Living Through Vulnerability

"Allow ourselves to be seen, truly seen" - Dr. Brene Brown.

After watching Ted Talks with Dr Brene Brown, I started to consider what does it mean to truly live through vulnerability? To fully accept ourselves without shame or self-doubt. Dr. Brown mentioned that after carrying out her research into understanding connection and vulnerability she was able to divide her research into two groups, one being 'worthiness' and the other 'wholehearted'. One group had a clear sense of disconnection, a lack of worthiness. While the other group displayed a sense of worthiness courage. I question if living through vulnerability could have altered my past experiences during my earlier training years and perhaps my career so far. As a child I suffered with an underlining heart condition which caused me to stay very thin and struggle to gain weight. I was advised not to pursue dancing due to my heart problem and breathlessness. Of course, as children when you are told not to do something, you rebel and push back. 😏 So I continued to dance, act, and sing regardless of health professionals’ opinions. As a child I was told I had the 'perfect physique for a dancer'. As I got older, I was fortunate enough to receive a heart operation which completely altered my life. As a teenager I noticed that my metabolism rapidly sped up. My body shape had changed, my skeletal structure had developed, I became curvier and broader. As well as my exterior change, I was experiencing confusion with my sexuality. By the time I reached my drama school years, I was growing into a young woman, exploring my sexuality, and embracing my body. It was from this point that it all changed for me. This sense of worthiness and self-acceptance, living throughout fear that I had started to lose. If I look back, I can recall times, I felt I was not good enough, my body was not right, my hair was not right, my piercings were wrong. I did not even feel comfortable talking about my sexuality, in what felt like at the time, a very heterosexual environment. There were not any girls identifying as part of the LGBTQ+ community so I often felt ostracized and different. Singled out to play the more 'butch' characters because of my low register voice and my sexual identity. There was a sense of stereotyping and marginalisation within the school. This at times became a toxic environment where I had shut down vulnerably and did not allow myself to accept my true authentic self. I had numbed my vulnerability without even realising. I always thought being vulnerable made you weak but upon reflection I can see I was putting up a guard, a wall which had made me self-doubt and disconnect. After watching Dr. Brown on Ted Talks, I can see the relation between numbing my vulnerability, and numbing the sense of feeling happiness, gratitude.  I had developed this constant feeling of 'not being enough' for the industry. I question if I could have changed to live my life vulnerably during those years could I have altered my own personal experiences? Could we change the industries perception of body perfection and stereotyping? There is an amazing influencer called Chessie King who is an ambassador for many women's mental health related organisations and supports companies that uplift real women. She fully embraces herself in all her authenticity and I ponder if we did this more collectively as performers, could we break these cycles of stereotypes and perception of females within the industry and females identifying as part of the LGBTQ+ community. Over the last couple of years, I have truly begun to embrace myself, approaching my late 20's, I am exploring authenticity and self-acceptance as a female performer identifying as part of the LGBTQ+ community.

Would love to hear your thoughts :)

Thank you.