Yesterday I was the practice client for a practice coach in an observed coaching session during class and, if you think you can’t find a painful thought, access it, ugly cry in front of your classmates, recover and find new insights in an eight minute coaching session, well I’m here to tell you you can.
Vulnerability, am I right? Did I expect to be overwhelmed by an intense emotional response in front of class? Not at all. Did I just let it happen and stay present? Sure. Yeah, I did. My only alternative was to pretend and fight it and that didn’t seem like an honest, true, or helpful choice. One of the things I’ve really come to learn in recent years is that vulnerability- that exposed and shaky human feeling- is powerful and beautiful and honest AND (and here’s the thing I’ve come to see) it doesn’t have to lead to shame.
Shame shame shame. That terrible notion that is vulnerable-adjacent but painful and darker and interested in harm and stuckness. I can see how those inklings of shaky exposure could signal the coming on of Shame and its darkness, but not so, my dear friends. Not so.
The wobbly open humanity of vulnerability is raw and visible, but it’s clean and powerful. It doesn’t have me scrambling for SORRY and regretting my decisions. Shame does that. Vulnerability lets me show my cards and admit, “This is where I’m at.” Shame punishes me into guilt and self-loathing and accuses with words like, “And this is why you’re so bad at this.”
Vulnerability is really great because it’s a lesson in some emotional literacy. This is how THIS feels, this is what I call _______. When I am in this situation, these are the emotions that bubble up. This is what those emotions propel me to do/avoid.
Shame just wants me to hurry up and bury it all and promise not to come around again. Shame wants me to turn that exposure into something I did wrong and something I don’t get to have and condemnation for being a loser.
Vulnerability, free from shame, is my new thing. It’s been coming on slowly for years now but now I can articulate it better and can see what’s not in the cocktail that used to sour the whole damn drink. So let the tears flow, let the weakness show, let the call for help go out. Those are beautifully human, free things available to us all and good for us. They will surprise you more than anything. They will create something while also helping you shed old things. Brene. Just talk to Brene about it.
Life, am I right? I can’t believe this is my life. In the midst of emotional rollercoaster whirlygigs, my life is pretty amazing. Friends visiting, beauty outside, adventures and exploration and a European tour come September? Crazy. I can’t believe this is my life. My special little guys aren’t so little anymore and we’re going on college visits with Jesse next week but so is life and this is mine. I’m a second string singer in a praise band on call for when the first string singer goes down (can’t make it). Was that on my bingo card? Not at all.
Forty six is nutsenheimer. Just when I think I get my sea legs, I lose ‘em. Just when I think, “Fuck it, I’ma do what I want,” some (shame) voice creeps in and says, “You’re done, lady. See if Walmart is hiring.” Most days I favor the light. Most days I favor the light. All days, you guys, the light favors me. Even when I don’t deserve it, the light favors me. Thanks be to God.
So if you’re still reading this, let me remind you the light favors you. Favor it back. The darkness has its own way of staying present and in the story in a way that doesn’t require our attention. The light, however, is offering us an open door to more freedom, more creativity, more love, more breathing room. When that light shines on you and you bask in it, and when you bask it in you get a chance to see what life is like in the light, rinse repeat and believe in Light LIFE MORE than whatever Darkness is trying to sell you. I know plenty of Darkness marketing and I know plenty of buying it and believing it and, friends and neighbors, let me tell you, it is AT BEST not helpful and AT WORST Harmful AF. Skip it. Be a crazy person that believes in the version of yourself basking and give no mind to the dark. That’s probably my 46 talking. It’s vulnerable, it can feel shaky but it’s not shameful. All those “What will people think?” voices? Bullshit. Bask, I say. Bask. Be in the bask, Wear your bask mask. High five.