Shame

"When we are ashamed, what is it that we are afraid that other people will know about? It is not simply that we feel like a failure since we did not in fact perform in accordance with some social expectation or did not fulfill some symbolic role. Shame also confronts us with the acknowledgment that we are never , by definition, able to fulfill these expectations or roles.
What we do not want others to know about is that we are in essence always a fraud. We might temporarily take on some symbolic role and bask in the fantasy of its consistence, but sooner or later we will be exposed in our nakedness, and our identity, marked by a constitutive lack, will be shown to be a sham."

Renata Salecl, Cabinet, issue 31