Feb 17

Feb 17 What's the Point in Being Vulnerable?

Well, that's just it. That is the point.

Vulnerability is the point.

There might not actually be a payoff, or a quick return on investment, let alone any return on investment in any one situation. Vulnerability builds on itself.

Being vulnerable - putting yourself out there… A textbook definition of being vulnerable reads: “susceptible to being wounded or hurt”.

Why is there such a negative connotation to a word that could potentially bring you closer to something good? All the definitions I read had such dire, negative examples.

So, I asked:

“What’s the payoff in being vulnerable? Is there a point? Is it worth it? If I don’t gain some satisfaction from being vulnerable, should I just crawl into a hole and wait awhile before I attempt to try again?”

I was teetering with this feeling when I watched “Marriage Story” (a current highlight on Netflix) with my brother and sister-in-law. I struggled to watch the painful back and forth between a couple navigating divorce. I sat questioning, “how can one avoid this type of painful vulnerability?”.

Towards the end of the movie, Adam Driver sings a song from “Alive” the musical Company:

“Somebody crowd me with love / Somebody force me to care / Somebody make me come through / I’ll always be there / As frightened as you / To help us survive / Being alive / Being alive, being alive, being alive, being alive”.

BEING. ALIVE.

Don’t we all want to feel alive?

That same week, I happened to listen to a Jordan Peterson podcast talking about how it’s impossible to escape pain.

“You have to learn that malevolence is built into the structure of life. Now and then you run into it - and it takes you out. You have to understand that it’s in you and in others. You have to decide that you’re going to contend with it. That’s a way out!!
You go from naivety to being hurt and cynical. It’s like the world is so terrible! Then maybe you get out of that and you think - things really are as bad as I thought. I CAN be betrayed. But there’s more to me than I thought. There’s more to courage than I thought. There’s something to being AWAKE!
Then you replace your naive defenselessness with the courage to reintegrate with the world.”

It takes courage to be vulnerable. To get closer to feeling fully alive and embrace the fullness of life.

That’s the point.

But let me remind you:

We are all alive, and awake in this together.