Hi there, come on in. This is Seriously Yourself, the podcast and I'm Ingrid Helander. 

Hello, how are you? Come in, have a seat relax, kick off for 15 minutes or so, just enough time just to get a little boost today. I'm so glad you're with me. Thank you, thank you for joining me this month and seriously yourself, the community, we're talking about visibility, visibility, meaning the ability to be seen, right? And along with that, the ability to see ourselves in all of our fullness and wonder, and then to allow ourselves to be seen in the world, right? How hard is that? How hard is that? You know, we're, we're so taught to ego up, create the alter ego that can be seen and often we need those, you know those little impressions that we bring along with us to be in certain groups of people, certain spaces, right? Like how do I show up and do this podcast? Well, I hope I show up with as much authenticity as possible, I hope you feel like you're seeing me that is a goal. And some days, you know, it's like maybe you're hearing the therapist hatted person or the, you know, person who is playing with the microphone or something like that, maybe I'm hiding behind something, it's good to check, you know, even when I come onto the mic, it's good for me to stop and check who's talking, who's talking to you.  So I would say I'm here, I feel pretty here today and usually do, because I like to talk to you, it's really fun and of course it feels pretty simple. I'm not seeing your faces in return though, I would love to. So visibility requires vulnerability, right? It requires that sometimes tender looking in noticing what is present within and sometimes on the outside of us too. And then letting that sometimes be seen if we so choose or at least seeing it ourselves and then deciding about it right, visibility requires vulnerability. And you know, the queen of vulnerability, I don't know if she's called herself that yet, but Brene Brown talks about that quite a lot. In her book Dare lead, She says vulnerability is the birthplace of love, belonging, joy, courage, empathy and creativity. It is the source of hope, empathy, accountability and authenticity. If we want greater clarity in our purpose or deeper and more meaningful spiritual lives, vulnerability is the path, wow, I mean really makes me feel like, okay, so worth it. Right, so worth being vulnerable. Which is why it is the topic of the month for august in the community, so worth being vulnerable so that we can be visible. You know, and maybe not just visible with the eyes but visible energetically around people. 

Recently, I read a post by a philosopher named Charles Eisenstein and he was talking about the difference that makes a difference for what the world chooses to change, right? To help really comes down to love, right? We can know that the monarch butterflies are suffering right? And becoming now endangered. We can know that. But until we recognize that we love them and that we would desperately miss them in our world, not only because of the ecosystem being offset right in a negative direction, but just missing them. Until we can feel that love right? That vulnerability, we won't make a difference. There will be no collective movement, which is probably what it requires of each of us somehow to call upon anything that needs to make the changes.

 So vulnerability, the ability to be seen, felt, known really is not only important personally. So that you can come to the end of your days and go, you know, I was here, you know, I was here, I lived, I made a difference somehow doesn't have to be big can be like the beating of the butterfly wing that connects to the rest of the world. But it needs to be you, right, needs to be you. So how do we take a breath and just notice? Oh, here, here I am. I am imperfect. I am confused sometimes. I am tired often. I'm impatient, I am all of these things but darn it, I love, I have love, I have energy, I have import. You do you see, you do you see that? Right? I've worked with a lot of people, a lot of people. Everyone does matter somehow. And it's interesting because the things that are most vulnerable in a person or maybe they consider to be the shortcomings or the pain of life or the difficulties are exactly what holds the power almost if I can use that word, the consequence of that person in connection to other people. When you have had things that have happened in your life that you have been able to somehow come to some kind of understanding about. Maybe you've really been able to take the constraints out of them and and notice them with a full embrace, whether it's loss or pain or yearning, frustration, longings, clarity's, courageous moments when you're able to get clear with those because you are able to be vulnerable both with yourself and with others, right? Those can all be seen. 

I'll give you an example when I was working with interns in the field of family therapy. Often, often someone would come in and the new student who was a Master's level students a grown up would come in and they would say, just please don't give me X kinds of clients because that was my story and it still feels a little raw or I might not have perspective about it. And I would listen. And okay, so maybe that maybe it would be please don't give me children whose parents have cancer because my mother just died of cancer. Or please don't give me young girls who have been molested because that's my story or please don't give me families who are dealing with addiction because that's what I just came out of, right? And in all faithfulness. I would say sure, I will certainly keep an ear out for things that might be too triggering in your first year of working as a therapist for you to manage. And I would honestly, I would we did lovely intakes and I would try to get as clear about what the client was bringing to them as I possibly could. And I would say nine times out of 10 the clients that they were most close to would pretty quickly disclose to them that they were dealing with. Exactly the thing the therapist had asked me to avoid and it blew my mind because it was like, no, really, I was trying to not give you that I was really trying to be respectful of your needs at that time. But in truth, I think that it is those very things that when they've been vulnerably addressed, right? We've taken the time to break down our own internal walls and be with parts of us that have been through hard things. It just gives us a connection to our human family that we don't have to hide. And pretty quickly in each of the cases I'm thinking of, the therapist would recognize, oh, I don't have to hide this. I don't have to feel like I'm incapable because something happened to me, right? I can know that I am a survivor, that I can listen to someone else's story and have compassion. I don't have to relate to it identically to be an agent of comfort and I can be seen, I really can be seen. It's okay. 

So I'm wondering how would you like to be seen even just a little more this week, right? Just a little more. How would you like to be seen? Would you like to be seen more fully if you've caught yourself being in maybe sort of a stereotypical pattern? Right? Let's say you feel like you're only being seen as the mom or the worker bee or the addict or the faithful few, right? Or the creative, if you're only being seen in one light, are there other parts of you that would like to be witnessed? Maybe there are some of the ones that you tend to push back a little, you know, those might be the very ones that you could be with get clear about and then notice who who comes who comes when you're more easily seen in these ways. 

I was talking with a wise woman this morning and she said, you know, one thing I know about addiction, we were talking about addiction at the time is that the cure for addiction is community, right? And of course, one will notice when there is someone who has an addiction, one of the, one of the things that happens more and more is they fall out of community, right? There's so much shame and hiding and isolating that goes into that. And there's something about visibility, right, That opens us up to community. We can be as much exactly who we are in that vulnerable way as possible. Yeah, so take the challenge this week, if you'd like, take a moment and just notice where's the moment of vulnerability that will help you be more visible first to yourself, and then as you open that up, how would you like to be a little more visible to those around you? I'm so excited to see what you come up with and I'm grateful that you have been here with me today. Look forward to seeing you next time. Thanks so so much. Ke being you okay, bye. 

Thank you for joining me for this episode of Seriouslyourself. To help treat yourself well each week, go ahead and subscribe to Seriouslyourself wherever you listen to podcasts, and please share this link with anyone you love who might be seeking a little more truth and delight in their lives. 

If you just can't get enough and you'd like even more goodness, you can become a part of Seriouslyourself, The Membership Community. You'll receive a monthly magazine, personal gatherings and cool little treats delivered right to your mailbox. Find out more about that on my website: https://ingridyhelanderlmft.com/seriouslyourself-the-membership/. 

And thanks to those who make Seriouslyourself special: our wonderful music is Midsummer from the album Flood by the fabulous Joel Helander. Seriouslyourself is produced by Particulate Media, K.O. Myers, Executive Producer. The ideas and inspirations come from beautiful humans like you, that I feel lucky to know. And I'm Ingrid Helander. Take good care of yourself. See you next time.