Being Vulnerable

My greatest challenge since childhood has been to be vulnerable to my own mother – the one who mattered so much, was also someone who I felt intimidated with so much. About a year and a half ago I went through a quite an emotional breakdown with her because I deeply felt she was not understanding towards my feelings and sensitivities. However, in a fight that erupted between us, I just realised I’d had enough. I broke down in front of her, rather than hide myself away after a fight in my room and cry alone, and expressed to her exactly what I felt – that her actions/words were breaking me and even though I wanted to be exactly what she wanted me to be, I failed. I felt like a failure and I apologised in my brokenness that I could not be her ideal daughter – that I would love to exchange my talents for the other ‘regular’ qualities her friends’ daughters had, but I didn’t know how to.
Little did I know what I had just done – bared my vulnerability. Little did I know what this would lead me to – my mother softened over time, and her expectations of me dropped dramatically. Over time she became more supportive of my talents and I learnt some of the regular things she expected of me. Today our relationship has touched middle ground – as I take time proactively to understand her needs of me from time to time, she is very encouraging of me. Fights have altogether stopped because I have stopped listening to the content, and focus instead on the intent, whenever either of us are angry or emotional. In fact it has been an Inner Child practice to give affirmations to the child within at these times such as, “It’s okay to be angry”,  It’s okay to be honest,  It’s okay to tell the truth“, “It’s okay to feel what you feel“. It strengthens the child in us to be completely open and honest to another.
Sharing above an awesome article by Sangeeta on how to be present to the other person’s vulnerability. I don’t know how she has put this in a point form but she has! 🙂 In places where I am still learning to be open to my own vulnerabilities, I am happy to refer to it.

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