Wholehearted living is about engaging in our lives from a place of worthiness. It means cultivating the courage, compassion, and connection to wake up in the morning and think, No matter what gets done and how much is left undone, I am enough. It’s going to bed at night thinking, Yes, I am imperfect and vulnerable and sometimes afraid, but that doesn’t change the truth that I am also brave and worthy of love and belonging.
For me, and for many of us, our first waking thought of the day is “I didn’t get enough sleep.” The next one is “I don’t have enough time.” Whether true or not, that thought of not enough occurs to us automatically before we even think to question or examine it.
I define vulnerability as uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure.
there’s no equation where taking risks, braving uncertainty, and opening ourselves up to emotional exposure equals weakness.
First I asked, “How many of you struggle to be vulnerable because you think of vulnerability as weakness?” Hands shot up across the room. Then I asked, “When you watched people on this stage being vulnerable, how many of you thought it was courageous?”
Vulnerability is about sharing our feelings and our experiences with people who have earned the right to hear them.
Trust is a product of vulnerability that grows over time and requires work, attention, and full engagement. Trust isn’t a grand gesture—it’s a growing marble collection.
‘Only when we’re brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light.’”
With an awareness of shame and strong shame resilience skills, this scenario is completely different. You still want folks to like, respect, and even admire what you’ve created, but your self-worth is not on the table. You know that you are far more than a painting, an innovative idea, an effective pitch, a good sermon, or a high Amazon.com ranking.
Shame resilience is the ability to say, “This hurts. This is disappointing, maybe even devastating. But success and recognition and approval are not the values that drive me. My value is courage and I was just courageous. You can move on, shame.”
Shame is the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging.
Guilt=I did something bad. Shame=I am bad.
Empathy is connecting with the emotion that someone is experiencing, not the event or the circumstance.
“In that single moment, I became very clear about how the world works and what it means to be a man: “I am not allowed to be afraid. “I am not allowed to show fear. “I am not allowed to be vulnerable. “Shame is being afraid, showing fear, or being vulnerable.”
“The most valuable and important things in my life came to me when I cultivated the courage to be vulnerable, imperfect, and self-compassionate.” Perfectionism is not the path that leads us to our gifts and to our sense of purpose; it’s the hazardous detour.
Perfectionism is not the same thing as striving for excellence. Perfectionism is not about healthy achievement and growth. Perfectionism is a defensive move. It’s the belief that if we do things perfectly and look perfect, we can minimize or avoid the pain of blame, judgment, and shame.
Perfectionism is a self-destructive and addictive belief system that fuels this primary thought: If I look perfect and do everything perfectly, I can avoid or minimize the painful feelings of shame, judgment, and blame.
Once the word Art enters the description of what you’re up to, it is almost like getting a hall pass from perfection. It thankfully releases us from any expectation of perfection.
automobile accidents are now the second leading cause of accidental death in the United States. The leading cause? Drug overdoses. In fact, more people die from prescription drug overdoses than from heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine drug use combined.
Because true belonging only happens when we present our authentic, imperfect selves to the world, our sense of belonging can never be greater than our level of self-acceptance. These definitions are crucial to understanding
The American Bar Association reports that suicides among lawyers are close to four times greater than the rate of the general population. An American Bar Association Journal article reported that experts on lawyer depression and substance abuse attributed the higher suicide rate to lawyers’ perfectionism and on their need to be aggressive and emotionally detached.
I believe that feedback thrives in cultures where the goal is not “getting comfortable with hard conversations” but normalizing discomfort.
Day also emphasized the importance of allowing people to make mistakes: “Our golden rule? If you screw up, you clean it up.”
Who we are and how we engage with the world are much stronger predictors of how our children will do than what we know about parenting.
In terms of teaching our children to dare greatly in the “never enough” culture, the question isn’t so much “Are you parenting the right way?” as it is: “Are you the adult that you want your child to grow up to be?”
“When my children used to walk in the room when they were little, I looked at them to see if they had buckled their trousers or if their hair was combed or if their socks were up.…You think your affection and your deep love is on display because you’re caring for them. It’s not. When they see you, they see the critical face. What’s wrong now?” Her advice was simple, but paradigm-shifting for me. She said, “Let your face speak what’s in your heart. When they walk in the room my face says I’m glad to see them.
Raising children who are hopeful and who have the courage to be vulnerable means stepping back and letting them experience disappointment, deal with conflict, learn how to assert themselves, and have the opportunity to fail. If we’re always following our children into the arena, hushing the critics, and assuring their victory, they’ll never learn that they have the ability to dare greatly on their own.
Sometimes the bravest and most important thing you can do is just show up.”
I can honestly say that nothing is as uncomfortable, dangerous, and hurtful as believing that I’m standing on the outside of my life looking in and wondering what it would be like if I had the courage to show up and let myself be seen.