Why You Should Embrace Vulnerability

“We all build internal sea walls to keep at bay the sadnesses of life and the often overwhelming forces within our minds. In whatever way we do this—through love, work, family, faith, friends, denial, alcohol, drugs, or medication—we build these walls, stone by stone, over a lifetime.”  ― Kay Redfield Jamison

We live in a “never enough” culture where we often try to seek more and be more, to mask the insecurities which make us feel vulnerable. As a result, whenever we experience obstacles, we build up emotional walls to protect ourselves from these negative feelings.

We’re all raised thinking that being vulnerable is associated with failure, disappointment, and being weak. But is that really the case? Vulnerability simply means uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure. And if you think about it, if we allow ourselves to be vulnerable, we’re actually being courageous because it’s much easier to avoid possibility of failure than to take a risk.

Additionally, being vulnerable enables us to connect with others, just as you’d appreciate others being open and honest with you, your vulnerability and willingness to share your feelings will be received positively and allow you to experience empathy from others.

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How to overcome our insecurities?

It’s very natural for us to keep our shame to ourselves because we fear others’ opinion of us, and that it doesn’t really require the presence of others. However, more often than not, we become the worst critic of ourselves.

The best way to overcome our insecurities is to embrace vulnerability, and openly admit and talk about them with others. Verbalizing and naming them often diminish their power and will slowly make us resilient to it, because in doing so others can understand our fears and emotions, leading to empathy. We’ve all experienced the relief of opening up to others, and our problems melt away when we feel understood. So a lot of times, it’s a matter of you letting go of your fear of being judged, in order to set you on your way to overcome insecurities.

It’s also very important to learn to be satisfied with who we are and what we have, and instead of allowing our fear of “never enough” to take over, we accept that we have enough already e.g. by ridding the unreachable goals of perfection, and be able to open up to criticism or failure without letting it define who we are.

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Hope this post resonates with you guys. Until next time.