Perfect

• Shame and offender therapy by Rich Kuyper, 1/3/97
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    • One piece at a time... by Rich Kuyper, 1/20/97
      
      

Where were you when I was writing "Shame and Pride"? I could have used the help. You've seen to the heart of the problem. These days I explain the affect system as a bank of spotlights, each of a different color, each triggered by its own special mechanism, each bringing something out of ground into figure so that we will act on what has now become the object of our attention in the special way dictated by that particular beam. Further, I see the shame beam in a sort of science fiction way---it is a darkness beam that obscures anything it hits. The function (the evolved purpose) of the affect system is to guarantee attention to whatever has been illuminated by affect. Whenever we ignore (disavow) the object made center stage by affect, we shift to the kind of defenses that both allow and force us to live with less than our best tools.

The healthiest use of shame affect would involve a careful search for the causes of obscurity/clouded subject, just as you suggest in your post. To do anything else moves us toward the world of psychopathology. I like the image of the Zen Master or the action movie hero who simply do whatever is indicated by the stimulus of the moment, after which they return to "neutral" and are completely ready to deal with whatever next might be illuminated by the affect system. My personal goal is to achieve the state of affective neutrality from which I can heed best the call of any affect by paying simple but effective attention to its trigger.

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