Vulnerability

So my sister is one of my sources of wisdom, pop culture, headaches and inspiration.

That little bouncing baby girl is so deep, she doesn't even realize it, 

but she looks up to me either way, and I do my best to live a life that's worth emulating.

Anyways, so it's valentine's day. :)

I've always been a fan even if I've never actually celebrated it as part of a couple.

I'm a sucker for holidays, and what they mean,

and what better holiday than one celebrating love. :)

I've always been externally allergic to love-love and sappy romantic love (atleast outward) haha

but I do believe in love.

Not just in romantic love ofcourse, but that deeper love story thats more than the feelings, 

the flowers, the cheesy stuff (which is ALSO just as important)

but i adore love stories that deals with the becoming. <3

I'm afraid im going to stop making sense soon, 

so let me turn you over to someone who knows what she's talking about instead,

this 20-min. TED talk, encapsulates my realizations since christmas,

its scary.

This is everything i wish i could say better and shorter,

but since i can't, I'll keep trying to live it out,

and in the mean time, listen to what she has to say.

*I included some highlights from her transcript*

Here's to working on being comfortable with our vulnerabilities.

Happy Valentines!

XOXO,

Joanie

"I am a storyteller.I'm a qualitative researcher. I collect stories; that's what I do. And maybe stories are just data with a soul. And maybe I'm just a storyteller... 

So where I started was with connection. Because, by the time you're a social worker for 10 years, what you realize is that connection is why we're here. It's what gives purpose and meaning to our lives. This is what it's all about.

...I ran into this unnamed thing that absolutely unraveled connection in a way that I didn't understand or had never seen. And it turned out to be shame. And shame is really easily understood as the fear of disconnection: Is there something about me that, if other people know it or see it, that I won't be worthy of connection? The things I can tell you about it: it's universal; we all have it. The only people who don't experience shame have no capacity for human empathy or connection. No one wants to talk about it, and the less you talk about it the more you have it. What underpinned this shame, this "I'm not good enough,"... The thing that underpinned this was excruciating vulnerability, this idea of, in order for connection to happen, we have to allow ourselves to be seen, really seen.

I roughly took the people I interviewed and divided them into people who really have a sense of worthiness -- that's what this comes down to, a sense of worthiness -- they have a strong sense of love and belonging -- and folks who struggle for it,and folks who are always wondering if they're good enough. There was only one variable that separated the people who have a strong sense of love and belonging and the people who really struggle for it. And that was, the people who have a strong sense of love and belonging believe they're worthy of love and belonging. That's it. They believe they're worthy. 

What do these people have in common? These are whole-hearted people, living from this deep sense of worthiness. What they had in common was a sense of courage. And I want to separate courage and bravery for you for a minute. Courage, the original definition of courage, when it first came into the English language -- it's from the Latin word cor, meaning heart -- and the original definition was to tell the story of who you are with your whole heart. And so these folks had, very simply, had the courage to be imperfect. They had the compassion to be kind to themselves first and then to others, because, as it turns out, we can't practice compassion with other people if we can't treat ourselves kindly. And the last was they had connection, and -- this was the hard part -- as a result of authenticity, they were willing to let go of who they thought they should be in order to be who they were, which you have to absolutely do that for connection.

The other thing that they had in common was this: They fully embraced vulnerability. They believed that what made them vulnerable made them beautiful. They didn't talk about vulnerability being comfortable, nor did they really talk about it being excruciating -- as I had heard it earlier in the shame interviewing. They just talked about it being necessary. They talked about the willingness to say, "I love you" first, the willingness to do something where there are no guarantees, the willingness to breathe through waiting for the doctor to call after your mammogram. They're willing to invest in a relationship that may or may not work out. They thought this was fundamental.

I personally thought it was betrayal. 

So I found a therapist... And so I said, "Here's the thing, I'm struggling." And she said, "What's the struggle?" And I said, "Well, I have a vulnerability issue. And I know that vulnerability is the core of shame and fear and our struggle for worthiness, but it appears that it's also the birthplace of joy, of creativity, of belonging, of love. And I think I have a problem, and I need some help... It's bad, right?" And she said, "It's neither good nor bad." (Laughter) "It just is what it is." And I said, "Oh my God, this is going to suck."

And it did, and it didn't. And it took about a year. And you know how there are people that, when they realize that vulnerability and tenderness are important, that they surrender and walk into it. For me, it was a yearlong street fight. It was a slugfest. Vulnerability pushed, I pushed back. I lost the fight, but probably won my life back.

So this is what I learned. We numb vulnerability --when we're waiting for the call. We live in a vulnerable world. And one of the ways we deal with it is we numb vulnerability.

The problem is -- and I learned this from the research --that you cannot selectively numb emotion. You can't say, here's the bad stuff. Here's vulnerability, here's grief, here's shame, here's fear, here's disappointment. I don't want to feel these...You can't numb those hard feelings without numbing the other affects, our emotions. You cannot selectively numb. So when we numb those, we numb joy, we numb gratitude,we numb happiness. And then we are miserable,and we are looking for purpose and meaning, and then we feel vulnerable. And it becomes this dangerous cycle.

One of the things that I think we need to think about is why and how we numb. And it doesn't just have to be addiction. The other thing we do is we make everything that's uncertain certain. Religion has gone from a belief in faith and mystery to certainty. I'm right, you're wrong. Shut up. That's it. Just certain. The more afraid we are, the more vulnerable we are, the more afraid we are. This is what politics looks like today. There's no discourse anymore. There's no conversation. There's just blame. You know how blame is described in the research? A way to discharge pain and discomfort.We perfect. 

And we perfect, most dangerously, our children. Let me tell you what we think about children. They're hardwired for struggle when they get here. And when you hold those perfect little babies in your hand, our job is not to say, "Look at her, she's perfect. My job is just to keep her perfect -- make sure she makes the tennis team by fifth grade and Yale by seventh grade." That's not our job. Our job is to look and say, "You know what? You're imperfect, and you're wired for struggle, but you are worthy of love and belonging." That's our job. Show me a generation of kids raised like that, and we'll end the problems I think that we see today. We pretend that what we do doesn't have an effect on people. We do that in our personal lives. We do that corporate -- whether it's a bailout, an oil spill, a recall -- we pretend like what we're doing doesn't have a huge impact on other people. I would say to companies, this is not our first rodeo, people. We just need you to be authentic and real and say, "We're sorry. We'll fix it."

But there's another way, and I'll leave you with this.This is what I have found: to let ourselves be seen,deeply seen, vulnerably seen; to love with our whole hearts, even though there's no guarantee --and that's really hard, and I can tell you as a parent, that's excruciatingly difficult -- to practice gratitude and joy in those moments of terror, when we're wondering, "Can I love you this much? Can I believe in this this passionately? Can I be this fierce about this?" just to be able to stop and, instead of catastrophizing what might happen, to say, "I'm just so grateful, because to feel this vulnerable means I'm alive." And the last, which I think is probably the most important, is to believe that we're enough.Because when we work from a place, I believe, that says, "I'm enough," then we stop screaming and start listening, we're kinder and gentler to the people around us, and we're kinder and gentler to ourselves.

Having a Coke With You

I've always been a fan of words, a sucker for the right combination of sense and sensibility

(hihihi yes, sounds like Jane Austin's book -- even if i havent actually read the book -- those were the right words.)

So I was super amused to hear a poem that had COKE in its title,

and I was even more amused when I read it, not because I knew all of the places in the poem 
(i wish i did though but I dont think that was O'Hara's point with this poem),

but because in the end, i like the idea that the person recognizes that there is beauty everywhere 
-- that there is and always will be something better but despite that, 
they still choose to be with you instead. having a coke. 

im corny and thats my understanding of it, so sue me, read the poem nalang! :)

Having a Coke With You

is even more fun than going to San Sebastian, Irún, Hendaye, Biarritz, Bayonn
or being sick to my stomach on the Travesera de Gracia in Barcelona
partly because in your orange shirt you look like a better happier St. Sebastian
partly because of my love for you, partly because of your love for yoghurt
partly because of the fluorescent orange tulips around the birches
partly because of the secrecy our smiles take on before people and statuary
it is hard to believe when I'm with you that there can be anything as still 
as solemn as unpleasantly definitive as statuary when right in front of it 
in the warm New York 4 o'clock light we are drifting back and forth 
between each other like a tree breathing through its spectacles 

and the portrait show seems to have no faces in it at all, just paint 
you suddenly wonder why in the world anyone ever did them

I look at you and I would rather look at you than all the portraits in the world
except possibly for the Polish Rider occasionally and anyway it's in the Frick 
which thank heavens you haven't gone to yet so we can go together the first time 
and the fact that you move so beautifully more or less takes care of Futurism 
just as at home I never think of the Nude Descending a Staircase or 
at a rehearsal a single drawing of Leonardo or Michelangelo that used to wow me 
and what good does all the research of the Impressionists do them 
when they never got the right person to stand near the tree when the sun sank 
or for that matter Marino Marini when he didn't pick the rider as carefully as the horse

it seems they were all cheated of some marvelous experience

which is not going to go wasted on me which is why I am telling you about it

—Frank O'Hara

Here's Frank O'Hara reading his work shortly before he died.
(Thank you mimi for the link and for remembering)

And here's where I first heard the poem, a chick flick (what'd you think?! ;p),

but the way the poem was read is just love. <3

(Not a huge fan of the movie and of the girl though, disclaimer lang. hihi)

XOXO,

Joanie