How to Be Vulnerable in an Increasingly Judgmental World

Showing your true self is the ultimate strength

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First of all, if you're new here, my name is Sophie. I’m on a journey to slow down, reconnect with nature, and live more intentionally. After moving off-grid, I’m sharing lessons on rewilding, simplicity, and finding balance in a busy world, without any of the fluff.

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Vulnerability is a quiet strength. Often mistaken for weakness or dubbed as oversharing, vulnerability is actually neither of those things. If anything, it takes courage to show our true selves with all our flaws and insecurities and to risk criticism and rejection.

In today’s society, though, vulnerability is becoming increasingly more difficult. How are we supposed to show who we really are when our social media feeds are dominated by highly curated images of perfect people living perfect lives? Sometimes it feels as if I’m the only one being imperfect and fumbling my way through life. Being true to yourself can be a lonely business.

“Authenticity is a collection of choices that we have to make every day. It’s about the choice to show up and be real. The choice to be honest. The choice to let our true selves be seen.”
― Brene Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection

Why is it so hard?

I’ve spent the last few months reflecting heavily on why it took me so long to start leading the life I truly wanted to live. For those of you who are new here, that’s the off-the-grid tiny house life. Then I realised it took me so long because I was scared: scared of judgment, rejection, criticism, and not meeting other people’s expectations.

I know when we talk about vulnerability, it’s often in the leadership space. At least, that’s where I first heard the concept when I read Brené Brown’s book Dare To Lead. But in the past months, I’ve often reflected on the idea of vulnerability in the space of “carving your own path” and finding a place where I truly belong.

Belonging

Belonging is another buzzword that has been highly popular in recent years, but I believe strongly that underlying everyone’s journey towards happiness is a deep and intrinsic need to belong somewhere. Geoffrey Cohen wrote a whole book about belonging. In this book, he writes about how important it is for humans to feel part of society, to feel as if we belong and not feel disconnected from those around us. He says that when we don’t have this feeling of belonging, it can come with a range of negative consequences, such as impacts on our physical and mental health.

For a long time, I felt like I didn’t belong. I left Belgium for New Zealand because I was exhausted by the burnout culture. So, I sought adventure and a new life in New Zealand. But even here, I found myself lost, trying on new lives like shoes and finding none of them fit. Even when I went to live off the grid, I felt I wasn’t “doing it right”, as if other off-gridders would judge me for not being “off the grid enough” — of course, that didn’t happen, it was all in my mind.

I realise now this journey has been about finding a place where I belong, not just geographically but in a way that feels true. Belonging isn’t about where I live or what I do for a living; it’s a sense of being and not having to hide your true self. But hiding is exactly what I was doing by trying to please everyone, by decorating my life to fit other people’s standards.

“Belonging so fully to yourself that you’re willing to stand alone is a wilderness — an untamed, unpredictable place of solitude and searching. It is a place as dangerous as it is breathtaking, a place as sought after as it is feared…it turns out to be the place of true belonging, and it’s the bravest and most sacred place you will ever stand.”
— Brene Brown — Braving the Wilderness

Why did it take me so long to find a place where I belonged and to find my own true identity?

Because I was too afraid of being judged, of showing my true self, and so we land back with vulnerability. Being vulnerable is letting go of the fear of what others might think. And if you’re carving out your own path, you can’t let others dictate what you might want or do or feel or think.

We moved roughly 10 times since we moved to New Zealand, and every single time, except for the last move, my choice of house was firmly dictated by how I thought people around me would judge my living space. I would always pick the nicer house, with the larger rooms, because it mattered what people would think. We barely ever have friends over, and none of them are judgmental at all, but still, I cared so much about what they would possibly think.

This fear of being judged was getting in the way of truly showing myself to others. I wasn’t being vulnerable, I wasn’t really sharing myself with others, because I was always putting up a curated version of myself so others would like me, because that’s what mattered most.

It’s difficult to say when things really clicked for me, but it was somewhere around the time when we moved into our current spot. This opportunity popped up out of the blue and it was too good not to take it with both hands. For some reason, all of a sudden I was able to just think about what I really wanted: a connection with nature and a roof over my head. Nothing else really matters to me, it doesn’t have to be the latest new trend or a fashionable colour on the walls. And so we designed and built the tiny house we really wanted, without letting any outside voices dictate our choices.

It was a turning point for me. I realised I’d been living with these invisible checkboxes in my mind: “Will others think this is good enough?”, “Am I doing this right?”, “Am I perfect enough?” It was time to set those aside and live for myself, follow my own path, and not do things because other people or society said I should.

How can you be more vulnerable?

That’s when I started to allow myself to be more vulnerable, to speak with my own voice, and to say what I truly think, always in a respectful manner, of course. I started by journaling and reflecting on situations where I hadn’t said what I was really thinking or had filtered my words to be “acceptable.” Then I wrote out what I would have said if I had been truly myself. This is a very powerful journaling exercise that helped me “find the words” to things I wanted to share with others.

As the days and weeks progressed I could feel my confidence grow. I began to speak up more, more openly and honestly. I began to allow myself to think about what I really wanted, even if it was vastly different from those around me. I was allowing myself to be more vulnerable.

I believe that in the world of today, we can certainly still be vulnerable and find a place to belong, in fact, it’s becoming even more essential every day. It’s important to shut out some of the negativity and unhelpful messaging coming through in social media. It’s important to realise we are all human beings with all our flaws and imperfections, and people will judge us no matter how hard we try to fit in. People will always have their opinions. But vulnerability helps us cut through all of the clutter and find true belonging — not by fitting in but by standing out as who we really are, as Brene Brown would say.

Something that inspired me this week:

I just finished The Bookseller at the End of the World by Ruth Shaw. It’s the life story of a woman who has two tiny bookshops in the most southern tip of New Zealand. She’s had a wild life and just reading about all the obstacles she has overcome in her life is pretty inspiring. She weaves short stories of the people who visited her bookshop throughout the book as well. I can’t wait to meet her in person at the Auckland Writers Festival in May.

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