Vulnerability Hangovers

I have a slight hangover today. And no, I didn’t drink too much last night. It has more to do with what I chose to write about on the blog yesterday. Brene Brown coined the term “vulnerability hangover” to describe feelings of shame, anxiety, exposure, self-doubt after being open and intimate about our true feelings, or about life situations which we have kept previously private and mostly to ourselves. We all walk that line of what we feel comfortable exposing about ourselves and our lives, and what we don’t. And sometimes, we tiptoe off of the line, or sometimes we even take a surprising leap (even surprising to ourselves) off of that line, and then we are stuck with the muddled feelings of relief yet regret, depletion, embarrassment, and ambiguity. These feelings are sometimes called “hangxiety” and they mimic the feelings that can occur in our bodies after a night of partying too much, with concerns that we’ve humiliated ourselves in the worst possible way.

I don’t have regrets about what I revealed yesterday about being estranged with family members. Authenticity is really important to me. I don’t care to create false images. I believe that a lot of unhealthiness in our society is related to image-consciousness, putting too much focus on what others think about us. (hint- they don’t really think much about us at all) This image-consciousness keeps a lot of things that need to be addressed, instead hidden, avoided and pushed under the rug. But, when you put the “tough stuff” out there, you sometimes feel weirdly naked and vulnerable and exposed. You allow yourself to be judged. You put your “humanity” out there, and then the image-consciousness bit in all of us, feels defensive and threatened and wants us to dive back into our safe, snug holes. We dread the idea that our Pandora’s box isn’t able to be closed again.

I was so grateful for those of you who commented on the blog yesterday. I know that this takes courage. Your comments took some of my own “hangxiety” away. Thank you. Many times friends and family will text me individually about one of my blog posts. They don’t feel comfortable commenting on my public blog space. It’s okay. I respect, and I understand this.

Interestingly, yesterday’s blog was one of the most read blog posts I have written in a long time. When we have the courage to “put ourselves out there”, we give others the permission to do the same, and barriers come down. Compassion and validation and community takes the shining, natural place of the individual masks which we all like wear.

My daughter is currently in a position where she is helping girls through the experience of rushing sororities at her huge southern university. Rushing sororities can be a very grueling, intimidating, and humiliating process. In its best light, the Greek system is meant to help people quickly find a group of friends with similar values and interests, and to create an instant social life and helpful network, for those who find themselves on huge campuses with mostly strangers. In its worst light, the university Greek system is full of judgment, cattiness, and based on first surface-level impressions without having the time to get to know a person in their “wholeness.” It’s really brave for a young person to put themselves out there in this way. I imagine most of these young ladies go through vulnerability hangovers throughout the entire process. My heart aches for their needless self-recriminations and fears. I want to hug them all.

I vividly remember once being in a group therapy situation, where I was describing a situation that had happened, in more of a logical, factual, clinical, flat-toned kind of way. “How did that make you feel?” the facilitator asked me. I answered him with more logical, sensical, matter-of-fact words, as if the situation was casual and had happened to someone else. “But, aren’t you angry?” he asked me pointedly, staring me down. “Of course I’m angry!! Why shouldn’t I be angry?!? This was wrong! It hurt! I didn’t deserve it!!” I blurted out emotionally, and loudly and full of tremorous rage. My explosion seemed to bring the room to a hush. Even I was surprised by my outburst. I had such a vulnerability hangover after that situation, I remember going to McDonalds right after the meeting and binging on chicken nuggets and cheeseburgers.

I write this blog for me. I love to write. Writing is my favorite creative outlet. It is my favorite path back to me. But I also pray that this blog helps people. I pray that things that I have gone through in my own life and my experiences that have I learned from (in good ways and bad), as “a mother,a daughter,a wife,a friend,a writer,a woman,a sister,a niece,a dog-lover, and mostly just another human being” can be a source of comfort and guidance and validation for others. We when share our passions and our ideas and our talents and our vulnerable hearts with others, that’s when we realize how connected everything really is on this Earth. When we share of ourselves, that’s when we realize that we truly are not alone. We all have the ability to be someone else’s “angel on Earth”, and also the beneficiary from “angels on Earth” from time to time. The system is designed that way, if we allow ourselves to be vulnerable and true and open and to surrender to our own deepest wisdom.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

2036. What’s in your perfect trail mix?

Another Word For It

“People may call what happens at midlife “a crisis”, but it’s not. It’s an unravelling- a time when you feel a desperate pull to live the life you want to live, not the one you’re “supposed” to live. The unravelling is a time when you are challenged by the universe to let go of who you think you are supposed to be and to embrace who you are.” – Brené Brown

I believe that I truly started “unravelling” when I turned 40 and the Great Recession started the ball rolling for me, in a big way. Unravelling can be painful, but it can also be so liberating. And it’s funny, we sometimes smugly think that we get to a point of being completely “unravelled”, but then we realize that we still get all tangled and tied up in knots, reminding us that we still have a long ways to go.

Our middle son is in medical school, and we were Facetiming with him last night. He is currently working and learning in the Crisis Trauma Unit in a major hospital in a major city in our country. He has seen and witnessed more in a few weeks than I hope to ever experience in my lifetime. (Those of you who are in the medical arts, thank you for heeding your calling. Thank you for putting your incredible talents towards the healing of others. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.) I asked our son last night if anything really unnerved him the most about his experience. Was there anything that really gave him pause, more than anything else that he had experienced? He told me that it was surreal to see a patient die who had been all “done up” for the day. Their makeup was in place, and their nails were freshly done. It struck him deeply that they had no idea that this would be their last day alive on Earth.

Maybe we are all just balls of yarn, unravelling. We will unravel until we come to the end of our own line of string. Our string gets intertwined and tangled up with others, throughout the days of our own unravelling, making patterns and connections, and then sometimes it rolls on, in a line, all by itself. We have no idea when or where our own ball of string ends, so we may as well enjoy our own unravelling. We may as well get all made up, get a manicure, and roll on with our days with purpose and curiosity and gusto, until one day, much to our own surprise, we reach the end of our string. We are completely unravelled. We are no longer twisted in knots. Our own unique line has been added to the blanket of Life. And we are free.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

2319. Do you prefer vertical or horizontal stripes?

Safe or Alive

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“Be the same person privately, publically, and personally.” – Wise Words (Twitter)

From an interview with Ryan Seacrest, Selena Gomez discusses her new album which was written at a time when she was processing a painful break-up and health issues in her personal life:

It’s all very real to me and I’m sure it’s just entertainment for other people; but I think I had become numb to it and it would be stupid of me if I didn’t acknowledge what I had felt because it would be inauthentic and that’s everything I claim to be and do. … I know there are thousands of people … who have felt this feeling and it’s extremely real, and on top of the social media and everything, it doesn’t matter if you’re in my position or someone else’s because you’re always going to somehow find this negative space and that’s why I have to be careful and I just have to take steps back and just focus on what I’m doing and nobody else.”

In art, in entertainment, in books, and in life, people respond most to those who can bravely bare their souls. We all resonate with those who are most authentic, most present, and yet sadly, it is such a fearsome thing to do – to put our own raw, real, vulnerable selves out there. It’s one of life’s greatest ironies, I think.

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