The Power of Vulnerability
My gosh! Our hearts can feel so tender. To share that with another human. Gulp.
Who here has felt that deep welling up of emotion? And then what do we do with it?
Shed a tear? Freeze up? Shove it down? Lash out?
To be human is so much. All our feelings. Memories. Worries.
We are thinking all the time.
Onto the next thing.
When we stop to acknowledge what we feel inside it’s so raw.
The doubt. The shame. We question our own value. Will this person like me?
We all want to fit in. Be understood. We all have these minds whirling. A million questions. Always searching for an answer.
When we stop, pause, notice what is going on inside we see the truth.
We can feel fragile. Exposed. Like no one understands this pain we feel.
We are all going through it. Some people learn to let it be in the background. But everyone feels vulnerable at times.
When we are courageous enough to share that part of ourselves with others, it is so powerful for everyone. We start to see, YES! We are human. We are imperfect.
It is easy to tell stories and get trapped in the narrow thinking of the ego. We act as though we are separate or different from one another.
If we stop, and pause for even just a moment to notice the beauty of life. We see this is what it is all about. The contrast. The dark and the light against each other. Beside each other.
The problem is that we judge the experience of our feelings. We compare: pleasant, unpleasant. We are always running for what feels good and rejecting what feels bad.
There is a way out of this mental trap.
Instead of getting trapped in reacting we can learn to experience our feelings in a state of observation.
This allows us to stay present. Let the feeling be. Just as it is. Stay with it.
To be vulnerable is to be able to see what is and be with it.
I believe an enormous amount of compassion develops from being with what is. We start to be able to love ourselves and each other and who doesn’t want more of that?!
I think for many people being vulnerable is terrifying. Often we haven’t had a safe space for our feelings to land. It’s true. It is scary. At first.
These practices of Vipassina and Yoga give us tools to develop that feeling of safety again so we can process what we feel instead of storing it, or shoving it or getting caught up in it.
In my deep dive courses people always come to this point where they start to crack open. I get to witness this process. It takes a lot of courage to admit what is going on for us, inside.
I admire when people decide to peel away the layers of all that they are not and start to see their imperfections are actually just a perfect part of who they are.
We can learn to love ourselves back to feeling okay; safe. The first few steps can feel scary, but once you start to take them it begins to feel like the journey of a lifetime.
It’s like looking up at a mountain and thinking, man I can’t climb that! But then setting off to do it and realizing it is just one step at a time. And soon enough the journey is a beautiful experience.
So just set off! Take one step.
Reach out for support and guidance and resources.
I love helping people shed the patterns that are holding them back.
