How To Be More Vulnerable With People
Let’s talk how to be more vulnerable.
Now I am no expert on this topic. In fact, I have actively been working on this and following the advice I am about to give you for the last few months.
I have always been open about general things in my life and my past trauma, but I have always struggled letting people into my more vulnerable states of experiencing my emotions with me. Because of this, I have felt very disconnected from people in my life. A lot of my loved ones have also ended up putting too much of themselves on me because it seemed like I could always hold more.
This is why I have been practicing being more open—and yes, it is definitely a practice! There is no easy fix and it will feel uncomfortable until it just becomes second nature to you. But I decided long ago, I want to love and feel loved so being uncomfortable is worth it to me. I am more afraid of wasting the little time I have on this earth than I will ever be about opening up.
When You Want to Bite Your Tongue, Open Your Mouth
The biggest advice I can give you is when you get that feeling in your gut to hold on to your words, not text that person, or get lost in your own thoughts, don’t. This is the exact time you need to reach out and speak those thoughts to someone. It will most likely be half baked ideas or incoherent feelings but that is okay—actually that’s great. This is what being truly vulnerable with some is, working through feelings and ideas with someone else.
Don’t Gloss Over “How Are You?”
Growing up in the United States can make it easy to ignore when people ask about your day or your life. We have been conditioned to see it as another form of hello where the only correct answer is one neutral or positive word. While this might be appropriate for more general settings, if you want to be more open with the people in your life you need to take that as an open-ended way of checking in on you. Share what has been causing you stress or getting you excited or annoying you to no end. It may seem small, but it allows an opening for a much more honest and genuine conversation.
Don’t Trauma Dump
Now this might be surprising but nowadays I’ve found it really common for people to open up way too early about their deepest traumas and then spend the next hour talking about it if not making joke after joke after joke about it. This is actually is more likely to put up a wall between you and the person you are sharing with because you are not going in with the intention to relate and be vulnerable with this person to form a connection. Instead, it is about you vocalizing all your hardships and dominating the conversation. It often asks for pity instead of empathy and doesn’t leave room for either of you to really sit in your feelings.
I don’t want you to take this a message to hide your struggles and suck it up. I often vocalized that I was sexually assault the first time I hung out with someone because it was important for them to understand where I was coming from in order for me to feel safer. What I didn’t do was then spend the next hour getting into the nitty gritty details of my story and all of my PTSD since the incident while crying.
There are always exceptions because of certain circumstances or people making it the right time to share but before you start unloading all of your emotional baggage in a new relationship ask yourself why you are doing this and what you hope to get from sharing this.
Allow Yourself to be Uncontrollable
Being in control is pretty close to the antithesis of being vulnerable. Let yourself be carried away by moments, conversations, and feelings with people. Being vulnerable doesn’t have to just be in the sad moments.
It can be really powerful to let someone in on your pure excitement and joy. Showing your unconstrained passion builds good connections because anyone that has good intentions for you wants you to be your most happy and full self. Giving someone the chance to celebrate you not only encourages you to be more open but actually makes you feel closer to them.
Learning to be Vulnerable Takes Time
These are just some of the ways to become more open I’ve discovered on my journey to create genuine connections. At the end of the day, it is a process. It will ebb and flow just like all relationships do. All you need to do is loosen the reigns and trust in the process.
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Blog by Nicole Asherah. Nicole Asherah is an artist who tries to connect people to intimate moments, feelings, and relationships experienced throughout life through her poetry, paintings, and photography.
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