I believe that the purpose of relationship is for us to grow; that it is the one place where all of our buttons will be pushed giving us the opportunity to look at ourselves and grow past our reactions. Relationships of all kinds give us this chance. Whether it’s our partner, a parent, a friend or a boss each situation gives us an opportunity to reflect on our behavior, look at a blind spot or discover a mistaken belief.
When our relationships go through challenges we might be tempted to sweep it under the rug, go into victim or martyr, blame the other, withdraw or maybe even run away. What we need instead is to be willing to be fully present, fully committed and fully vulnerable in order to discover the best outcome for both. It is easy for me to write about this and easy for us to say how true that is but how easy is it in practice? What does it take?
I believe it takes willingness, awareness and vulnerability. In other words, I am willing to be aware of myself and to share without protection what I feel. For most, the hardest is the vulnerable sharing.
It doesn’t feel good to get emotionally naked with someone, especially if the other person isn’t doing the same or is poking at us and yet, if we are going to make it work, that is exactly what we have to do.
The dictionary defines vulnerability as “without adequate protection” and “physically or psychologically weak”, “open to attack”. Those definitions don’t make a good foundation for any connection. No wonder we resist it. Instead, we have to remember it’s just the opposite. The strength and endurance of a relationship rests in the ability of the partners to stay open to each other, to take off the masks and the armor, to relate soul to soul instead of protection to protection.
I remember early on in my marriage being in the middle of an argument, realizing I was wrong and still continuing to argue. I just didn’t know how to stop, swallow my pride and admit I was wrong. And, even though I can do it today, I can still sometimes feel remnants of that pride. Those moments when even though I believe I am willing and aware, I am nonetheless also aware that I am protecting myself from being fully vulnerable. And that becomes the perfect moment to practice vulnerability!
Vulnerability isn’t easy because we have been conditioned to be what others expect us to be rather than allowed to be our natural self. We have been molded by parental and societal restraints so that many of us have lost our capacity for vulnerability. We have come to believe through conditioning and other experiences that being our true self can be dangerous. We can get really hurt, disappointed, betrayed, shamed and so on.
It can be scary. And yet, how do we go forward if we are hiding or withholding who we really are and what we are really feeling? Finding what is really going on inside of us and sharing it is the quickest way to open up communication, foster intimacy and create a path to peace and resolution. This is truly the best chance we have to practice growing up. Sure, we can take our toys and leave or we can sulk or act out or hold a grudge but where does that get us? That negative energy sits in our body giving us no peace or resolution.
I firmly believe that we humans are very multi-layered. We are the products of past lives, genetics, soul contracts, traumas, conditioning, ancestral patterns and programming. How could there not always be more to discover and love about our self? Achieving true and complete vulnerability continues to be one of my lifetime goals. Not just in my relationships but in all situations.
A good relationship requires that we be willing and aware and vulnerable. Vulnerability is easier when you feel that it is okay to be you.
This confidence, paradoxically, comes from the practice of vulnerability.
The more we acknowledge our feelings, the better we know ourselves. The more we then share our feelings, the greater the space we create for an open loving connection. The more we do it, the more okay we feel to just be ourselves.
Our spiritual journey is to move out of the conditioned and programmed self and into the real self. This path is about vulnerability and about reality. It is about what is real, not conditioned or programmed. Vulnerability is a way to discover what is real, to take down the protections and allow ourselves to feel and know. What is real is simple. It is clear. Its only source is love. We are meant to live from love, with love and in love. That is what connects us to the Divine and to each other in ways that make peace, harmony and balance the new normal.