Caring for your vulnerability hangover

Vulnerability hangover – It’s a term I heard Brene Brown mention before and recently again Ritch Litvin. And it never quite landed with me. Until this week. 

Through a wonderful set of circumstances I landed on Austria’s largest national 2-hour long radio show. It has a unique setup. The wonderful host, Claudia Stöckl, came to my apartment in Vienna and we had breakfast together, which we recorded. What followed for me was the most vulnerable, public conversation I’ve had in my life to date. We talked about how much money I made, the relationship with my family through living in the monastery for a while. About my fears and mistakes of living into a projected reality from my father. As much as I could I stayed true to my values, holding nothing back and going into kind discomforted, to the places that may hurt, but aren’t harmful to visit. 

And feeling somewhat satisfied after the interview was over, what followed for the next couple of days was extremely new. My mind went back again and again to things I said about myself, about my family, about others close to me. Was that ok? Did I say too much? Will people be triggered? Will people understand? Those thoughts raced through my mind every few minutes, alongside fear, shame, insecurity. 

Until I remembered 3 days later that this may be normal and the concept, a vulnerability hangover finally clicked. More than that, I concluded that it may be a good sign not a bad one. I leaned out of the window, I crossed some boundaries and of course many parts of my body are screaming “STOP, NOT SAFE!”. 

To every client I work with I say that I want to help them shower their fears with love, but not let them be the decision maker for their course of action. That was a good reminder to take a sip of my own Koolaid, although a challenging one. I spent some time to sit with my fears, my anxieties, my despairs and just held them, asking them about their stories. And slowly they unraveled.

What I discovered is that every story that came up was a fear about something that happened in the past: I remembered a time where I was ridiculed when I spoke up, a time where I was physically hit for doing what I thought was right. A time where I didn’t get the support from my parents on something I loved doing. These stories were all there, wanting to protect me from that ever happening again. Or to be more precise, as I understand things today, they were wanting some attention to ease the pain that was never eased for them before, now that it was exposed again. And so I did, to make more room for the actions that the present moment is taking me into.

In my line of work as a coach these days I hear a lot of people suggesting that you “crush” or “conquer” your fears. I’ve found that approach largely ineffective and temporarily helpful at best. What fundamentally shifts our approach to life and allows us to reach for the things we never dared to reach for before is to offer tremendous kindness to the fears and stories holding us back. As soon as we do that, they have a chance to unravel and the clarity of the moment with the obvious next action step emerges. 

Vulnerability hangovers are powerful signs. Caring for them is vital too. If you haven’t done either in a while, ask yourself this: What’s worth standing up for that scares me, but I know is the right thing? Try it out and care for your vulnerability hangover after if it comes.