One of the greatest characteristics a human being can possess is the art of listening and receiving information from someone, while removing your opinion on what’s being expressed. Think about how different our world would be if we all objectively received a person who is sharing who they are and what makes them think and operate the way they do… instead of meeting their words with a collision of judgement based on our subjectivity. I truly believe these head-on collisions with the vulnerability of humans, cause humans to stop being vulnerable. Being that vulnerability consists of a deep share, we’re aware that the person sharing is looking for some type of understanding, comfort, and/or healing. We are all responsible for ourselves, and I hope that we become more responsible for receiving each other’s vulnerable moments without judgement.
Vulnerability begins first with the self. Before I ever practiced baring my heart with others, I had to practice telling the truth to myself. For me, that meant writing things down in a journal. Ink became a witness to what my mouth couldn’t yet say. The page never judged me… it simply received me. In that private space, I learned the courage of self-honesty, the kind that doesn’t hide behind excuses or explanations. But as much as the journal gave me room to breathe, I realized healing often requires more than expression on paper.
How can we rid ourselves of shame and guilt if our words never find another soul to touch? Sometimes solitude becomes a shelter, but it can also become a prison. Scripture reminds us in James 5:16:
“Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed.”
Healing lives in the sharing. Vulnerability isn’t just about telling the truth to yourself, it’s about daring to place that truth in the hands of another and trusting they won’t crush it.
And yet, not every set of hands is safe. Learning who we can be vulnerable with is a journey marked by both disappointment and discovery. There will be times when we share and are met with misunderstanding, perhaps even betrayal. But those moments, painful as they are, refine our discernment. They teach us the priceless worth of the friend who listens without rushing to fix, the partner who receives without rushing to judge, and the confidant who doesn’t treat our vulnerability like gossip but like gold.
It takes trial and error, but it is worth it. For when you find the ones who can truly receive your vulnerability, you find more than safety… you find freedom. Freedom from shame, freedom from silence, and freedom to become more fully yourself. In return, you become the kind of person who can hold space for another’s trembling truth, the kind who knows how heavy a heart can be and how light it feels when someone helps carry it.