The Vulnerable Side

Feature Image credits – https://ideas.ted.com/how-showing-vulnerability-helps-build-a-stronger-team/

These days split personalities isn’t just a personality disorder. It’s more or less a requirement of the corporate life. I am most definitely not being cynical when I say it’s almost impossible to survive in the corporate world if you don’t have a game face in addition to your true face. You cannot be genuine, you cannot be vulnerable and you most certainly can’t always be absolutely honest for fear of affecting another individual in a negative manner. Social convention dictates that you say and do what is most acceptable to the collective society. In the busy lives of people who are working hard to make a living, there is no time to handle the mess and emotional turmoil that comes along with your vulnerable side. However, inconvenient as this may be, most would never want to trade that side of their life with anything in this world.

What is this vulnerable side? Its the side that makes you feel things – love, joy, sadness, jealousy, fear, anger. Its the side that makes you stop and notice the world around you, inspires you to be creative. Its the side that keeps track of your insecurities while also pushing you to dream. Its the side that makes you crave for social interactions and a general acceptance. In short, its the side that makes you human. That statement alone should make you realize the importance of being vulnerable. It, unfortunately, is also the side that makes you weak. It makes you susceptible to exploitation. Which would mean, one has to cultivate their vulnerability to strike the perfect balance however hard it may be to do so.

In the corporate world, vulnerability might have a wrong connotation to it. But when you substitute it with the concept of empathy, you strike gold. The best example of this comes from experience. When I am feeling testy about my team mate trying to snatch a meaty assignment from me, that shows that I am insecure and it throws a negative light on me. But when I show maturity by analysing my team mate’s headspace and trying to understand why they are trying to take that assignment for themselves, it shows empathy and automatically elevates my stature in the eyes of the team. If I had a dollar for everytime someone praised me for my “empathy” I’d be halfway to my retirement by now! In short, you constantly live under the pressure to project a positive image so you have the added pressure on yourself to convert all the “negative” impulses into “positive” spins hence the idea that the corporate world is no place to show your vulnerabilities. However, the challenge here is that recent social conventions say showing your vulnerability makes it easier to build a strong relationship with your teams. I am yet to experience it. Empathy builds those relationships. Sharing your true opinions or sharing your insecurities will not endear you to your team at all.

What about your personal life? Can you at least be vulnerable in peace there? Probably not. In my experience, definitely not! For the longest time, I didn’t have any other side to me or rather that’s what I believed. As far back as I can remember, fear and insecurity drove most of my actions. For most of my teens and my mid-twenties, I was in this rut of wanting to please outsiders and that drained my energy and kept me from building my own aspirations. My vulnerability was well exploited by some. In fact, some of my insecurities kept me from even building a plan for my life or even trying to picture what I wanted to do with my life. That, in my mind, is the worst. I let my vulnerable side completely take over my life. It was detrimental to my future. However, I got over it.

Almost suddenly, one day, I just got tired of being vulnerable. It was like I somehow turned off that switch in me. I was a completely changed person. I can’t really say I turned off everything but I most definitely filed away my vulnerable side to a corner at the back of my mind. And let me tell you, it is working wonders! I am a confident and self reliant person, someone I can finally be proud of! I am genuinely a lot happier and free of worries. It’s a different kind of freedom. Does that mean I am not vulnerable anymore? Of course I am! Feeling this joy has its own trepidations. I am fearful that the other shoe might drop and believe me, there are people around me who keep pointing that out, even if I try to not think about it too much. But I am happy that I have reached a point in life where I am able to look past the vulnerabilities and focus on what makes me happy in the present. It’s a gift that I truly cherish and hope to continue being blessed with!

In conclusion, I want to take a moment to reflect on my vulnerabilities and remind myself that no person can truly be happy without a balance of their game face and their true face. If one takes precedence over the other, a person can lose touch with reality and that is dangerous! It is that balance that I must strive to maintain and never tip towards either extreme!