Brene Brown - Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead

Advance praise for Daring Greatly

A wonderful book: urgent, essential, and fun to read. I couldnt put it down, and it continues to resonate with me.

Seth Godin, New York Times bestselling author of Linchpin

The brilliantly insightful Bren Brown draws upon extensive research and personal experience to explore the paradoxes of courage: We become strong by embracing vulnerability, we dare more greatly when we acknowledge our fear. I cant stop thinking about this book.

Gretchen Rubin, New York Times bestselling author of
The Happiness Project and Happiness at Home

In Daring Greatly , Bren Brown refers to herself as both a mapmaker and a traveler. In my book, that makes her a guide. And I believe the world needs more guides like her who are showing us a wiser way to our inner world. If youd like to set your course on being more courageous and connected, engaged and resilient, leave the GPS at home. Daring Greatly is all the navigation youll need.

Maria Shriver, New York Times bestselling author of
Just Who Will You Be?

Daring Greatly is an important booka timely warning about the danger of pursuing certainty and control above all. Bren Brown offers all of us a valuable guide to the real reward of vulnerability: greater courage.

Daniel H. Pink, New York Times bestselling author of
Drive and A Whole New Mind

What I find remarkable about this book is the unique combination of solid research and kitchen-table storytelling. Bren becomes such a real person in the book that you can actually hear her voice asking, Have you dared greatly today? The invitation in this book is clear: We must be larger than anxiety, fear, and shame if we want to speak, act, and show up. The world needs this book and Brens unique blend of warmth, humor, and butt-kicking makes her the perfect person to inspire us to dare greatly.

Harriet Lerner, Ph.D., New York Times bestselling author of The Dance of Anger and Marriage Rules:
A Manual for the Married and the Coupled Up

One of the tragic ironies of modern life is that so many people feel isolated from each other by the very feelings they have in common: including a fear of failure and a sense of not being enough. Bren Brown shines a bright light into these dark recesses of human emotion and reveals how these feelings can gnaw at fulfillment in education, at work, and in the home. She shows too how they can be transformed to help us live more wholehearted lives of courage, engagement, and purpose. Bren Brown writes as she speaks, with wisdom, wit, candor, and a deep sense of humanity. If youre a student, teacher, parent, employer, employee, or just alive and wanting to live more fully, you should read this book. I double dare you.

Sir Ken Robinson, New York Times bestselling author of
Out of Our Minds and The Element:
How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything

Heres the essence of this book: Vulnerability is courage in you but inadequacy in me. Brens book, weaving together research and Texan anecdote, shows you the path forward. And dont for a moment think this is only for women. Men carry the burden of being strong and never weak, and we pay a heavy price for it. Daring Greatly can help us all.

Michael Bungay Stanier, author of Do More Great Work

I deeply trust Bren Brownher research, her intelligence, her integrity, and her personhood. So when she definitively lands on the one most important value we can cultivate for professional success, relationship health, parental joy, and courageous, passionate livingwell, I sit up and take notice. And even when that one most critical value turns out to be the risky act of being vulnerable . Bren dared greatly to write this book, and you will benefit greatly to read it and to put its razor-sharp wisdom into action in your own life and work.

Elizabeth Lesser, New York Times bestselling author of
Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow
and cofounder of the Omega Institute

In an age of constant pressure to conform and pretend, Daring Greatly offers a compelling alternative: Transform your life by being who you really are. Embrace the courage to be vulnerable. Dare to read this book!

Chris Guillebeau, New York Times bestselling author of The $100 Startup

DARING GREATLY

DARING GREATLY

How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead

BREN BROWN ,

Ph.D., LMSW

GOTHAM
BOOKS

GOTHAM BOOKS

Published by Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.

Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.); Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England; Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephens Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd); Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd); Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi110 017, India; Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd); Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

Published by Gotham Books, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

First printing, September 2012

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Copyright 2012 by Bren Brown

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the authors rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

Gotham Books and the skyscraper logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Brown, C. Bren.

Daring greatly : how the courage to be vulnerable transforms the way we live, love, parent, and lead / Bren Brown.1st ed.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN: 978-1-101-59499-5

1. Assertiveness (Psychology) 2. Risk. 3. Courage. I. Title.

BF575.A85B76 2012

158dc23 2012018649

Printed in the United States of America

Set in Janson Text

Designed by Spring Hoteling

While the author has made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers, Internet addresses, and other contact information at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

Except for friends and family, names and identifying characteristics of individuals mentioned have been changed to protect their privacy.

ALWAYS LEARNING

PEARSON

To Steve

You make the world a better place

and me a braver person.

CONTENTS

WHAT IT

MEANS TO

DARE

GREATLY

THE phrase Daring Greatly is from Theodore Roosevelts speech Citizenship in a Republic. The speech, sometimes referred to as The Man in the Arena, was delivered at the Sorbonne in Paris, France, on April 23, 1910. This is the passage that made the speech famous:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.Next page