Big Think - The Power of Vulnerability

Vulnerability is one of those things men tend to struggle with in relationships, primarily because so many of us were raised never to show vulnerability. I suspect women also deal with this issue, but it's often men who get the bad rap for it.

In this article from Big Think, the author offers some short but useful insights on the necessity of vulnerability in healthy relationships.

The Power of Vulnerability

by Kathleen Kelley Reardon

July 17, 2014

Years ago I read an article by Harvard business professor Chris Argyris whose message stuck with me. “Good Communication that Blocks Learning” was about the mental models we develop early in life for dealing with emotional and threatening issues. These “defensive routines,” as Argyris termed them, exist to prevent human beings from experiencing embarrassment or threat. At the same time, however, they prevent examination of the nature and causes of both. In short, they prevent learning and thereby perpetuate bad choices.

Breaking free of defensive communication routines requires a willingness to be vulnerable. Only while bringing down our guard are we able to effectively examine why certain unsavory situations occur repeatedly in our lives. Ironically, this kind of vulnerability requires courage.

Doing the unexpected, as hard as it may be, often brings rewards. We know that apologizing, when defensiveness or retaliation is expected, can lead to calmer communication. The unexpected causes most of us to reflect. Indeed, it is often how young children learn new things.

Moreover, the rule of reciprocity in human interaction calls for a civil response to a civil offering. Ignoring this rule has its consequences, but here again breaking free of defensive routines can enable us to change the communication options of others. If we move beyond defensiveness, the rule of reciprocity encourages others to do so as well.

It would be naïve to suggest that antagonistic relationships around the world would disappear were the key players to reflect more on their defensive routines. But it wouldn’t hurt, either.

To the extent we stick with routines, we cease to learn other communication options. Perhaps worse, we become predictable -- and thereby manageable -- by others, many of whom we’d prefer not to give such power if we had our wits about us. They are able to provoke us to and corner us within our own defensiveness because it’s so easy to do.

Unblocking defensive communication routines starts with recognizing their existence and realizing what can be said in their place. “This is where I usually become defensive...” or “Rather than escalate this into an argument neither of us wants, let me suggest...” are two phrases that may prove useful the next time you feel yourself becoming defensive, and there are many others. Their use opens us up to learning, and so makes us more skillful at communication.

Sure, there is risk in relinquishing defensiveness. The greater risk, though, is that of becoming stuck in routines that repeatedly take us to the same unhappy and unproductive place.

photo: PathDoc/Shutterstock.com


by Kathleen Kelley Reardon

Robert Augustus Masters - 7 Ways (Besides Sex) To Emotionally Connect With Your Partner

One of the key differences between men and women, in my experience, is that men tend to use sex to create intimacy while women see sex as an expression of intimacy. This is by no means universal, but it is common enough that Robert Augustus Masters included it in one of the 7 tips below: Instead of using sex to build connection, let sex be a fully embodied expression of already-present connection. 

The biggest and most important point here, which Masters mentions, is that we cannot be emotionally intimate with our partners if we are not intimate with our own emotions. For most men, this is a part of our lives that we have been culturally conditioned to avoid. We need to rewire that conditioning if we want deeply intimate and healthy relationships.

The passage below is excerpted from Emotional Intimacy: A Comprehensive Guide for Connecting with the Power of Your Emotions by Robert Augustus Masters, PhD. Copyright © 2013 Robert Augustus Masters. Published by Sounds True. This article originally appeared at MindBodyGreen.

7 Ways (Besides Sex) To Emotionally Connect With Your Partner

BY ROBERT AUGUSTUS MASTERS
AUGUST 19, 2013

Without emotional intimacy, relationships founder on the reefs of emotional discord or flatness—no matter how heated the sex, no matter how much we hold in common—leaving us marooned from the interpersonal closeness for which we yearn.

En route to developing emotional intimacy, we must learn to find a fitting balance between containment (as when our anger is on the verge of turning into hostility) and expression (as when our held-back anger needs to be given emphatic voice). There’s a lot of debate about the merits of expressing versus not expressing emotions, particularly those that are labeled “negative,” but beyond the sniping between these two camps is another approach: we can make skillful room for both expression and nonexpression, so that expression ceases to be self-indulgent or harmful, and nonexpression ceases to be mere repression. Imagine emotional restraint and emotional uninhibitedness in savvy sync, coexisting consciously and compassionately.

If we want more depth and connection and joy in our relationships, we’re going to have to develop more emotional intimacy with our partners, our friends, our family, our coworkers. It’s that simple and that challenging. Connecting only through our upbeat emotions is not enough—we also need to find, and keep finding, relationship-deepening connection through all our emotions. And there is no way we can do this if we are not significantly intimate with our emotions.

Here are 7 ways to emotionally connect with your partner:

1. When you realize you’re being reactive, say “I’m being reactive.” 

How simple this sounds, and yet how challenging to put into practice — mostly because of the shame we’re on the edge of fully feeling as we become aware of our reactivity.

And once you’ve stated that you’re being reactive, STOP, no matter how tempted you might be to continue your reactivity. Soften your belly, breathe more deeply, and wait until you’re ready to say what you’re feeling and nothing more.

2. Learn to express your remorse from your heart. 

Don’t settle for shallow or emotionally flat expressions. If you’re not sorry, don’t say you are — but if you’ve done something that’s hurt another and you feel bad about this, and the words “I’m sorry” get stuck in your throat, say that you’re having hard time saying it. Such a confession will usually soften you enough to allow your remorse a fitting voice.

3. If you’re being defensive and know it, don’t hesitate to say so.

Be your own whistleblower. Don’t wait for the other to pressure you into owning up to your defensiveness. And don’t slip into being defensive about being defensive!

4. Don’t allow emotional disconnection to last any longer than necessary.

When you lose touch with the other, reestablish it as soon as possible. If you’re staying emotionally disconnected to punish the other, confess that as soon as possible, regardless of how uncomfortable that may be.

5. Never threaten to leave the relationship in order to get your own way or to make your partner beg you to stay.

If you feel like being manipulative, say so, rather than acting it out. Threats are negative promises, and are usually mood-dependent. If you really want to leave a relationship, such wanting will remain present no matter how good, bad, or indifferent you feel.

6. Instead of using sex to build connection, let sex be a fully embodied expression of already-present connection. 

When you want to have sex when you are not very connected to the other, turn your attention to your emotional state and do what it takes to bring that into your heart.

7. Don’t forget that the deeper you dive, the less you’ll mind upsetting waves.

View your relationship as an ever-evolving adventure, potentially deepened by all that happens, however unpleasant. You may hurt more as you mature, but you’ll mind less.