"Vulnerability is not winning or losing. It's having the courage to show up when you can't control the outcome." --- Brené Brown
I've never felt so vulnerable in my life than I have in the last two years when I tore down all the walls I built to protect myself.
I've also never felt like I've failed so many times as in this last year, or like I've veered off course and gone down so many different paths and attempted different things that just didn't fit.
But through that vulnerability, failure and accepting that I no longer have any control over any outcome, came an immense strength, growth, and peace within myself.
I've learned to accept that vulnerability is love, strength, and growth, but also difficult and filled with uncertainty.
I've learned to accept feedback, both good and bad, sometimes very harsh but truthful. Accepting feedback is how I grow, but I also must be careful who I'm accepting feedback from.
Brené Brown says that shielding ourselves from all feedback by disconnecting from vulnerability and emotion gets us to a place where we no longer feel anything. You pay for self protection by sealing off your heart from everyone and everything.
But when you seal off your heart you experience a death--of yourself, your heart, your soul. And I've already experienced that death.
I want to keep feeling alive, vibrant, and fearless. I don't want to fall back into my belief that vulnerability is weakness, I don't need it, and I can go it alone. Cause the truth is, I can't.
So here's to vulnerability, to living your truth, to walking the path of MOST resistance, but the one that makes me feel most alive.
2020 taught me so much, but mostly how to continue down my own road, accepting only feedback from others that I respect, but also not compromising my journey, change course and try to walk down the same path others did.
I need to stay on my own road, even though it may be lonely at times.
Excited to see what else 2021 brings and where my road leads.
"It's your road, and yours alone.
others may walk it with you,
but no one can walk it for you.”-- Rumi