Monday, August 12, 2013

Why Be Vulnerable

Affirmation:  By going outside of my comfort zone I empower myself.

When I first moved to North Carolina in 1986 my young neighbor invited me to walk with her.  I'd always been physically active.  I skated as a child, both ice and roller.  I climbed trees, jumped rope, played ball and rode a bike to name just a few activities.  As a young adult I played tennis but I had never exercised for the sake of exercising.  This invitation was inviting me to try something new.  She also wanted me to walk with her three mornings a week at 5 AM.  I love the mornings and I've always risen at a fairly early hour but to get up when it was still dark and to be dressed and out the door and walking the streets was for me quite a challenge.  We were to walk several miles and initially I was not physically prepared.  I needed to ice my shins after each walk because of shin splints, sharp pains in the front of my calves.  But, after a couple of weeks, the shin splints disappeared and I started to look forward to our chats.  After a short time, a few of the other neighbors joined us and now we were not only exercising our bodies but building our community.  I moved from that neighborhood in 1990 but walking has become an essential part of my quest to be optimally healthy. I do not, however, walk at 5:30 AM.  I now have the luxury of heading out after the sun has risen. The decision to say "yes" to my young neighbor's invitation was a life-changing experience.  It not only opened my world to the importance of exercise but it empowered me by allowing myself to see what I could accomplish if I decided to unite my mind and my body. 



I had stepped outside of my comfort zone.  It may seem like a small step but for me, it was a giant leap.  It was the beginning of a lifetime pursuit of staying strong and healthy.  It certainly wasn't the first time I had been outside my comfort zone.  When I arrived here in NC I was already 40 years old.  I'd moved many times, had 3 children and had taught for several years but somehow this was different.  Accepting and meeting this challenge was life changing.  Perhaps, I didn't think I could make such a commitment, but I did and once I allowed myself to be proud of this feat, I found myself wondering what else I was capable of.  I guess, looking back on it, it was one of the most empowering decisions of my life.     

Every day we are faced with decisions, small and large, important and trivial but each decision shapes our lives and shapes our future.  Certainly, I can look back on my life and see how some choices enhanced my life and I can see how if I had chosen differently how very different my life would be today.  Right now I'm reading The Time In Between by Duenas.  It's a marvelous example of how choice colors our life.  We are not only charged with making choices that will enhance our lives; we are then charged with making a conscious choice to mentally frame that choice in a positive light, to make sure that the consequences of that decision enhances our lives.  It's easy if it was a choice that easily led to some perceived blessing but when the decision led to a struggle or perhaps even a disaster, reframing it can prove to be extremely difficult but with practice, it can be done even if it's simply to use the experience as a lesson which empowers us going forward.

The second focus of Brene Brown's Daring Greatly is vulnerability.  (The first focus was about shame and I wrote about it in the blog, Shame on You!) When we allow ourselves to be vulnerable we open ourselves up to making mistakes but we also open ourselves up to opportunity and growth.  One must walk the fine line between humility and foolishness if one is to embrace the quality of vulnerability.  What Brene Brown is talking about is the opportunity to live a full, rich life because we are not afraid to try something that makes us uncomfortable, to try something at which we might fail.  That behavior not only takes us outside of our comfort zone but it encourages the virtue of humility. 

What would one try if one wasn't afraid to fail, if one was willing to be vulnerable?  It's not only what one might learn but who one might become.  I have some of the most amazing friends.  People who are not just willing to try something new but look for opportunities to do so.  My only concern is that sometimes they don't see what remarkable things they are doing.  They don't or won't take credit for their awesome spirits.  Sure, there are historical accounts of people whose humility changed the world, people like Abraham Lincoln and Mahatma Gandhi.  I, however, love to look at those heroes who are in my immediate life and relish their virtues.  There are so very many. 


There are the writers who open up their lives to others.  The painters who display their work.  There are those who start their own businesses.  I have friends who have done mission trips to all different parts of the world.  How about those friends who begin a new career in their retirement years?  Some of the most remarkable women I've ever met are the ones who attend the Pink Ribbon Yoga Retreat every year especially the ones who come knowing no one and without a clue of where they are going or what they'll be doing.  I'm sure you can think of many people in your life who step outside of their comfort zones.  They may not initially think they can but that doesn't stop them; they do it anyway.  They know they might fail but they also know they might succeed.  It doesn't matter one way or the other because just by saying "yes", simply by being willing to be vulnerable, to be humble, their lives will be richer and more rewarding.

Yes, it was a small step to agree to walk at 5 AM three mornings a week.  We need not take huge steps to initiate change in our lives.  The little "yeses" are the beginning which empowers us to one day take a giant step and maybe not only change our world but The world. 

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