How To Accept Your Vulnerabilities
“Vulnerability is the only authentic state. Being vulnerable means being open, for wounding, but also for pleasure. Being open to the wounds of life means also being open to the bounty and beauty. Don’t mask or deny your vulnerability: it is your greatest asset. Be vulnerable: quake and shake in your boots with it. the new goodness that is coming to you, in the form of people, situations, and things can only come to you when you are vulnerable, i.e. open.”
― Stephen Russell, Barefoot Doctor’s Guide to the Tao: A Spiritual Handbook for the Urban Warrior
Are you that person who shares every detail of your life with a person you met a minute ago? Or are you that person who openly tells people how their actions affected you emotionally? If you like someone, do you just say it or make it obvious with your actions? Then that’s vulnerability for you and that’s okay.
In fact, vulnerability is not just okay, it is awesome. However, there might be times when you curse yourself for being so vulnerable, and at that moment here are a few ways in which you can accept your pretty vulnerabilities:
What’s Your Vulnerability?
First of all, what is YOUR vulnerability? I don’t want to know what your neighbor or relative goes through. Because for everybody vulnerability has a different definition. Know where your vulnerability is coming from and that’s vulnerability for you.
Think about whether you feel vulnerable in certain situations, with certain people, or because of some past trauma? Now that we have joined the dots, let’s accept this vulnerability.
Tapping Your Insecurities
Your vulnerabilities emerge from certain insecurities you have within. For instance, you could be vulnerable because you always felt that you are not worthy of love or you feel you are unlucky when it comes to love.
So now, in order to accept your vulnerabilities, you need to first accept your insecurities. Say that it is okay to feel the way you feel. Then convert that insecurity into a positive affirmation: “I am worthy of love,” “I am complete” and “I know I am lovable.”
This will be the beginning of your “I actually have started liking my vulnerabilities” moment.
Have You Looked At Your Beautiful Face?
Vulnerabilities are all okay until the point when it becomes a means for you to prove yourself to somebody. Hello, excuse me, you beautiful person inside out, what are doing? Don’t ever lower your self-esteem or self-worth to prove yourself to anybody.
No, you need to understand this. Just look at yourself in front of the mirror and ask the mirror “Do you think I am doing this life thing right?” and wait for the mirror to reply. It doesn’t, right? (If it does, you might want to change your mirror, this is horrifying)
Coming back to the point, we humans are all mirrors to each other. We think of ourselves as what others perceive us to be. But the mirror didn’t have an answer to your question, did it? Similarly, nobody has the answer to whether what you are doing is right, wrong, acceptable or not, beautiful or not, intelligent or not, nobody other than you knows.
Vulnerability Makes You A People Pleaser?
Being open and honest about yourself is okay, but there might be times when you can feel that people around you are not really a huge fan of your vulnerable side, and that’s also okay (because, who cares, right?)
Just know that you cannot like everybody and so everybody cannot like you either. So instead of thinking about how your vulnerabilities make you a less likable person, think about all those people who stuck by you and were okay with your vulnerabilities.
These are the people who actually love and care about you and these are the people that should actually matter to you. After all, how can openly showing your emotions and talking about your entire life ever be a nuisance to your loved one, right?
When Are You Not Vulnerable?
So when is it when your vulnerability is like: “Okay, bye. We cannot be present here.”
Why does your vulnerability shy away from coming there? Whatever it is, you need to challenge yourself and be vulnerable even at the times you don’t want to be. Are you holding yourself back from being vulnerable? It’s time to come out of your comfort zone and be vulnerable. If you are being vulnerable, then let it be all the time.
Your brain has this weird way of noticing what is considered normal. If you go out of your comfort zone, your brain automatically thinks that you are doing something that you are supposed to do. And that’s how we use science, psychology, and a little bit of common sense to accept our vulnerabilities (somebody is being a bit of a show-off here).
Final Words
Have you ever seen the olden golden movies where we think that the characters are overacting? They actually aren’t, they are being vulnerable because vulnerability was never considered as a weakness or taken in a negative manner. So whoever came up with “Vulnerability Sucks” really needs to come forward and apologize to all of us who are trying to hide our vulnerabilities each day thinking that it is making us less lovable. No, I am really serious about this.
