My Year of Becoming Vulnerable

I find it difficult to appear to be less than perfect. Admitting to my struggles is uncomfortable. Acknowledging my feelings and shortcomings feels even worse. The whole process runs counter to the narrative I try to maintain in my head. I force myself to believe things are going well regardless of how they really are going. Whether it’s hiding an addiction or suppressing emotions, it’s easier to rationalize my imperfections than to admit I suffer from anything. It’s more painful to put my stuff out in the open than to appear vulnerable. I prefer to act as if I have it all under control.

Recently, several things interrupted my life causing me to pause and consider where I am and where I am heading. A career change coincided with my kids maturing and moving out on their own. This crossroads forced me to look back and contemplate how my path has led me to this point. There are definitely actions I have suppressed. Other details have never been moved to closure. While I don’t have regrets, I see opportunities to make changes. I have plenty of time to create more enjoyment from the experiences left in front of me. I have uncovered some interesting things. Plenty more discoveries are waiting.

Recounting My Past

As I began to unearth my past, I realized I have been covering up unresolved anger issues I’ve held since childhood. When I was a pre-teen, I would lose control and meltdown with regularity. There are times when I still get these attacks and really lose control. The attacks are not violent but there is something driving them to come pouring out of me. I learned how to diffuse the anger but I have never gotten to why it percolates and blows up in the first place. There are days when I just feel angry and I need to figure out why.

As I recount my childhood into my teenage years, I see where high-functioning anxiety gripped me causing me to lose enjoyment from school and most other social functions. Anxious sweats and severe nervousness forced me to avoid dances and skip out on virtually all school functions. I rarely felt comfortable talking in school. I got down on myself for being too nerdy and not wearing stylish clothes.  Eventually, I disliked school so much I just skipped classes and whole days of school. Thankfully, I had a couple of close friends, but my inability to socialize prevented me from creating any new relationships. To deal with these imperfections, I pushed my emotions aside and suppressed my feelings. It’s surprising how easily anger, anxiety, and other emotions push into the background when you cut off the power to fuel them. 

The problem was very few things or people were allowed to permeate that exterior. While I suppressed the unpleasantness, I also prevented a lot of good things from happening, especially creating new friendships and letting my emotions back out to enjoy life. I have met a lot of people over the years since but very few, outside of my wife, developed into lasting relationships through my adult years. That narrative has begun to change more recently. The last couple of years have shown me I have access to tools to overcome feelings that have dogged me my entire life. I am determined to break that cycle and create relationships to better enjoy life. In order to make that change, it’s time to let all of that emotion back into my life and let go of the defensiveness and the feelings of inadequateness.

Being vulnerable must take the place of being guarded in my life. Here’s why. I have spent too much energy avoiding situations or trying to cover up things I do not want others to see. To combat this, I must be willing to share my emotions and allow my feelings to face acceptance or rejection. I have to confront feelings of judgment, passive-aggressiveness, and pretentiousness. These attitudes must be dispelled or we need to move in different directions. Life is too short to not experience it fully with authentic people. I plan to take this forward in all aspects of life: Success, failure, new opportunities, and unfinished business.

The Starting Point

The journey to becoming vulnerable has taken shape in two ways in my life. The first element involves my circle of people. I have discovered people in my life truly interested in me. No agenda, no judgment. They offer support and they want to listen and help. These people have always been there, but I have done a terrible job of seeking them out. We take turns unpacking our stuff. We do it together and we both take time to listen to one another. I hug some of these people. Crazy right?

Other people I had valued have become distant or vanished completely. I think when I had a job or we both had kids doing something, we shared that in common. Unfortunately, we never developed the commonality into a real connection. We didn’t share things. We had no intimacy. It wasn’t their fault our relationship evaporated. Neither of us invested ourselves enough in order to make it last. 

The key is to find people who are invested in my best interest and who want me invested in their stuff. It sounds simple, but when I took an inventory of the people in my relationship circle, I was surprised by its size. This isn’t about quid pro quo. I asked myself this question, “How many people do I count on way more than they count on me? And, what about the other way?” Being surrounded by people with little skin in the game should prompt consideration to evaluate the circle. At the same time, if I am not invested in relationships, I owe it to the other person to invest or get out. There are great people out there looking for meaningful friendships and deep connections that go both ways.

What’s Up With My Writing?

The second part of the journey involves my writing. I started to journal to make sense of the ideas I have been carrying around in my head. This blog became a natural outgrowth of journaling. Taking ideas from my notebook and turning them into articles expands the ideas I am exploring. It forces me to elaborate and add details to create a much more coherent thought process. This process adds great strength to my ideas and gives them a concrete voice. I have learned a lot about organizing ideas and conveying those thoughts into ideas. The articles have grown longer and developed more interest. Yet, I think I can go much farther.

In the same way, as I have been sharing with friends, I feel like the process of turning journaling into articles holds the potential to benefit others. As I use my writing to unpack my thoughts and ideas, at least one person reading it might be wrestling with the same ideas. 

As I have developed experience, I realized something is being lost as I translate my ramblings into articles. In short, my writing needs more soul to continue to evolve. Creating informative articles might be helpful and catch some interest, but information does not create connection. To really connect, I need to share something really personal and allow people to identify with it. Like any solution, it seemed to create my next problem. 

It’s really hard to be vulnerable when I spent most of my life avoiding sharing or emotions. Flipping a switch to suddenly be vulnerable sounds simple, but it is far from it. When I tried to pour more of myself into the story, I found it extremely difficult. My writing became confusing to read. Trying to move past pretense and information sharing and into an emotional connection proved challenging. I found myself hedging around topics or covering the emotion with big words or senseless ramblings. Regardless of the challenge, I became determined to try to relate better and forge a deeper connection with whoever reads my work.

Here’s What You Might Notice

So, over the last couple of months, I have actively worked to incorporate more of my background and emotions into my writing. This process, however, has been rife with challenges. I specifically recall the first article I published adding greater emotion. The pen dropped and I felt satisfied. I had shared deep, personal vulnerabilities. My writing expressed more emotion than anything I had written previously. I uncovered something about myself and put it out there for my readers. I made myself vulnerable.

Except, I really wasn’t. A couple of days later, I went online and read the article again. My big reveal wasn’t so big. Although it may have been more than I usually shared, I still had a long way to go. I alluded to many things but I refused to detail or expose emotions in an open, transparent manner. In other words, I had taken a step, but it was small. Many more steps are needed to get to my destination.

I am making a commitment right now to take those steps and allow myself to become more vulnerable. I hope you read along and make this part of your journey, too. Becoming vulnerable is critical to our mental health. We all have things we cover up and try to hide. By bringing those things out, we expose ourselves to the feelings we fear. But, if we can get past those feelings, we can find others who deal with the same fears or can empathize with our situation. Once we find each other, we can share what is holding us back. It’s an authentic way of developing relationships and helping each other as human beings. It works. I know it does because I have seen it work in my life.

Journeying Separately, Yet Together

Authenticity and vulnerability won’t work for everyone. I am not worried about everyone. My concern focuses on the journey rather than my number of followers or readers. I hope this does not end our journey together. Instead, I hope we can journey together and seek to discover deeper, more authentic, more honest, and trustworthy friendships. 

I want to relate and commune with people who are willing to share the good and bad parts of themselves. A relationship where each of us takes the time to share and listen to each other’s stories. Together, we develop a bond which continually fosters growth through all of the stages of life including planting, flowering, pruning, and harvest. I want to develop and invest in relationships with people who:

• Do not require me to pretend or put up false pretenses
• Allow me to be comfortable and to talk honestly 
• Help me process my feelings and emotions
• Challenge me to think and act differently because I would be better for it, not because it’s demanded from me
• Listen to words and will not judge, but 
• Help me construct a more positive future

These behaviors will be my focal point and serve as guideposts for my journaling and writing. I hope you find it interesting, insightful, or encouraging. I have a goal to dig in and continue reflecting and learning about myself. Beyond that, I hope my writing encourages just one other person to be honest with themselves, too. We are all on our own journey, but we owe it to others to help with their journey. What we discover along the way helps others navigate to their intended destination. Maybe, just maybe, we can all learn more about each other together. Talk to you soon.

Place the focus on becoming vulnerable rather than being vulnerable