Brené Brown: The power of vulnerability

Brené Brown, PH.D.

What can I say that Brené hasn't? Sensing her poignant view-points and connecting to her story-telling approach, in this TED presentation, is what captivated me. Her selected TED Idea worth spreading topic was: The Power of Vulnerability.

Brené explains that being a social worker for 10 years brought to light that "connection is why we're here. It's what gives purpose and meaning to our lives." [Hum... not being in social work or having had that background, this is good to know...keep going...] "...what we know is that connection, the ability to feel connected is -- neurobiologically that's how we're wired -- it's why we're here." Thus from this knowledge, Brené started her research with the baseline of 'connection'. With connection in mind, she went out asking people about connection stories, and received 'disconnection' stories. Fairly quickly, just about six weeks in to her research, she was halted by an "unnamed thing that absolutely unraveled connection in a way that [she] didn't understand or had never seen", in the end this unnamed thing turned out to be shame.

Brené explains that "...shame is really easily understood as the fear of disconnection. Is there something about me that, if other people know it or see it, that I won't be worthy of connection."


"[The constant] "I'm not [blank] enough I'm not thin enough, rich enough, beautiful enough, smart enough, promoted enough." The thing that underpinned this was excruciating vulnerability, this idea of, in order for connection to happen, we have to allow ourselves to be seen, really seen."

Brené Brown continues her talk describing vulnerability and shame and how we consistently battle these inner-emotions, inner-though processes. This research study started out with an aim of being completed in a year, which then turned out to be six years with a collection of thousands of pieces of data.

Since then, Brené Brown has written a book and published a theory, however still continues on with her research. She's come to realize that with all this data, there's more. She's moved into her next phase of this research and this was to understand sense of worthiness. And with this, Brené ventured off into more untangling of this paradigm - which brought her to choosing to live & love wholeheartedly and to choose authenticity.

I applaud Brené's venture into "Wholehearted" land, since most of us still live in the "vulnerability" forest trying to keep 'numbing' our pains, emotions, visibilities...

I have a lot to learn from Brené Brown [and from countless others, I'm sure]. And this is why my journey to 'source', my journey to 'me', is never ending. The more I learn, the more there is to learn - and the more I apply my learning, the more of myself I discover, which tips me back to needing to learn more...

I hope you enjoyed this learning-video as much as I did. And hopefully I too can choose to live and love wholeheartedly and choose authenticity.

Have you read any of Brené Brown's books [or any of her work]? What are your thoughts on 'vulnerability', 'shame', 'sense of worthiness' and 'connection'?

Here are a few of Brené's Badges - these link to her website: