Let Your Guard Down And Be Vulnerable, Even When It’s Hard

I am usually not the person to share how I feel. I keep my problems to myself—my troubles, anything I am experiencing. I have taught myself that they are petty and not worth sharing.

I listen to others, though. All the time. I give them advice and I am there for them. But when it comes to sharing things about myself, I put up a wall. I feel that my problems are not as important as those of others.

Here is what I have learned.

Putting up walls to protect ourselves from the cruel world is perhaps the worst thing we can do. Not only do we block out those who are not good for us, but also those who genuinely open their hearts to us daily.

Recently, I let my walls down for the first time in a very long time. Spoke about times in my life I had never thought would come out into the open. Slowly but surely, I am beginning to turn those walls into well guarded pathways. I realized that some people don’t mind if you have a past you would rather forget—they don’t mind if you are not up to the standard you placed for yourself.

Because life is a journey of discovery and love.

Once you learn to let down those walls, beauty seeps through even to the deepest parts of yourself.

God knows how much you can handle, how much you are in pain because trusting others is not your specialty or maybe you trust too much.

We are all different. Some of us share everything; some of us can cry in public and some of us cannot. For some of us, vulnerability is a weakness, while others have already discovered the strength of being vulnerable with those who care about them.

In the end, letting down our walls and letting even just one person in is a chance that we must all be willing to take. Because God places people into our lives for a reason. He connects us with certain other people to make us realize things about ourselves we never knew were important.

Even if you do not believe in God, think of it this way.

Why do certain people surprise you with their genuine heart, their goodness, and their want to hold you even when life seems to be letting you down left and right? Because of the goodness and love they have inside for you.

The world is filled to the brim with millions of different people, and you just so happen to come across even just one person who listens and takes time to understand. To me, that is a miracle in itself. A beauty that the world or, to me, God has given you. Don’t take it for granted, don’t be so afraid of your darkness and your baggage that life is a burden. Find someone who is willing to take it and carry it with you.

Find a person who loves you deeply and wholeheartedly and slowly start to chip away at the stone wall surrounding your heart.

Four steps to assist in this process:

1. Stop thinking the worst of all people. Try thinking about all the goodness that is shown in the world. Not everyone will hurt you. At some point, this world will throw you the greatest curveball of your life—don’t miss it because of your walls are made of stone.

2. Take a deep breath, accept yourself, and be brave enough to love others. This is the first step to letting others in. Accept your past and your present and work toward accepting the future any way it turns out.

3. Don’t think so much. Speak your truth, because it might just help someone else share a secret they have put a wall around.

4. Lastly, remember to be careful about who you let into your guarded pathways, but don’t be so scared that you sink deeper and deeper into internal regret, sadness, and thinking of your truth and vulnerability as a negative instead of a positive.

5. Pray. Pray. Pray. Talk to God or whomever you believe in. Tell them everything.

I have so much love for the people of this world. Each of you are beautiful and unique. Each of you have baggage. And each of you deserve someone to assist you in carrying every part of your scattered heart and soul.