![]() ![]() Vulnerability is not a weakness, a passing indisposition, or something we can arrange to do without, vulnerability is not a choice, vulnerability is the underlying, ever present and abiding undercurrent of our natural state. ![]() In his recent On Being conversation with Krista Tippett, Whyte reads his meditation on vulnerability: Why we do that and how we can transcend it is what poet and philosopher David Whyte explores in a portion of his endlessly insightful Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words ( public library), which also gave us Whyte’s wisdom on aloneness, the deeper meanings of friendship, love, and heartbreak, and anger, forgiveness, and what maturity really means. Although we may intellectually recognize how essential vulnerability is to our aliveness and every significant expression of it, we remain astonishingly averse to being vulnerable, expending tremendous resources on constructing elaborate and ultimately illusory defenses against this basic condition of being alive. Social scientist Brené Brown conveyed the same sentiment somewhat differently in considering what resilient people have in common: “If we are brave enough often enough, we will fall this is the physics of vulnerability.” However we may formulate it, the equation holds true - uncomfortably, devastatingly, often intolerably true. “Vulnerability is a guardian of integrity,” artist and unheralded philosopher Anne Truitt wrote as she contemplated what sustains the creative spirit. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |