendous amount of money every year as governments — federal, state and local — pour billions of dollars down the rathole of “eradicating drugs.” And in the zeal to prosecute this “war,” innocent people (and even family pets) are being killed pretty regularly, but it’s shrugged off as necessary. Maybe worst of all, the fight against drugs is being used as an excuse to erode more and more of our freedoms. And even if you think recreational drugs are good — which I don’t — the problem isn’t getting any better. It never will.

Some people can’t accept that, though. On Facebook, a friend of a friend was blaming cocaine for the death of Whitney Houston. He said, “Cocaine sucks!! So do the nations and organizations that pump it into the U.S. May the iron rod of Jesus come down on the narco-nations now. In Jesus’ name. She might have done more cocaine than anybody in history; even though she might have kicked it recently. Know who brought cocaine to the U.S.?”

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