Quotes about Vulnerability

We can gradually drop our ideals of who we think we ought to be, or who we think we want to be, or who we think other people think we want to be or ought to be.

When a woman forsakes her vulnerability because she's been hurt or because she lives in a dangerous world or doesn't want to be used, she loses something essential about being a woman.

Hearts were made for being broken. There's really no way around it if you want to be a human being.

If you think dealing with issues like worthiness and authenticity and vulnerability are not worthwhile because there are more pressing issues, like the bottom line or attendance or standardized test scores, you are sadly, sadly mistaken. It underpins everything.

The man I love may decide tomorrow that he loves me no more - but if my heart remains open, I will endure the storm.

Danger breeds best on too much confidence.

I want to let you in on a little secret: I don't always feel like I'm a success. That's right. There are plenty of times when I feel like I've just totally messed up and failed to connect with the people I'm trying to communicate with.

Seek first to understand, then to be understood ... Remember, unexpressed feelings never die. They are buried alive and come forth later in uglier ways. You've got to share your feelings or they'll eat your heart out.

Sometimes people call folks here at the Simple Way saints. Usually they either want to applaud our lives and live vicariously through us, or they want to write us off as superhuman and create a safe distance. One of my favorite quotes, written on my wall here in bold black marker, is from Dorothy Day: "Don't call us saints; we don't want to be dismissed that easily

My brokenness is a better bridge for people than my pretend wholeness ever was.

A rabbit, it has been said, can outrun a lion. But the rabbit's great fear of the lion paralyzes it, making it easy for the lion to catch and consume it.

the greatest barrier to intimacy is fear -- fear of being known, fear of being rejected, fear of facing the truth about ourselves... ...We are afraid to be known because at some deep level we fear that the truth about us, when out in the open and reflected back to us through someone else's eyes, will be shocking to ourselves.