Quotes About Vulnerability

In fact I was not alone in doing this. Almost everyone cried, but we all learned to hide it, and those who didn't were the ones who got bullied.

Fear forces you to look tough on the outside but makes you weak on the inside.

Everyone always warms to people who can laugh at themselves. It's human nature - and the best jokes are always against ourselves. It shows character, humility and grace.

I'm afraid to hope but I can't help it, and the idea of hoping in this most hopeless of all places makes me want to cry.

Studies seem to show that those of us who believe we must achieve in order to merit love and respect—not just be ourselves—are vulnerable to emotional troughs when our opportunities to excel are restricted.

Think of all the women you know who will not allow themselves to be seen without makeup. I often wonder how they feel about themselves at night when they are climbing into bed with intimate partners. Are they overwhelmed with secret shame that someone sees them as they really are? Or do they sleep with rage that who they really are can be celebrated or cared for only in secret?

To be loving is to be open to grief, to be touched by sorrow, even sorrow that is unending.

We are encouraged to see honest people as naive, as potential losers.

Usually adult males who are unable to make emotional connections with the women they chose to be intimate with are frozen in time, unable to allow themselves to love for fear that the loved one will abandon them.

We cannot know love if we remain unable to surrender our attachment to power, if any feeling of vulnerability strikes terror in our hearts. Lovelessness torments.

Many of us learned that passivity lessened the possibility of attack.

Often, men who would never think of lying in the workplace lie constantly in intimate relationships. This seems to be especially the case for heterosexual men who see women as gullible.

When we reveal ourselves to our partner and find that this brings healing rather than harm, we make an important discovery—that intimate relationship can provide a sanctuary from the world of facades, a sacred space where we can be ourselves, as we are. . . . This kind of unmasking—speaking our truth, sharing our inner struggles, and revealing our raw edges—is sacred activity, which allows two souls to meet and touch more deeply.

When men lie to women, presenting a false self, the terrible price they pay to maintain power over us is the loss of their capacity to give and receive love.

True love is a different story. When it happens, individuals usually feel in touch with each other's core identity. Embarking on such a relationship is frightening precisely because we feel there is no place to hide. We are known. All the ecstasy that we feel emerges as this love nurtures us and challenges us to grow and transform.

It is this dependency that became, and is, the breeding ground for abuses of power.

For black men of all ages it is more acceptable to express rage than to give voice to emotional needs.

Batterer, he observes that there are few male models for grieving, and he emphasizes that "men in particular seem incapable of grieving and mourning on an individual basis.

From the moment little boys are taught they should not cry or express hurt, feelings of loneliness, or pain, that they must be tough, they are learning how to mask true feelings. In worst-case scenarios they are learning how to not feel anything ever.

The presence of pain in our lives is not an indicator of dysfunction.

Choosing to be honest is the first step in the process of love.

Without trust there can be no genuine intimacy and love.

Shame makes self-acceptance and self-love impossible.

Running fron the pain, they never know the fullness of love's pleasure.