"Overcome Shame, Become Who You Are"

This video explores the concept of shame and its impact on personal freedom and self-actualization, drawing on Nietzsche's philosophy. It discusses how societal ideals can lead to feelings of inadequacy and prevent individuals from becoming their true selves.

This video is made possible by Brilliant, a math and science problem-solving website that makes learning fun and rewarding. In "The Joyous Science," Nietzsche writes, "Whom do you call bad? Those who always want to put others to shame. What is most humane? To spare someone's shame. What is the seal of liberation? To no longer be ashamed of oneself." So, according to Nietzsche, someone who's truly free is free of shame, and he thinks someone who shames others is bad. Why is it important to be free of shame, and why is it bad to shame others? That's what I want to explore in this essay, and I want to start with a question: What does it mean to be free? In "The Joyous Science," Nietzsche says, "What does your conscience say? You shall become who you are." Let me explain. This is an important idea in Nietzsche's work, and not only is it one that I agree with, but it's the starting point of this essay. Everyone has a true self which they must become, and it's possible for us to fail to become our true selves. Think of yourself like the seed of an oak tree. As the seed, you contain the entire, full expression of the oak tree within you. But if the conditions aren't right—if the soil isn't good, if you don't have enough sunlight, rain, or nutrients—you can fail to become a fully grown oak tree. And so, freedom is the freedom to become what you are, to become the fullest expression of yourself. With that idea in mind, we can turn back to shame. Why is shame bad? Because it can prevent you from fully becoming who you are. And to explain how, let's look deeper into shame. What's the thought behind shame? The shameful mind says, "Who I am is not who I should be." But what does that mean? Let's look into it. The shameful mind has an ideal. It has an image of what it means to be a man, or a woman, or a father, or a wife. And the shameful mind compares itself to this ideal image and finds itself inadequate. This measurement, this realization that "who I am is not who I should be," leads to shame. But where did this ideal image come from? All "shoulds" come from society. Think about it. When you were a baby, did you have any ideas about what you should do? Probably not. You just did what you wanted to do. A pure mind says, "This is what I want to do." A conditioned mind says, "This is what I should do." So when you live according to a "should," you aren't being yourself.