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So, I'll start with this: a couple
years ago, an event planner called me

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because I was going
to do a speaking event.

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And she called, and she said,

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"I'm really struggling with how
to write about you on the little flyer."

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And I thought, "Well,
what's the struggle?"

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And she said, "Well, I saw you speak,

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and I'm going to call
you a researcher, I think,

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but I'm afraid if I call you
a researcher, no one will come,

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because they'll think you're
boring and irrelevant."

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(Laughter) And I was like, "Okay."

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And she said, "But the thing I liked
about your talk is you're a storyteller.

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So I think what I'll do
is just call you a storyteller."

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And of course, the academic,
insecure part of me

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was like, "You're going
to call me a what?"

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And she said, "I'm going
to call you a storyteller."

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And I was like, "Why not 'magic pixie'?"

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(Laughter) I was like, "Let me
think about this for a second."

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I tried to call deep on my courage.

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And I thought, you know,
I am a storyteller.

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I'm a qualitative researcher.
I collect stories; that's what I do.

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And maybe stories are
just data with a soul.

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And maybe I'm just a storyteller.

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And so I said, "You know what?

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Why don't you just say I'm
a researcher-storyteller."

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And she went, "Ha ha.
There's no such thing."

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(Laughter)

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So I'm a researcher-storyteller,
and I'm going to talk to you today --

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we're talking about
expanding perception --

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and so I want to talk
to you and tell some stories

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about a piece of my research that
fundamentally expanded my perception

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and really actually changed the way
that I live and love and work and parent.

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And this is where my story starts.

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When I was a young researcher,
doctoral student,

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my first year, I had a research
professor who said to us,

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"Here's the thing, if you cannot
measure it, it does not exist."

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And I thought he
was just sweet-talking me.

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I was like, "Really?"
and he was like, "Absolutely."

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And so you have to understand

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that I have a bachelor's
and a master's in social work,

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and I was getting my Ph.D. in social
work, so my entire academic career

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was surrounded by people who kind of
believed in the "life's messy, love it."

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And I'm more of the, "life's
messy, clean it up, organize it

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and put it into a bento box." (Laughter)

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And so to think that I had found my way,
to found a career that takes me --

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really, one of the big
sayings in social work is,

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"Lean into the discomfort of the work."

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And I'm like, knock discomfort upside
the head and move it over and get all A's.

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That was my mantra.

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So I was very excited about this.

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And so I thought, you know what,
this is the career for me,

51
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because I am interested
in some messy topics.

52
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But I want to be able
to make them not messy.

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I want to understand them.

54
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I want to hack into these
things that I know are important

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and lay the code out for everyone to see.

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So where I started was with connection.

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Because, by the time you're
a social worker for 10 years,

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what you realize is that
connection is why we're here.

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It's what gives purpose
and meaning to our lives.

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This is what it's all about. It doesn't
matter whether you talk to people

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who work in social justice,
mental health and abuse and neglect,

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what we know is that connection,
the ability to feel connected, is --

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neurobiologically that's how
we're wired -- it's why we're here.

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So I thought, you know what,
I'm going to start with connection.

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Well, you know that situation where
you get an evaluation from your boss,

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and she tells you 37 things
that you do really awesome,

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and one "opportunity for growth?"

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(Laughter)

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And all you can think about
is that opportunity for growth, right?

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Well, apparently this is
the way my work went as well,

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because, when you ask people about love,
they tell you about heartbreak.

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When you ask people about belonging,

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they'll tell you their most excruciating
experiences of being excluded.

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And when you ask people about connection,

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the stories they told me
were about disconnection.

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So very quickly -- really about
six weeks into this research --

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I ran into this unnamed thing
that absolutely unraveled connection

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in a way that I didn't
understand or had never seen.

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And so I pulled back out of the research

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and thought, I need
to figure out what this is.

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And it turned out to be shame.

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And shame is really easily understood
as the fear of disconnection:

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Is there something about me that,
if other people know it or see it,

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that I won't be worthy of connection?

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The things I can tell you about it:
It's universal; we all have it.

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The only people who don't experience shame

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have no capacity for human
empathy or connection.

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No one wants to talk about it,

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and the less you talk about it,
the more you have it.

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What underpinned this shame,
this "I'm not good enough," --

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which, we all know that feeling: "I'm
not blank enough. I'm not thin enough,

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rich enough, beautiful enough,
smart enough, promoted enough."

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The thing that underpinned this
was excruciating vulnerability.

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This idea of, in order
for connection to happen,

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we have to allow ourselves
to be seen, really seen.

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And you know how I feel about
vulnerability. I hate vulnerability.

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And so I thought, this is my chance
to beat it back with my measuring stick.

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I'm going in, I'm going
to figure this stuff out,

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I'm going to spend a year,
I'm going to totally deconstruct shame,

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I'm going to understand how vulnerability
works, and I'm going to outsmart it.

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So I was ready, and I was really excited.

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As you know, it's not
going to turn out well.

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(Laughter) You know this. So,
I could tell you a lot about shame,

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but I'd have to borrow
everyone else's time.

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But here's what I can tell
you that it boils down to --

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and this may be one of the most
important things that I've ever learned

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in the decade of doing this research.

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My one year turned into six years:

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Thousands of stories, hundreds
of long interviews, focus groups.

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At one point, people were
sending me journal pages

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and sending me their stories --
thousands of pieces of data in six years.

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And I kind of got a handle on it.

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I kind of understood, this is what
shame is, this is how it works.

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I wrote a book, I published a theory,
but something was not okay --

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and what it was is that,
if I roughly took the people I interviewed

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and divided them into people who
really have a sense of worthiness --

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that's what this comes down to,
a sense of worthiness --

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they have a strong sense
of love and belonging --

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and folks who struggle for it,

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and folks who are always
wondering if they're good enough.

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There was only one variable that separated

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the people who have a strong
sense of love and belonging

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and the people who really struggle for it.

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And that was, the people who have
a strong sense of love and belonging

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believe they're worthy
of love and belonging.

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That's it.

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They believe they're worthy.

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And to me, the hard part of the one
thing that keeps us out of connection

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is our fear that we're
not worthy of connection,

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was something that,
personally and professionally,

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I felt like I needed to understand better.

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So what I did is I took
all of the interviews

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where I saw worthiness, where I saw people
living that way, and just looked at those.

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What do these people have in common?

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I have a slight office supply
addiction, but that's another talk.

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So I had a manila folder,
and I had a Sharpie,

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and I was like, what am I
going to call this research?

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And the first words that came
to my mind were "whole-hearted."

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These are whole-hearted people,
living from this deep sense of worthiness.

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So I wrote at the top of the manila
folder, and I started looking at the data.

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In fact, I did it first in a four-day,
very intensive data analysis,

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where I went back, pulled the interviews,
the stories, pulled the incidents.

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What's the theme? What's the pattern?

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My husband left town with the kids

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because I always go into
this Jackson Pollock crazy thing,

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where I'm just writing
and in my researcher mode.

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And so here's what I found.

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What they had in common
was a sense of courage.

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And I want to separate courage
and bravery for you for a minute.

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Courage, the original
definition of courage,

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when it first came into
the English language --

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it's from the Latin word
"cor," meaning "heart" --

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and the original definition
was to tell the story of who you are

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with your whole heart.

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And so these folks had, very simply,
the courage to be imperfect.

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They had the compassion to be kind
to themselves first and then to others,

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because, as it turns out, we can't
practice compassion with other people

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if we can't treat ourselves kindly.

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And the last was they had connection,
and -- this was the hard part --

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as a result of authenticity,

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they were willing to let go
of who they thought they should be

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in order to be who they were, which you
have to absolutely do that for connection.

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The other thing that they
had in common was this:

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They fully embraced vulnerability.

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They believed that what made them
vulnerable made them beautiful.

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They didn't talk about
vulnerability being comfortable,

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nor did they really talk
about it being excruciating --

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as I had heard it earlier
in the shame interviewing.

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They just talked about it being necessary.

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They talked about the willingness
to say, "I love you" first...

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the willingness to do something
where there are no guarantees...

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the willingness to breathe through
waiting for the doctor to call

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after your mammogram.

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They're willing to invest in a
relationship that may or may not work out.

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They thought this was fundamental.

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I personally thought it was betrayal.

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I could not believe I had pledged
allegiance to research, where our job --

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you know, the definition of research
is to control and predict,

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to study phenomena for the explicit
reason to control and predict.

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And now my mission to control and predict

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had turned up the answer that the
way to live is with vulnerability

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and to stop controlling and predicting.

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This led to a little breakdown --

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(Laughter)

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-- which actually looked more like this.

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(Laughter) And it did.

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I call it a breakdown; my therapist
calls it a spiritual awakening.

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(Laughter) A spiritual awakening
sounds better than breakdown,

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but I assure you, it was a breakdown.

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And I had to put my data
away and go find a therapist.

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Let me tell you something:
you know who you are

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when you call your friends and say,
"I think I need to see somebody.

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Do you have any recommendations?"

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Because about five
of my friends were like,

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"Wooo, I wouldn't want
to be your therapist."

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00:11:51,730 --> 00:11:56,407
(Laughter) I was like,
"What does that mean?"

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And they're like,
"I'm just saying, you know.

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Don't bring your measuring stick."

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00:12:01,730 --> 00:12:05,690
(Laughter) I was like, "Okay."

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So I found a therapist.
My first meeting with her, Diana --

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I brought in my list of the way
the whole-hearted live, and I sat down.

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And she said, "How are you?"
And I said, "I'm great. I'm okay."

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00:12:21,880 --> 00:12:25,987
She said, "What's going on?" And this
is a therapist who sees therapists,

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00:12:26,070 --> 00:12:31,227
because we have to go to those,
because their B.S. meters are good.

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00:12:31,310 --> 00:12:37,507
(Laughter) And so I said,
"Here's the thing, I'm struggling."

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And she said, "What's the struggle?"

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And I said, "Well,
I have a vulnerability issue.

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And I know that vulnerability
is the core of shame and fear

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00:12:48,110 --> 00:12:49,647
and our struggle for worthiness,

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00:12:49,730 --> 00:12:55,347
but it appears that it's also
the birthplace of joy, of creativity,

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00:12:55,430 --> 00:12:57,400
of belonging, of love.

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00:12:57,780 --> 00:13:03,157
And I think I have a problem,
and I need some help."

213
00:13:03,240 --> 00:13:08,347
And I said, "But here's the thing:
no family stuff, no childhood shit."

214
00:13:08,430 --> 00:13:13,347
(Laughter) "I just need some strategies."

215
00:13:13,430 --> 00:13:17,347
(Laughter)

216
00:13:17,430 --> 00:13:22,600
(Applause) Thank you.

217
00:13:24,280 --> 00:13:25,760
So she goes like this.

218
00:13:27,430 --> 00:13:32,347
(Laughter) And then I said,
"It's bad, right?"

219
00:13:32,430 --> 00:13:35,347
And she said, "It's neither good nor bad."

220
00:13:35,430 --> 00:13:38,920
(Laughter) "It just is what it is."

221
00:13:39,660 --> 00:13:42,347
And I said, "Oh my God,
this is going to suck."

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00:13:42,430 --> 00:13:44,380
(Laughter)

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00:13:45,590 --> 00:13:49,877
And it did, and it didn't.
And it took about a year.

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00:13:49,960 --> 00:13:51,917
And you know how there are people

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00:13:52,000 --> 00:13:55,967
that, when they realize that vulnerability
and tenderness are important,

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00:13:56,050 --> 00:13:58,080
that they surrender and walk into it.

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00:13:59,230 --> 00:14:03,557
A: that's not me, and B: I don't
even hang out with people like that.

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00:14:03,640 --> 00:14:08,510
(Laughter) For me,
it was a yearlong street fight.

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It was a slugfest.
Vulnerability pushed, I pushed back.

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I lost the fight,
but probably won my life back.

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And so then I went back into the research
and spent the next couple of years

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really trying to understand
what they, the whole-hearted,

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what choices they were making,
and what we are doing with vulnerability.

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Why do we struggle with it so much?

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Am I alone in struggling
with vulnerability?

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No. So this is what I learned.

237
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We numb vulnerability --

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when we're waiting for the call.

239
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It was funny, I sent something
out on Twitter and on Facebook

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that says, "How would
you define vulnerability?

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What makes you feel vulnerable?"

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And within an hour and a half,
I had 150 responses.

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Because I wanted to know what's out there.

244
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Having to ask my husband for help
because I'm sick, and we're newly married;

245
00:15:06,250 --> 00:15:10,937
initiating sex with my husband;
initiating sex with my wife;

246
00:15:11,020 --> 00:15:16,007
being turned down; asking someone out;
waiting for the doctor to call back;

247
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getting laid off; laying off people.

248
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This is the world we live in.

249
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We live in a vulnerable world.

250
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And one of the ways we deal
with it is we numb vulnerability.

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And I think there's evidence -- and it's
not the only reason this evidence exists,

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but I think it's a huge cause
-- We are the most in-debt...

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obese...

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addicted and medicated
adult cohort in U.S. history.

255
00:15:48,320 --> 00:15:51,527
The problem is -- and I learned
this from the research --

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that you cannot selectively numb emotion.

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You can't say, here's the bad stuff.

258
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Here's vulnerability, here's grief, here's
shame, here's fear, here's disappointment.

259
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I don't want to feel these.

260
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I'm going to have a couple
of beers and a banana nut muffin.

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(Laughter) I don't want to feel these.

262
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And I know that's knowing laughter.

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I hack into your lives for a living.

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God. (Laughter)

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You can't numb those hard feelings without
numbing the other affects, our emotions.

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You cannot selectively numb.
So when we numb those, we numb joy,

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we numb gratitude, we numb happiness.

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And then, we are miserable, and we
are looking for purpose and meaning,

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and then we feel vulnerable,

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so then we have a couple
of beers and a banana nut muffin.

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And it becomes this dangerous cycle.

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One of the things that I think we need
to think about is why and how we numb.

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And it doesn't just have to be addiction.

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The other thing we do is we make
everything that's uncertain certain.

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Religion has gone from a belief
in faith and mystery to certainty.

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"I'm right, you're wrong. Shut up."

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That's it.

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Just certain. The more afraid we
are, the more vulnerable we are,

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the more afraid we are.
This is what politics looks like today.

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There's no discourse anymore.
There's no conversation.

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There's just blame. You know how
blame is described in the research?

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A way to discharge pain and discomfort.

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We perfect.

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If there's anyone who wants their life
to look like this, it would be me,

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but it doesn't work.

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Because what we do is we take fat
from our butts and put it in our cheeks.

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(Laughter)

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Which just, I hope in 100 years,
people will look back and go, "Wow."

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(Laughter) And we perfect,
most dangerously, our children.

290
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Let me tell you what
we think about children.

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They're hardwired for struggle
when they get here.

292
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And when you hold those perfect
little babies in your hand,

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our job is not to say,
"Look at her, she's perfect.

294
00:18:11,320 --> 00:18:13,147
My job is just to keep her perfect --

295
00:18:13,230 --> 00:18:16,587
make sure she makes the tennis team
by fifth grade and Yale by seventh."

296
00:18:16,670 --> 00:18:19,477
That's not our job.
Our job is to look and say,

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00:18:19,560 --> 00:18:22,517
"You know what? You're imperfect,
and you're wired for struggle,

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00:18:22,600 --> 00:18:24,700
but you are worthy of love and belonging."

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00:18:25,500 --> 00:18:29,277
That's our job. Show me a generation
of kids raised like that,

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00:18:29,360 --> 00:18:31,897
and we'll end the problems,
I think, that we see today.

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We pretend that what we do
doesn't have an effect on people.

302
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We do that in our personal lives.

303
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We do that corporate -- whether
it's a bailout, an oil spill...

304
00:18:45,390 --> 00:18:48,487
a recall. We pretend like what we're doing

305
00:18:48,570 --> 00:18:50,720
doesn't have a huge
impact on other people.

306
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I would say to companies,
this is not our first rodeo, people.

307
00:18:55,770 --> 00:18:58,440
We just need you to be
authentic and real and say...

308
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"We're sorry. We'll fix it."

309
00:19:05,540 --> 00:19:08,247
But there's another way,
and I'll leave you with this.

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This is what I have found:

311
00:19:09,740 --> 00:19:14,260
To let ourselves be seen,
deeply seen, vulnerably seen...

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00:19:16,890 --> 00:19:21,217
to love with our whole hearts,
even though there's no guarantee --

313
00:19:21,300 --> 00:19:22,497
and that's really hard,

314
00:19:22,580 --> 00:19:25,920
and I can tell you as a parent,
that's excruciatingly difficult --

315
00:19:28,490 --> 00:19:32,617
to practice gratitude and joy
in those moments of terror,

316
00:19:32,700 --> 00:19:34,957
when we're wondering,
"Can I love you this much?

317
00:19:35,040 --> 00:19:37,167
Can I believe in this this passionately?

318
00:19:37,250 --> 00:19:39,117
Can I be this fierce about this?"

319
00:19:39,200 --> 00:19:42,717
just to be able to stop and, instead
of catastrophizing what might happen,

320
00:19:42,800 --> 00:19:47,200
to say, "I'm just so grateful, because
to feel this vulnerable means I'm alive."

321
00:19:48,750 --> 00:19:52,347
And the last, which I think
is probably the most important,

322
00:19:52,430 --> 00:19:54,080
is to believe that we're enough.

323
00:19:54,660 --> 00:19:58,510
Because when we work from a place,
I believe, that says, "I'm enough"...

324
00:20:00,740 --> 00:20:04,647
then we stop screaming
and start listening,

325
00:20:04,730 --> 00:20:07,007
we're kinder and gentler
to the people around us,

326
00:20:07,090 --> 00:20:09,230
and we're kinder and gentler to ourselves.

327
00:20:10,120 --> 00:20:14,220
That's all I have. Thank you. (Applause)