One problem we have with the English language is that when we use a word its meaning is not always exact. Some words have a range of meanings. One of these is "vulnerability".

Meanings

The word "vulnerability" has at least three meanings.

When we say that someone is vulnerable we may be suggesting that they are exposed to harm or abuse. Children who grow up in households characterized by violence, and sexual abuse, are vulnerable. If they leave their families, or are kicked out, and are living on the streets, they are vulnerable. Members of indigenous communities, because of prejudice, neglect, abuse, low educational and health standards, and diminished employment opportunities, are vulnerable. People drawn into the ambit of fundamentalist religious communities, who are frequently subject to emotional and spiritual abuse, are vulnerable. Throughout history, women have been in a vulnerable position relative to men. In times of war, the men who fight the battles, and the women and children who stay at home, are vulnerable. This sort of vulnerability has to do with being in a position of powerlessness. [243]

We also talk about individuals who deliberately expose themselves to harm as having made themselves vulnerable. Those who push their bodies to the limit, who undertake dangerous expeditions, or who deliberately place themselves at risk, are making themselves vulnerable. Some people are stimulated by risk-taking. Others take risks to prove themselves to their peers. They need to demonstrate their fearlessness. Some take risks to rescue others, who are in danger. Others place their lives at risk because they are under orders, like the soldiers who scrambled out of trenches during the First World War. This sort of vulnerability could be described as either courage, or foolhardiness.

Vulnerability has a third meaning. It can refer to occasions when we deliberately share material that is personal, where what we share could be used against us. To be vulnerable, in this sense, we need to be strong enough to cope with potential exposure without being diminished when it occurs. If the first type of vulnerability is associated with powerlessness, and the second with either courage or foolhardiness, then the third type of vulnerability can be seen to derive from compassion.

It is this third form of vulnerability that I would like to explore.

Two Audiences

The vulnerability that has to do with self-revelation is directed at two audiences.

The first audience is us. Before we can share ourselves with others, we need to be aware of our strengths and weaknesses. This means that we must have reached the stage where we are reasonably comfortable with ourselves, where [244] our self-worth is not diminished by recognition that we are plagued by deficiencies and weaknesses. Our self-talk needs to have reached the stage where it is honest, accepting, and gentle.

The second group of listeners are those with whom we will share those aspects of our experience that would benefit them. We will share differently with different groups of people, at different stages in their lives, and ours. We will share generalities with a broad circle of friends. We will share more with those with whom we are more intimate. In nurturing our children, we will share insights and experiences, when they would be helped by them. Our sharing will be most appreciated when we reveal something of our humanity, our weaknesses. This could involve a surrender of power, or privilege, in favour of a leveling mutuality. Those situations in which we are most likely to share at a deep level of self-disclosure, and vulnerability, are those where either we or others need to push through maturational barriers.

Worldviews

There are some circumstances in which it is not weaknesses, but hesitations, doubts or confusion to which we will admit. We live in communities that espouse particular worldviews. These worldviews help maintain communities. We are dependent on such communities for our nurture and security. Most want to believe that the community has an accurate fix on reality, because it guarantees their future. Deviance challenges the community's story, its worldview, its hold on its members, and its capacity for surviving and perpetuating itself. Few are willing to publicly admit, either to themselves or others, that they have difficulty endorsing commonly-held perceptions. However, when they are able to face their doubts, and share them, when appropriate, with [245] others, they soon discover that they are not alone, and that their confession has been an enormous relief to others, who have silently nursed doubts, or tried to silence them.

Benefits

The ability to be honest with ourselves, and others, benefits both us and those with whom we choose to share. We experience freedom from the anxiety that attaches to the pretence we are encouraged to maintain. The accurate appraisal of our strengths and weaknesses, together with our willingness to confess to the latter, increases rather than diminishes our self-esteem. This acknowledgement of deficiencies, in the absence of self-congratulation, or self-flagellation, opens us to new insights about ourselves. It deepens our relationships with others, who are no longer intimidated by us. When it is our hesitations that we share, the suspicion that we are not alone in our questioning of assumptions is confirmed, and, at the same time, we give others permission to be true to their own truth. The more we are true to ourselves, to our observations and convictions, the more likely it is that we will find ourselves embraced by the Spirit of Truth.¹²⁴

While those who find it difficult to be vulnerable marvel at our honesty and self-exposure, the very fact that we have reached the stage in our journey where this sort of self-revelation is possible, means that we do not feel vulnerable.

Dangers

This is not to downplay the dangers associated with vulnerability. [246]

It is a danger to those who are not ready for it, people who are emotionally pressured into confronting and sharing their weaknesses. Sharing from a position of weakness, rather than strength, can damage fragile self-esteem and strengthen a tendency to self-depreciation. It is also possible that our sharing may represent little more than a play for sympathy, a form of manipulation. It could be an opportunity for seduction, or, by casting us in the role of therapist, for the exercise of power. It is also possible that it may be an attempt to draw others into an alliance against a third person, whose presence troubles us.

We also need to be aware of the dangers that arise as a consequence of our sharing ourselves with others, even where that sharing arises from a position of strength. Our vulnerability will not always be appreciated. Our timing may be out, or the other person may not be ready for what we have to share. We may be misunderstood. We may also be used. If it is our hesitations we have shared, and our confidence is betrayed, we may need to cope with the community's anger and their ostracism of us.

An Incremental Journey

Our capacity for vulnerability relates to the stage we have reached in our personal development. The more we are in touch with the many layers of the self, the more vulnerable we will be able to be.

The ideal environment for sharing is one in which there is a degree of mutuality. I have taught a range of subjects in my academic career. I have found most of them stimulating. However, the course that I have most enjoyed, and that has been of the greatest benefit, both to myself and students, has been a course concerned with personal, spiritual development. We have explored issues, with no theological [247] or ideological parameters setting limits to the inquiry. I have encouraged, not the ingestion of massive amounts of information, but rigorous self-exploration, as well as personal and intellectual honesty. Confidentiality has been maintained, and participants have felt supported in their quest for truth, truth about themselves, their world and their God. There have been moments where we have embraced each other's souls.

Our capacity to share, in a manner that requires a degree of vulnerability, develops gradually. Little by little we are encouraged to open up. The stronger we become, and therefore the more secure we feel, the more vulnerable we discover we are able to be. Having reached this stage, we recognise that there is strength in our vulnerability. But it is a gentle strength, a type of strength that is foreign to many, unless they have experienced it.

A Continuum

I have argued that sharing details of our lives with others can be either a healthy or an unhealthy exercise. It can benefit or damage them. However, it is rarely one or the other. There is a continuum between sharing that derives from a generous capacity for vulnerability, and an unhealthy sharing which is manipulative. As we continue to grow, as our identity becomes more centred in the deeper levels of self, our sharing will become more healthy and beneficial.

It is factors in the unconscious that control the style of sharing that serves the interests of a damaged ego. However, the more we are aware of these factors, the more we can anticipate their intervention. This does not mean that we will no longer be blind-sided. [248]

One of the differences between healthy and unhealthy sharing is that unhealthy sharing is provoked by our needs, whereas healthy sharing is evoked by the needs of others. When our sharing arises out of our compassion for others, and where we have sufficient freedom from the urgency of our needs to give them time, we have the capacity to be "as wise as serpents and as harmless as doves".¹²⁵

The Spirit

The sharing that takes place between two people who are willing to be vulnerable is a dance of intimacy and mutuality in which the atmosphere is heavy with Presence. It is the presence of the Spirit, the Go-Between God, which makes intimate sharing possible. It is this Spirit who is discerned in the interchange.¹²⁶ Caught up in this pregnant atmosphere, we discover that we need to achieve a balance between our attempts at responding to the person we are engaging, and our discernment of intimations, deriving from this Spirit, which offer guidance. [249]

[ROI 243-249]