Daring Greatly: The book that inspired me to write my first story on Medium
I am not what has happened to me. I am what I choose to become. -Carl Jung
I’ve always liked the idea of reading books more than actually reading them.
That grandfather reading a newspaper in a crowded and loud metro. That kid staring into a book bigger than himself while waiting for his parents to pick him up after school. That mother, with a baby in a stroller, a cup of coffee and a fiction book on her table, without the presence of the phone. Isn’t there something admirable about people who are intrinsically motivated to read?
My grandmother used to go to the library every Tuesday and borrow four books, which she would finish by the next Tuesday. I get excited just thinking about the possibility of immersing myself in the story so deeply that it makes you forget about unresolved arguments, appearance nuisances, lack of money in your bank account or crime news in the world.
Right off the bat, I had a desire to create this joy for myself. I wanted to become like people I’ve admired: a joyful reader. At the very beginning, I couldn’t find a book that really interests me. The world-known classics never spoke to me. I felt it was a trap of a long journey with no happy ending. The romance stories seemed meaningless to read because what was there to learn and grow from? I admit that it was a quite pretentious attitude, which made me underestimate the romance genre. Thrillers appeared more appropriate, and really, I had been glued to crime stories the longest. It has been the anticipation of “who is the killer?” that fueled my desirable addiction to reading. However, after several months, I was confronted with another obstacle. It was hard to choose a new book because I kept asking myself:
“How could this story possibly be any different than the one I read last time? What plot twist is there to be read that I haven’t heard of yet?’’
I was highly judgmental.
Consequently, as a current professional athlete with Masters Degree in Sports Psychology, I’ve turned to books closer to “my career”. Something that will broaden my horizons and keep me updated in evolving science of psychology. Maybe help me perform better as well, I thought. Although determined to accomplish my mission, I’ve hit another rock on the road. I felt shame.
I felt embarrassed about borrowing or buying psychology books because I was worried about my image. I was ashamed to hold books known as “self-help’’ in public and I was ashamed to talk about them with my friends. I was hiding without understanding why. The real triumph of realization happened when I started reading Daring Greatly by Brené Brown.
Her work, such as blog stories, Instagram posts, and particularly her podcasts, has been familiar to me. I’ve enjoyed her voice because she had the presence of a friendly next door neighbor. Her aura always radiates passion for her work, strong character, opinionated comments, but also a genuine and empathic approach toward contrary perspectives.
Daring Greatly blew my mind because it uncovered a brand new outlook I’d never considered before in my life. As I was venturing into the unknown world, with every page read it started to look like the answer to all my problems is, simple as that, to be vulnerable.
What does this mean? Where has “tough cookie’’, individuality, self-sufficiency, and “better busy than bored’’ mentality disappeared? The more I read, the more I learned that the possible reason for all my problems is shame.
What? But I worked so hard to have a degree, to be liked by people, to always bring positive energy, to make it to the professional sports level, to be respected and to respect others by avoiding intrusive behavior.
This book had basically confronted my existence. Brown’s research evidenced that in a culture of “never enough’’, shame prevents us to feel worthy. Daring Greatly is not about “be tough, you can do it all.’’ On the contrary, it reminds us that we are not alone in this thing called living. Her strongest claim, in my opinion, is that every human being strives for belonging and human connection. And yet, majority of time most of us are hiding, fearing to reveal our true-self. Are we convinced it is making us cooler to have “I don’t care” attitude, more powerful if we never admit our mistakes, or more trustworthy if we have it “all together’’ all the time?
We are constantly putting on armor to protect ourselves from all of life’s potential blows: disappointments, betrayals, failures, and unreciprocated love. What we don’t understand, and what this book explains in a lovely way, is that this very armor prevents us from experiencing connection and worthiness.
No matter how much we know or what we do for a living, the truth is that we all have both dark and light inside us. As Brown’s research shows, we all experience shame and we are prone to displaying more judgement toward things we are most concerned about. Remember my aversion toward book genres? It was insecurity about my own topics in writing.
Brené Brown is teaching us to be courageous enough to explore our insecurities, fears and failures. This is vulnerability: to love despite not knowing if we will be loved back, to support without assurance that we will receive the same support, to be seen as we truly are and not as we think we should be.
As I was reading the book, the thought “I would like to write about vulnerability’’ kept coming to my mind. I wanted to explain Brown’s ideas in my own words, to myself and to others. But at the same time:
“There are dozens of articles about the book.’’
“I’m not an expert.’’
“Who cares about vulnerability?’’
“Is the topic intriguing enough?’’
“What if my grammar sucks and people don’t understand what I’m trying to say?’’
And this is where it hit me. This is exactly what the book is talking about; the fear foreboding the joy. So how to fight this urge to prevent the pain by hiding, pretending or ignoring (unfortunately numbing) our emotions? Brené Brown says the answer is in shame resiliency.
When we are courageous to be seen despite the flaws and setbacks, then we create space for real connection. When I chose to share my aspiration to start a blog with my fiance, I found out that he was excited as much as I was. By sharing with him how scary it is to have a piece of mind online, we ended up having an open discussion about our shame and frustrations in life. This is the power of vulnerability: it creates space to be heard, to be understood and to find support from people we really care about. For me, the real connection is when disengagement, loneliness and unworthiness doesn’t exist.
From experience, I know that when we take a step in this direction, we are intrinsically motivated to take action. We are no longer driven by others’ approval or values determined by society. We generate intimacy and compassion with the world around us and we stop carrying this heavy burden on our backs that is making us feel stuck.
I enjoy writing. I use writing to express gratitude. I use writing to give my mind a break. I use writing to organize my thoughts. I use writing to express myself to myself. I haven’t always been the best in writing, but I’ve spent many hours/days/weeks and months to sharpen my craft. However, I wasn’t vulnerable with my writing! Daring Greatly inspired me to pursue my practice in a different way: to share my work and be unapologetically excited about it.
If instead of “how much we know’’, “what we do’’ and “what others will think’’, we make a leap of faith by focusing on “here is what we are now” and “here is what we choose to become”, we give ourselves an opportunity to experience a real connection in our lives.
Will we rise to the challenge of being vulnerable?
