I think the universe is trying to tell me something.
So I've been mulling over this for the last day or so and I
think I'm ready to put forward my thoughts (and the thoughts of others) on this
serendipitous occurrence.
“When we
were children, we used to think that when we were grown-up we would no longer
be vulnerable. But to grow up is to accept vulnerability… To be alive is to be
vulnerable.” ~ Madeleine L’Engele
Realistically speaking, a mentally healthy individual is one
who can tolerate ambiguity in life. Tolerating ambiguity means tolerating
vulnerability, in both self and others. It is the well-adjusted person who can
feel vulnerable but not be terrified by it. Accepting that we are all
susceptible to life’s ravages is a part of being human and in many ways defines
how happy we can be in a world full of uncertainty. Nobody likes to live a life
filled with worry or fear. So many people search out the ultimate way to remove
their fear and their pain, and in the process they are completely focused on
fear and pain. Vulnerability and your acceptance of it is what allows you to
move beyond the fear and pain because it allows you to acknowledge that they
are both integral aspects of life, and that life goes on, whether you like it
or not. By accepting vulnerability you are not giving it power over you because
you are aware and expectant of the presence of both fear and pain but you are
not trying frantically to avoid it. Unfortunately, modern society has taught us
that we are supposed to be invulnerable. We are supposed to be strong and
impervious or resilient to life’s hardships all the time. But what is really
interesting is that this very attitude is what cuts us off from the support and
love and care that we need to weather life’s storms. It makes us into an island
or a bastion, alone and battered. As we try to show others that we are
invulnerable we are also pushing them away because we feel this should be
something we can handle all by ourselves, which is of course society’s greatest
lie.
This was brought home to me by the chapter I mentioned
earlier. It’s in a book called Just
Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone by Dr
Mark Goulston (M.D.)(Psychiatry). Basically the book is about effective
communication in both your personal and public lives. The underlying premise is
that in order to be heard, you have to listen. Listen to words, listen to
bodies, listen to emotions and listen to silences because the only way you'll ever get heard is if you shut up and listen first. Dr Goulston is a
psychiatrist and he goes in depth into the biological workings of the brain to
uncover the secrets to successful communication. What he found is that people
who feel listened to are the people that you will get through to on a deeper
level. I won’t bore all my non psychologist readers with the gritty details. In
a nutshell, it works like this: The brain is hard-wired to read all signals from words, body language, emotion and surroundings. These receptors are called
mirror neurons. Studies show that when we see or hear of someone else’s
emotion, sensation or action, the same parts of the brain that they use to
process these things are activated in our brains. Essentially our mirror
neurons fire in the same way that theirs are firing at the time. In this way we
can empathise and understand what they are going through. Our brains mirror
theirs in order for us to understand. How does this relate to vulnerability?
Well, the chapter in his book is called “When all is lost- bare your neck”. Seems a little counter-intuitive does it not? To cut a long chapter short the underlying premise is this: When
you are in a situation where you need to connect and you are feeling a little
vulnerable, you need to be assertive and show the other person your
vulnerability. Dr Goulston calls this
Assertive Vulnerability. And it works because- mirror neurons. By showing other
people your vulnerability you are stimulating in their brains the same
emotions, fears and messages that your brain is experiencing. And biologically
they respond to this as if these messages are their own. Most healthy
individuals will react to your vulnerability with the desire for the pain and
vulnerability to stop, because to some degree it is now their pain and
vulnerability too. This leads to a desire to help. Is it slowly becoming
evident how showing your vulnerability can be a useful tool for connecting with
someone on a deeper (even biological) level? There is of course a qualifying
statement here; you cannot expect someone’s mirror neurons to activate the
right response if you’re not showing the response you want to be activated.
I.E. you cannot scream at someone about how vulnerable you are feeling and
expect them to calmly and with care talk about your vulnerability- they are likely
to scream back. Take a good attitude and speak from the heart if you want the
same in return. And please, don’t take it from me. Do your own reading about
mirror neurons and see for yourself. Big things happening in that field right
now.
And lastly I turn to the video clip I found on TED (Don’t
ask, I have no idea what it stands for). If you've gotten this far through the
blog post then you owe it to yourself to take 20 minutes extra to watch the clip.
Really, it has so many wonderful insights that it simply must not be left
unexplored. There’s no way that I can do justice to what Brene Brown has to
teach us in this clip, but I will leave you with a brief description of the
talk. “Brene Brown studies human
connection – our ability to empathise, belong, love. In a poignant, funny talk,
she shares deep insight from her research, one that sent her on a personal
quest to know herself as well as understand humanity. A talk to share.”
This past year has been such a growing experience for me and
I have no words to describe the ways in which I have been so often vulnerable.
Incidentally, a few months back I posted another blog piece entitled Be
Brave…Be Vulnerable. I have learnt so much more since then that I wish I could
share with you all but I feel that after watching this clip I felt as if
someone had opened a door to a place I already knew existed but had always been
too scared to find. I leave it up to you to open that door for yourself now. I
hope that in your life you can embrace vulnerability as the courageous choice
which will bring you closer to others, to humanity and most importantly to
yourself. Vulnerability does not make you weak, it makes you accessible. Know
that your vulnerability can be your strength.
