Keynotes
Navigating Shame: The Evolutionary Roots, Psychological Impact, and Healing Power of Compassion - Dr. Marcela Matos
Shame is a powerful and universal human emotion, evolved to assist us to navigate our social relationships. Shame can also be profoundly painful and have harmful effects on psychological functioning and mental health. This keynote will focus on shame as a transdiagnostic emotion and risk factor, from the lens of the evolutionary biopsychosocial model. The talk will explore how shame memories can become central to our sense of self-identity, and entail traumatic qualities that maintain and exacerbate threat system activation, especially in the social and relational aspects of our lives, with adverse and enduring effects on mental wellbeing. However, cultivating compassion, especially self-compassion and receiving compassion from others, have been found to buffer the negative impact of shame experiences. While shame and shame memories can be painful and difficult to approach, this talk will examine the gathering evidence about the role that compassion-focused interventions can play in helping alleviate and prevent the suffering associated with shame.