Quotes About Vulnerability

Dare to Lead: I'm here to get it right, not to be right.

Belonging to ourselves means being called to stand alone - to brave the wilderness of uncertainty, vulnerability, and criticism.

owning our worthiness is the act of acknowledging that we are sacred. Perhaps embracing vulnerability and overcoming numbing is ultimately about the care and feeding of our spirits.

If you're not in the arena with the rest of us, fighting and getting your ass kicked on occasion, I'm not interested in your feedback.) HOW

We are biologically, cognitively, physically, and spiritually wired to love, to be loved, and to belong. When those needs are not met, we don't function as we were meant to. We break. We fall apart. We numb. We ache. We hurt others. We get sick.

Grief does not obey your plans, or your wishes. Grief will do whatever it wants to you, whenever it wants to. In that regard, Grief has a lot in common with Love. — ELIZABETH GILBERT

The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself. —ANNA QUINDLEN1

Far from being an effective shield, the illusion of invulnerability undermines the very response that would have supplied genuine protection.

When we are experiencing shame, we are steeped in the fear of being ridiculed, diminished or seen as flawed. We are afraid that we've exposed or revealed a part of us that jeopardizes our connection and our worthiness of acceptance.

running from it. Embracing our vulnerabilities is risky but not nearly as dangerous as giving up on love and belonging and joy—the experiences that make us the most vulnerable. Only when we are brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light.

When I think about my self-esteem, I think about who I am in relation to who I want to be, where I come from, what I've overcome and what I've accomplished. When I feel shame, I'm taken back to this place of smallness where I lose that sense of context. I'm returned to a small place—I can't see

We hustle for worthiness by slipping on the emotional and behavioral straitjacket of cool and posturing as the tragically hip and terminally "better than." Being "in control" isn't always about the desire to manipulate situation, but often it's about the need to manage perception. We want to be able to control what other people think about us so that we can feel good enough.

sharing appropriately, with boundaries, means sharing with people with whom we've developed relationships that can bear the weight of our story. The result of this mutually respectful vulnerability is increased connection, trust, and engagement.

I'm brave enough to listen." I actually put it on repeat: "I'm brave enough to listen.

Most of the time we approach life with an armored front for two reasons: 1) We're not comfortable with emotions and equate vulnerability with weakness, and/or 2) Our experiences of trauma have taught us that vulnerability is actually dangerous. Violence and oppression have made our soft front a liability, and we struggle to find a place emotionally and physically safe enough to be vulnerable.

As a shame researcher, I understand our reluctance to talk about it—shame is so powerful that we sometimes feel shame just talking about shame.

Here's a list: RUMBLING TOPICS

We have to be able to talk about how we feel, what we need and desire, and we have to able to listen with an open heart and an open mind. There is no intimacy without vulnerability.

They practice critical awareness by reality-checking the messages and expectations that tell us that being imperfect means being inadequate.

Advice Giving/Problem Solving I can fix this and I can fix you. Sometimes when we see pain our first instinct is to fix it. This is especially true for those of us whom people seek out to help with problem-solving. In these instances, rather than listen and be with people in their emotion, we start fixing.

I drank and smoked to minimize my feelings of vulnerability and to look busy when all of the other girls at my table had been asked to dance. I literally needed something to do, something to help me look busy.

Heartbreak comes from the loss of love or the perceived loss of love. My heart can be broken only by someone (or something, like my dog, though a part of me really believes my dog is a person) to whom I have given my heart.

I believe that vulnerability—the willingness to show up and be seen with no guarantee of outcome—is the only path to more love, belonging, and joy. He quickly followed up with, "And the downside?" This time I was the one laughing. "You're going to stumble, fall, and get your ass kicked.

Betrayal is an important word with this guidepost. When we value being cool and in control over granting ourselves the freedom to unleash the passionate, goofy, heartfelt, and soulful expressions of who we are, we betray ourselves. When we consistently betray ourselves, we can expect to do the same to the people we love.