Vulnerability is our path back to one another

A friend of mine shared a Brene' Brown Ted Talk on Facebook yesterday in which Brene' said this:

"Vulnerability is our most accurate measure of courage. If we're going to find our way back to one another, vulnerability will be the path." 

My friend Jenny Wilkerson Baker introduced me to this word 'vulnerability' a little over 4 years ago when we sat down for the first of many interviews. She talks about it again in the short clip below from our most recent conversation in early 2022. 

(I'll share a link to the entire conversation in the comments; it's my favorite chat with Jenny yet. And I have loved them all.).  

It's amazing, really, that 4 years ago I had no idea what vulnerability was. Oh, I knew the generic definitions to this word, I just didn't know the ones that were life changing. Because today, there is nothing I long to have more of in my world and create more of in the bigger world than vulnerability. 

Brene' Brown says, it's our path back to one another. I believe she's right. And I also believe it's our path back to God. The same thing has separated us from both; the internal and external pressures to hide who we are. 

I have seen what happens in a room, in a conversation... in a relationship, when without saying a word another feels permission - safety - to be who they truly are. To tell the story they really want to tell. To strip themselves of all masks and with delight say, this is me. 

Do you know how much of the world is hiding beneath the burden of having no place to say, "this is me?"

Much of the true beauty in this world is hidden beneath those burdens. I am not sure there is anything more sad than sensing how much of the world feels pressured to hide the most beautiful parts of themselves. 

The parts that have overcome. The parts that have endured. The parts that have experienced every emotion in life. The parts that have poured so much life INTO life. 

Yet, they are sadly the parts that have lived truths that have somehow become easier to live out as lies. 

Brene' Brown is right - it is the most accurate measure of courage to go back to the truth. To share it with another. 

It is equally a great act of courage to sit with another and create a space that invites it in - the truth. 

I have seen what happens when courage takes the stage. There is little if anything more beautiful. 

And I have seen a world where courage isn't even invited to the show. 

The former is the path. Brene' Brown is right. It is the only path back to one another. And to God. 
But like every path, it is up to us to build it and to travel it.

​It's up to us to find the courage to do so.