A Mason's Work

So in our recent episodes we talked about openness and creating space.

We talked about silence and using that as a positive response to drama and turmoil and

the stuff going on around you.

In today's episode I want to talk about vulnerability.

You'll probably have heard people say that we should be more vulnerable or you should be

more vulnerable or I feel vulnerable.

But we don't really kind of surface what that really means for a lot of people.

And so I want to kind of give you a little bit of a road map of what vulnerability is.

Maybe talk about some of the reasons why you should consider exploring that near everyday

life.

So vulnerability is it is a feeling that you have.

It's an emotional response or an emotional sort of interplay between risking your social

reputation in some way or another with some exposure of some sort of truth that you would

prefer to keep hidden because you're concerned about the social repercussions.

It's not just like coming clean or confessional.

You can be vulnerable in a lot of ways.

You can be vulnerable talking about a pain you've experienced.

You can be vulnerable talking about the things that you're afraid of in general or in specific.

So when we talk about vulnerability, we're really talking about kind of an emotional openness

that comes in response to the fear of some sort of rejection.

When we're being vulnerable, the most vulnerable, we are oftentimes expressing perhaps very,

very strong emotions or very, very strong exposing very strong historical events that you've

had a response to.

That process of sort of divesting yourself of it in some way and putting yourself out

there with someone else in the room or in the conversation or even you can be vulnerable

in situations like hosting a podcast.

When you have that kind of exposure, there's a lot of things that kind of happen.

But as you're vulnerable, sort of vulnerable content that comes from a vulnerable place,

songs that you write from a vulnerable place, interactions you have from a vulnerable place,

tend to be deeper, stronger and more fulfilling, particularly when rejection isn't the response.

So what are the barriers that we might have to being vulnerable?

Some of us are just very, very fearful of the social response.

So you have experienced something that had a strong potential social negative connotation

or you've had some sort of past event.

I hesitate to say trauma but some sort of past event that you are uncomfortable sharing.

And you're worried that you're going to be rejected for it.

You might also be reluctant to be vulnerable because you are afraid to invite people into

that part of your life.

You don't necessarily want other people to talk to you about these places where you feel

a ton of emotional response.

Whatever the case may be, there's tons of reasons why you might be worried about being vulnerable

or concerned about what that outcome might create.

But I want to be quite clear.

The more vulnerable you can become, the more vulnerable you can be.

And without necessarily this isn't a virtue signaling situation.

This isn't a pretending to be vulnerable.

You don't want to use it to manipulate people, for example.

But the more vulnerable you can be, the deeper connections you can make.

And the stronger the connections with your network, the more likely you are to be able to

explore the parts of you that may be holding you back, which is awesome and super helpful.

You build a strong resilience to the overall upcoming adversities that you may experience

in life.

That resilience comes from people in your network hearing you vulnerable, express yourself

and not rejecting you.

So there's just a ton of positive business case benefits for this.

You also will find that by letting go and allowing other people to kind of help carry the burden

for a little while.

First off, the burden for them will not be as emotionally taxing, most likely.

And for you, the relief you're going to get through this kind of unburdening or collective

vulnerability will be profound.

It's like opening a whole new area that when you have a cold or something in your congested,

it's like that first day where you can breathe clearly again.

So as you experience the opportunities in your life to be vulnerable, I would encourage

you to lean into the vulnerability as opposed to lean away from it.

You will not very likely you will not have negative reactions from oversharing or from

being vulnerable as much as you'll have the strong responses from the unburdening of

some of these ideas and thoughts or some of the kind of airing out of your experiences,

the emotional content that you have.

So consider vulnerability in your path forward and do your best to cultivate it.

And I think you'll find positive outcomes and responses.

Head your way.