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In this episode we dive into the importance of authentic relationships. As the author Ben Boss said in his Book about Dyslexia, “Ironically, community is the antidote to shame.” Let’s talk about shame and vulnerability and how important it is to take time to find your tribe and put forth effort to be vulnerable.
TRANSCRIPT:
Today I’m going to talk about the life-giving power of authentic relationships and connection with those around you. I will also talk about shame and vulnerability, because these things are so intimately related, whether we believe this or not.
We all understand fundamentally that relationships are important. We have all felt first-hand what goes on inside of us when a core relationship is rocky and facing struggle. We have also felt the incredibly healing and energizing power of a flourishing relationship, whether it’s within the context of a brand-new relationship with someone you’re dating that you feel totally yourself with, or a long-time friendship that always builds you up. Although we all know the importance of the relationships in our lives, there is still a constant struggle for each of us to find balance within the rhythms and demands of those same lives and to make them a priority.
In this work that I am so very passionate about, I feel like the idea of being imperfect implies directly that one is in relationship. In relationship to oneself and in relationship to others in one’s life. In order to fulfill the idea of Radical Imperfection, of embracing who you are fully as beautifully imperfect, our lives require an ongoing condition of vulnerability. Our daily lives must have regular interactions which reinforce both the helpful narrative we have in our heads (and hearts) and help to unravel the lies and the liar.
Interestingly, we can live a life with people that we love and cherish, but who we don’t really ever let in, or perhaps we were at one time open with them and then at some point we chose to close ourselves off. Maybe believing internal lies or the messages we interpreted from painful interactions with them, and we push them out of our world; out of the realm of authentically seeing who we are.
Until we realize that we must not just see others for who they are, but we must ourselves expose the parts of us that we believe to be imperfect within trusting relationships; we won’t truly connect in these relationships. When we open up and bare our souls within a loving relationship, a beautiful back-and-forth of vulnerability starts to unfold. The very act of exposing to each other our souls and weaknesses; the hidden parts of our struggles and the pain in our journeys, our triumphs and our deep wrestling in pursuit of joy; unravels layer after layer of the lies, and creates a platform for deep and empowering healing to take place. We feel seen and heard. This is the essence of acceptance. We see that we are enough and we can keep going.
As life has so much to bear, we often compartmentalize what is taking a tole on our internal world and trudge on; understandably working hard to balance the load and meet our responsibilities with speed and accuracy. This very tendency draws us into a downward cycle where our own thought work can become more of a challenge; the weight of loneliness drawing us inward. It becomes easier to focus on what we need to get done, and so, the work of connection within community, that frees us and makes our lives satisfying, less easily unfolds within our already busy schedules. When we are alone, not allowing to be BOTH vulnerable and find acceptance within loving relationships, more and more the unhelpful narrative is fed, creating thoughts again leaning towards shame and unworthiness.
Have you ever noticed how when after an incredibly connected period of your life, often can follow a disconnected period and you are hit with waves of emotional struggle; and you don’t understand how internally you can go from such a blissful internal state to a nearly stagnant and lonely place so quickly?
I believe passionately that our need for intimate loving relationship is our most foundational need; and you probably remember hearing me say before that being loved and accepted is our deepest and most foundational need, and I’m not trying to contradict myself here; rather, I feel they go hand in hand so bear with me here as they are intimately a part of each other. I believe we are created with this deep need for intimate loving relationship because it’s the single most fulfilling experience there is. It’s because of this need, for an intimate loving relationship, that we deeply desire acceptance. Total acceptance to me is also synonymous with Unconditional Love. An acceptance where we find ourselves metaphorically naked in all that we are, body, mind and soul, and completely enough. I am not saying love accepts evil and bares no consequence. Actually, I believe that evil is a natural product of acting within the emotional results of believing lies about our acceptability at the core. These lies tell us that we are unloved and unworthy. They tell us to hide and they make us live in constant fear. The lies cause us to live in shame of the past and fear of the future, never present enough to enjoy what is; never able to take of the blinders of shame and fear long enough to feel the beauty of imperfection; to feel the absolute heaven in vulnerability within the context of unconditional love. We need to bare ourselves and we NEED to feel accepted. I believe this goes for every deeply important relationship we have. To ourselves. To our creator. To our closest friends and family. And once liberated, we are able to go out and share the liberating truth with others so that they too can take off the blanket of shame and blinders of fear and know that they’re not alone. Loneliness is the perfect environment to breed the lies, to strengthen the liar and to perpetuate the life lived in reaction to the fear and shame; a life lived immersed in pain.
One of my favorite authors and speakers is Brene Brown. She is the author of several books and a world-renowned speaker. She is a shame and vulnerability researcher and makes me laugh a lot. I was completely in need of her words of wisdom each time I read or listened to any of her work and came away in awe. If you’ve read or heard any of her work, you likely already knew I loved her from this message I am sharing, or even from the name of the podcast itself. She says “In the absence of love and belonging, there is always suffering.”
We all struggle with meeting our needs for connection and acceptance, and until we are reminded over and over again the critical importance of this, often from repeated experience, we will continue to struggle to meet this need in other ways. The only remedy here is vulnerability and practice. There is no cheap substitute. It has to be real, and when you taste the freedom birthed from this experience, no other attempt to fill the void created will ever come close to comparison.
Lately, I’ve been over the moon with excitement and motivation for this passion that I’ve wanted to pursue for years and am finally leaning into; this podcast and blog and my mission to help women to embrace who they are and grow with total love so that they can become a source of empowerment for themselves and others. In all of my excitement, I became quite un-centered and imbalanced in that my life started to revolve around the work I have been doing, and this happened in a matter of a week. Because of the nature of this work, it’s both ironic and perfect. This work is about being vulnerable and so I was being vulnerable. I was being vulnerable to my audience, to you all. And that’s wonderful, but in this context, I am not finding the connection and acceptance needed at the foundational level in order to fuel the work that I do. My relationships have to come first. But then comes the other part, the reminder that I am imperfect, and still learning all of this over and over again. So I am listening, and I am reminding myself these truths as I create this message today.
It is powerful for me to remember that the work that I am doing isn’t possible without community and vulnerability. The very word “Imperfectionist” implies a relationship exists. I do want to continue to bear my soul to you incredible people, so that you can see that you’re not alone. To encourage you to do the same within a safe and loving relationship. But, in order to be effective in this work, I also need to make a priority of finding the unconditional love my soul desperately needs from my relationships; from my relationship with myself and my thought work, from my relationship with God, from my relationship with my husband and the incredible women in my life that are a receptive embrace of love for me.
This makes clear a very important point… you need not only to have people in your life, but people in your life that you can trust to do this work with. This incredible life work of being raw and real and feeling the embrace of their unconditional love. Now, I must make note that we all have to remember that our friends and family are not perfect of course, so as in any other area, we need to remember that they won’t be perfect in this area either and neither will we. We need to give them and ourselves grace. Make sure that you are working within yourself to find acceptance too so that you’re not putting all of it on someone else. That is very important in this work.
So, as I was pouring myself into this work and processing all sorts of thought work on my own; I drew back from making time in my life, and for just a short period of a week or so, for those relationships and connections with those that know me and accept me; for those that I know and I accept in my life intimately. Then, upon going to a simple nature group meeting at the park with other homeschool, my soul was nourished in the deep intimate connection we had in sharing our struggles, our failures, our successes and our fears. I realized something I have realized time and time again, that I need this more than so many other things. I need to make time for relationship with women, with my husband, with my family. I need to make time to connect and to be real. I need to remember that even though thought work is powerful and wonderful and worth it, that I need to also check back into reality after diving deep to create this content and be present in order for any of it to even be worthwhile and effective in my own life. My brain wants to wander and to dissect new ideas constantly when I’m excited. That’s all good and fine, but it also can push out of my life the precious moments of beauty that fill my cup overflowing and make this work both purposeful, worth-while and actually effective.
I had to stop. I had to pull back. I checked in with my body. I checked in with my friends. I checked in with my husband and my kids. I journaled and prayed (they are the same for me often). I meditated. I walked. I slept. I just stopped working so hard on this passion of mine to step back into what makes it amazing and helpful. I found renewal and strength.
Last night I got to “talk to” (in text) my sister. Of my people, she is the one that can fill me instantly with an abundance of unconditional love. She sees me and is constantly working to see me more, she loves to see who I am and constantly looks for ways to build me up. As I pour this out, I am overwhelmed with gratitude for this soul-nourishing relationship. If it weren’t for my sister, I really don’t know where I would be. She is my alter ego in so many ways. I look to her and know that I can do it. I know her strength and perseverance, her humility and grace and authenticity will infect my soul by our connection and I will succeed.
We all need people like this in our lives. We ALL need to have at least one person that can pour into us this needed love. I believe that it’s through people like my sister that God loves me. I believe this is the ultimate act of love, allowing me to feel this connection not just through my own personal spiritual journey, but with the connection of amazing people in my life that show me what it is to be loving and authentic and imperfect and keep going. You need people like this in your life, and frankly, this person likely needs you. As much as she pours into me, she infects me with a contagious spirit of love and empowerment to pour this on her and other people.
I remember when I was in my very late teens and early twenties, having years of my life where nobody really knew me. I was in a very painful relationship and clung to my walls with clenched fists unrelenting. I was not truly known by anyone. Every so often I would have a drink (or three) and then the tears along with the choppy bits of disorganized and undeciphered pain would pour out of me. I still often wore my heart on my sleeve in the sense that I would talk about pain I had endured, but I wore it like a branding that labeled me the victim. I didn’t talk about the shame and the fear. I didn’t talk about how lonely I currently was or how I desperately needed to get out of that relationship, or what was taking place right there in my life at that time. I didn’t talk about how I felt like I was a dead girl walking through life empty; or running rather. I didn’t think that what was real about me then was lovable. There was too much to un-bottle and it kept being added to. Shoved down and buried. I was volatile and yet strong. I lived under the mask of my thorn. I would not relent. I would not let anyone in. There has been no more painful time of my life than living amidst the internal pain in the loneliness of that time. Regardless of the good or bad external experiences of my life at the time, the internal turmoil was overwhelming, but I plastered a smile on my face and pressed on.
Fear and shame are traps. We can do all the thought work in the world, and though there is incredible value in changing our thoughts, without people in our lives that can walk along this journey with us, this thought work can only take us so far. We can only believe so much without community. When we have never loved ourselves, as I’m sure some of you can relate to, we can not fake it in our narrative. We need reinforcements to change our story.
My sister’s words started to become my internal narrative and I hers. It took time of really talking and opening up to see each other as we really are in order to bond in our relationship as adults to the level where we were a source of unconditional love for each other. Again, we are still not perfect, and we can acknowledge that. Placing all of your emotional needs on another person is not what this is about here. It’s about mutual love and benefit. About learning and growing together.
As we have continued to get onto a deeper level, our conversations have evolved so much so that we now rarely waste time talking about anything that’s not deep anymore. Although we still love to talk about the small things, we are so connected that we seek truth and healing in each encounter with each other. We are at the point now that in simply the act of sending her a text about something, I find growth and healing. She is God’s love for me.
Not everyone has a sister like I do. I know I’m incredibly blessed. And some of you may be in a season of life similar to what I described earlier when I was younger. That is a scary and lonely place and if you’re there, my heart goes out to you and I encourage you to press on in this work. Don’t judge yourself in this but take one step at a time and soak in the ideas I tell you, please; you are loved, you are accepted, as you are, AND you are enough. The blanket of shame will come off. It won’t be easy but it will be triumphant and beautiful. This pain that I’ve endured is what has led me to this incredibly fulfilling work and it will pave a way for you as well if you keep going; if you keep working to embrace the wonderful person you are; if you keep digging beneath what you judge yourself as being, and get below, down to the thoughts that are creating a turmoil for you. Unravel them and plant seeds of truth.
So, I want you to think if there is anybody in your life that when you are around them, you become more of the best version of YOU. You naturally feel empowered and motivated when you leave their presence. Many of you were picturing someone or several people in your mind when I first started to talk about my sister. For you, fantastic. This is your tribe right now. This is where you start. Make them a priority. Make it happen regularly, even if it’s hard. Your life literally depends on it, the real worthy life that is.
If you don’t have anybody in your life right now like this at all that you can think of, then I would highly recommend finding a therapist as a starting point. If you can’t afford therapy, you can consider group therapy, or you can consider going to a church therapist, or a school therapist. When I was young and going through that very debilitating time in my life, I started to see a counselor for free at my university as she was studying to become a therapist and so I was able to help her reach her hours, while she provided for me the safe accepting environment to open up. If that is too much for you right now, even finding a group online in a private page, perhaps a private Facebook group, can serve as the first step in being vulnerable and making connections. Start somewhere.
I would urge you to choose wisely as not all relationships render this connection and unconditional love. That doesn’t mean they are all bad, but I would ask you to consider the idea that your thought world is incredibly powerful and very much affected by the words of the people that surround you, and even more so as you are beginning this journey I believe. If you surround yourself with people that are constantly talking negatively about themselves and or others; people that are lovable and imperfect like you, but who, when you’re around them you always feel worse, drained, and regretful? These are not the kind of relationships I would encourage you to pursue more time with right now, or to expose your most tender vulnerabilities to.
This is something I wished I had learned early on. I would shove things down until they would just come hurling out of my mouth in a whirlwind of shocking pain on whatever unsuspecting victim was in my midst. No joke, these situations were self-sabotage as they only fed my feelings of shame and unworthiness; I would sit in regret of all of the unfiltered thoughts that had gushed out into the ears of someone I might have barely known. It would send me spinning. Anyway, think wisely about the people you surround yourself with, and who you will choose to open up to. Even if you have incredible healthy people in your life, but you are triggered a lot by some of them, work within other contexts first. If your marriage has such struggles and walls and feelings that you feel you cannot safely open up and be vulnerable, then this is a whole other subject for me to talk about on another day. But just start somewhere and find the connection and vulnerability your soul needs.
I have to mention that if you have children, this relationship is different. It is the same in that you still wish to be real and authentic with your kids. It’s of utmost important that the generations of kids being brought up, understand that we know we are imperfect and that we don’t try to be perfect, or expect them to be. However, children should not bear the weight of their parents’ wounds. Our children’s narratives are so pliable and most of the time the parent’s self-image is incredibly powerful in the formation of their child’s self-image and internal narrative. Our children need us to be the safe place where they feel that they can be completely themselves and be seen, heard and fully accepted, but they cannot be expected to reciprocate this, as they are now working hard on growing and developing and learning to make sense of and interpret their world; and they SHOULD NOT be subjected to all of our baggage. This is an opinion of mine formed from reading a lot on the topic and I hope that you don’t wallow in shame if you have done this, again… we are all imperfect; I just wanted to share this so that people are aware that it is important for us to find other sources of our own personal love and acceptance outside of our children.
Another point, is that, as we talked about in episode 2; Everybody is Judging you. When you are still very sensitive to other people’s opinions of you, a condition we all battle with, then it will be hard at first, even once you’ve found people to be open with, to feel safe and not experience conversation hangover, where you’re obsessing over what you said, and if you said too much, and what they think of you. I encourage you to go back and listen to that episode. We all judge, it’s not on purpose to hurt other people, and although it’s often not helpful and hurtful (and I’m not saying Good), it’s a human condition. It’s not something to take personal or to try to control. The point here is to try not to find perfect people who will never judge you; they don’t exist and you’ll never feel safe opening up. The point here is to find other imperfect people who are trying and failing too, but really want and need love like you do, and are willing to be vulnerable with you, so you can try to be a safe place for each other.
As I am sure I’ve already said more than once in every episode and post; reflective writing on this will be so helpful. It will help you to peel back layers and see yourself where you are truly at. When you reflectively write about what you think about vulnerability, you are being vulnerable. When you accept your own feelings on a matter without judgement, you are providing for yourself some acceptance and an example of the great healing power that will happen within healthy loving relationships. You’re also rewriting your story and changing your narrative.
If you’re so compelled, when you’re done with this, open up a word document and just start writing. Write about what connections your brain made with the topic of vulnerability, shame and raw unconditional love and acceptance. Write about experiences you’ve had with others where you’ve felt heard and seen and fully accepted. Write about how you felt afterward and how it affected not only your thoughts but your emotional world and your actions. Write about situations where you’ve been able to hear, and see, and really accept someone else and how it felt for you on the other end. Write about what you feel you need to share with someone. What are you battling accepting within yourself? What are you feeling shame about? What makes you afraid? Putting it on paper diffuses the bomb. It doesn’t wipe away all of the problems, but it calls them out. They’re no longer mysterious thieves, lurking in the shadows, waiting to steal your joy. They become a thing you can put your finger on. Now write about how you would feel if you didn’t feel this way (as in the work of Bryon Katie). How would you like to feel? Write about how it would feel to truly let go of the things that are beyond your control. Write about what it would feel like to accept the things about yourself that you are so ashamed of.
I also would recommend you go ahead and watch the Netflix special by Brene Brown. I have yet to watch it, but I know her and her work and it’s on this very topic. She will cement the truth about this topic so eloquently and deeply for you, and it will be incredibly helpful! If you don’t want to do that, I encourage you to watch her Ted Talk on YouTube. You can also listen to her audio talk on audible called the Power of Vulnerability or any number of books of hers. You can also listen to her podcast, the Good Life Podcast, or go on BreneBrown.com/articles to read things she’s written. I just love her work and know how powerful it is. It’s foundational in the concept I have for this podcast and I hope you find it empowering as well.
I read a quote yesterday in a book I was reading (on audible, yes that counts) called the Dyslexia Empowerment Plan by Ben Boss. He said “Ironically, community is the antidote to shame.” Wow. Really think about that one… It absolutely is ironic that within the very nature of shame is the power to draw us away from connection; but the liar would have us believe that we are unlovable, to keep us from the very source of the love we desperately need. And thus, as we wallow in shame and fear, we are cast far from even the inclination to be vulnerable, and thus have no opportunity to be seen and accepted. For if we don’t ever show who we are, we can never be really accepted, and if we never are really feeling that acceptance, then we can never be fully known or feel unconditional love. Because unconditional love says; “No matter what; no matter what you’ve done; what you think; how you are; or what you say; I still accept you as you are.” But the liar can perpetuate the lie within us that we are not lovable within the confines of this imposter syndrome feeding itself until we break free and accept the notion that we will find acceptance in our vulnerability and move to take action.
Our actions reinforce our beliefs, as they also stem from our beliefs. However, we can also bravely take action contrary to the negative beliefs we hold as a proactive way to reinforce the truth we are learning in our heads and are working to root within our hearts; we can take this action as we simultaneously work to change the beliefs that we hold, and in this way, the action we take can then begin to reinforce the beliefs that are true, turning the spiral upward.
Today I will leave you with these words to sit with and digest. What better way to not feel alone than to connect with loving people? We all need that love, but it takes action because love is not a reward, love is an action. Love happens in doing and you can spark the doing. Remember, you are beautifully and radically imperfect and you are enough. Let your light shine in the world sunshine, and know you’re never alone.
My love to you everywhere,
Holly Ann Kasper
The Radical Imperfectionist
