Life and Vulnerability

It is interesting to notice our own vulnerability in life.  I am 37 years old and still can feel vulnerable in different situations in my life.  Does this make me sensitive or alive?  It is the reading of “Hold Me Tight” by Dr. Sue Johnson that has gotten me to thinking about connections in life, with friends/family and most importantly with my self.  What does vulnerability mean?  Feeling close with others and being comfortable with needing others.  This is an aspect of vulnerability that is hardest for most.  I was just talking with a friend we were discussing what it feels like to need others.  But having a “secure connection with a loved one is empowering” Dr. Sue Johnson.   When we feel emotionally safe with others we will feel safer in the vulnerabilities of life, the ups and downs that life brings.  Even when life is hard, which does happen, we feel more secure and safe because we know that how we feel matters to someone else.

Stop and think “who can I feel vulnerable with”? Can I be vulnerable with my self?  What would that look like?

Tags: change and life, Life and vulnerability, life transitions

Emotional Boundaries within families

I have been noticing that more and more people are hurting from the emotional pain that they have taken on from their parents pain.  This means that when you were a child you may have been the emotional sounding board for your parents pain or emotional process.  This is more likely to happen if your parents are going through divorce or feel stuck in a dysfunctional relationship and the parent has poor emotional boundaries.  If your parent did not have the tools to process their own emotions or have the support from other adults to process their feelings, they may have turned to you, their child.  This was not done in malice but in the pain of their own experience and poor boundaries.

What can happen though is that as little beings we love and want out parents to be happy, and we want to feel needed and wanted.  For some though they take on the pain and hurt as their own, you internalize it.  Which can end up haunting us later in life, added to our own pain and stress of life (or as positive: Growth).  When our own stuff is affecting our lives or making it difficult to grow in our adult years we may feel the added burden from our parents painful stress and/or stories of their past.

It is at this time that you can go through a process, most likely in therapy with the support and guidance of a therapist, where you can heal the pain and memories and seperate what your emotional pain/stress is from your parents.  Lear to have clear and healthy boundaries within your life.

(As always these are my thoughts not intended for therapy but for something to think about.  Always get personal advice from a lic. therapist in your area.)

Tags: parenting, sharing with children, too much talk with kids