WEBVTT

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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,

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because I am interested
in some messy topics.

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

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I want to understand them.

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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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(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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(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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She said, "What's going on?" And this
is a therapist who sees therapists,

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because we have to go to those,
because their B.S. meters are good.

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(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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and our struggle for worthiness,

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but it appears that it's also
the birthplace of joy, of creativity,

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of belonging, of love.

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And I think I have a problem,
and I need some help."

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And I said, "But here's the thing:
no family stuff, no childhood shit."

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(Laughter) "I just need some strategies."

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(Laughter)

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(Applause) Thank you.

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So she goes like this.

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(Laughter) And then I said,
"It's bad, right?"

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And she said, "It's neither good nor bad."

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(Laughter) "It just is what it is."

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And I said, "Oh my God,
this is going to suck."

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(Laughter)

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And it did, and it didn't.
And it took about a year.

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And you know how there are people

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that, when they realize that vulnerability
and tenderness are important,

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that they surrender and walk into it.

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A: that's not me, and B: I don't
even hang out with people like that.

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(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.

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We numb vulnerability --

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when we're waiting for the call.

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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.

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

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initiating sex with my husband;
initiating sex with my wife;

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being turned down; asking someone out;
waiting for the doctor to call back;

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getting laid off; laying off people.

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This is the world we live in.

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We live in a vulnerable world.

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

00:15:27.690 --> 00:15:31.747
And I think there's evidence -- and it's
not the only reason this evidence exists,

00:15:31.830 --> 00:15:36.850
but I think it's a huge cause
-- We are the most in-debt...

00:15:38.540 --> 00:15:39.760
obese...

00:15:40.910 --> 00:15:45.070
addicted and medicated
adult cohort in U.S. history.

00:15:48.320 --> 00:15:51.527
The problem is -- and I learned
this from the research --

00:15:51.610 --> 00:15:54.750
that you cannot selectively numb emotion.

00:15:55.290 --> 00:15:57.620
You can't say, here's the bad stuff.

00:15:58.430 --> 00:16:02.447
Here's vulnerability, here's grief, here's
shame, here's fear, here's disappointment.

00:16:02.530 --> 00:16:04.347
I don't want to feel these.

00:16:04.430 --> 00:16:07.247
I'm going to have a couple
of beers and a banana nut muffin.

00:16:07.330 --> 00:16:11.857
(Laughter) I don't want to feel these.

00:16:11.940 --> 00:16:13.857
And I know that's knowing laughter.

00:16:13.940 --> 00:16:16.347
I hack into your lives for a living.

00:16:16.430 --> 00:16:20.917
God. (Laughter)

00:16:21.000 --> 00:16:26.357
You can't numb those hard feelings without
numbing the other affects, our emotions.

00:16:26.440 --> 00:16:33.007
You cannot selectively numb.
So when we numb those, we numb joy,

00:16:33.090 --> 00:16:35.730
we numb gratitude, we numb happiness.

00:16:37.150 --> 00:16:42.247
And then, we are miserable, and we
are looking for purpose and meaning,

00:16:42.330 --> 00:16:43.697
and then we feel vulnerable,

00:16:43.780 --> 00:16:46.537
so then we have a couple
of beers and a banana nut muffin.

00:16:46.620 --> 00:16:49.980
And it becomes this dangerous cycle.

00:16:51.090 --> 00:16:56.220
One of the things that I think we need
to think about is why and how we numb.

00:16:56.930 --> 00:16:59.010
And it doesn't just have to be addiction.

00:17:00.480 --> 00:17:03.930
The other thing we do is we make
everything that's uncertain certain.

00:17:05.430 --> 00:17:10.457
Religion has gone from a belief
in faith and mystery to certainty.

00:17:10.540 --> 00:17:12.290
"I'm right, you're wrong. Shut up."

00:17:14.190 --> 00:17:15.400
That's it.

00:17:16.610 --> 00:17:20.697
Just certain. The more afraid we
are, the more vulnerable we are,

00:17:20.780 --> 00:17:24.137
the more afraid we are.
This is what politics looks like today.

00:17:24.220 --> 00:17:27.400
There's no discourse anymore.
There's no conversation.

00:17:27.810 --> 00:17:31.370
There's just blame. You know how
blame is described in the research?

00:17:32.550 --> 00:17:35.050
A way to discharge pain and discomfort.

00:17:37.620 --> 00:17:38.747
We perfect.

00:17:38.830 --> 00:17:42.547
If there's anyone who wants their life
to look like this, it would be me,

00:17:42.630 --> 00:17:43.797
but it doesn't work.

00:17:43.880 --> 00:17:47.447
Because what we do is we take fat
from our butts and put it in our cheeks.

00:17:47.530 --> 00:17:50.907
(Laughter)

00:17:50.990 --> 00:17:54.347
Which just, I hope in 100 years,
people will look back and go, "Wow."

00:17:54.430 --> 00:18:00.347
(Laughter) And we perfect,
most dangerously, our children.

00:18:00.430 --> 00:18:02.507
Let me tell you what
we think about children.

00:18:02.590 --> 00:18:05.347
They're hardwired for struggle
when they get here.

00:18:05.430 --> 00:18:08.247
And when you hold those perfect
little babies in your hand,

00:18:08.330 --> 00:18:11.237
our job is not to say,
"Look at her, she's perfect.

00:18:11.320 --> 00:18:13.147
My job is just to keep her perfect --

00:18:13.230 --> 00:18:16.587
make sure she makes the tennis team
by fifth grade and Yale by seventh."

00:18:16.670 --> 00:18:19.477
That's not our job.
Our job is to look and say,

00:18:19.560 --> 00:18:22.517
"You know what? You're imperfect,
and you're wired for struggle,

00:18:22.600 --> 00:18:24.700
but you are worthy of love and belonging."

00:18:25.500 --> 00:18:29.277
That's our job. Show me a generation
of kids raised like that,

00:18:29.360 --> 00:18:31.897
and we'll end the problems,
I think, that we see today.

00:18:31.980 --> 00:18:37.430
We pretend that what we do
doesn't have an effect on people.

00:18:38.870 --> 00:18:40.447
We do that in our personal lives.

00:18:40.530 --> 00:18:43.890
We do that corporate -- whether
it's a bailout, an oil spill...

00:18:45.390 --> 00:18:48.487
a recall. We pretend like what we're doing

00:18:48.570 --> 00:18:50.720
doesn't have a huge
impact on other people.

00:18:51.430 --> 00:18:54.700
I would say to companies,
this is not our first rodeo, people.

00:18:55.770 --> 00:18:58.440
We just need you to be
authentic and real and say...

00:18:59.920 --> 00:19:02.060
"We're sorry. We'll fix it."

00:19:05.540 --> 00:19:08.247
But there's another way,
and I'll leave you with this.

00:19:08.330 --> 00:19:09.657
This is what I have found:

00:19:09.740 --> 00:19:14.260
To let ourselves be seen,
deeply seen, vulnerably seen...

00:19:16.890 --> 00:19:21.217
to love with our whole hearts,
even though there's no guarantee --

00:19:21.300 --> 00:19:22.497
and that's really hard,

00:19:22.580 --> 00:19:25.920
and I can tell you as a parent,
that's excruciatingly difficult --

00:19:28.490 --> 00:19:32.617
to practice gratitude and joy
in those moments of terror,

00:19:32.700 --> 00:19:34.957
when we're wondering,
"Can I love you this much?

00:19:35.040 --> 00:19:37.167
Can I believe in this this passionately?

00:19:37.250 --> 00:19:39.117
Can I be this fierce about this?"

00:19:39.200 --> 00:19:42.717
just to be able to stop and, instead
of catastrophizing what might happen,

00:19:42.800 --> 00:19:47.200
to say, "I'm just so grateful, because
to feel this vulnerable means I'm alive."

00:19:48.750 --> 00:19:52.347
And the last, which I think
is probably the most important,

00:19:52.430 --> 00:19:54.080
is to believe that we're enough.

00:19:54.660 --> 00:19:58.510
Because when we work from a place,
I believe, that says, "I'm enough"...

00:20:00.740 --> 00:20:04.647
then we stop screaming
and start listening,

00:20:04.730 --> 00:20:07.007
we're kinder and gentler
to the people around us,

00:20:07.090 --> 00:20:09.230
and we're kinder and gentler to ourselves.

00:20:10.120 --> 00:20:14.220
That's all I have. Thank you. (Applause)