I’ve been re-reading Daring Greatly by Brene Brown. Back in 2020, I read (I think) three of her books; I know I read The Gifts of Imperfection and Daring Greatly, but I can’t remember the third. At any rate, I’m re-reading these books as well as reading others written by her because her books helped me a lot back in 2020, and I think revisiting them will continue to help.

I know a lot of people don’t like her, and to an extent, I understand why. She’s a very privileged white woman who speaks from that privilege quite a lot. And there are definitely times where I disagree with her or at least her approach, as she does often oversimplify things and forgets that marginalized communities don’t have the luxury of living by her perspective. This is certainly an issue that comes up at times when I’m reading her work.

However, that doesn’t mean her principles automatically lack value or relevancy. And there’s a great deal in her work that has been helping to heal a lot of the traumas I’ve been through in my life by reminding me that, while the traumas were not my fault, I am still in complete control over how I react to them. A principle that I’ve been learning to live by lately is that I cannot control how other people choose to behave. My anxiety is constantly telling me that if I do xyz, maybe I can anticipate what another person is going to do and maybe then I can influence their choices. This is usually in response to a fear of abandonment or an insecurity or my habit of catastrophizing. But the reality is that 1) it’s not my job to anticipate someone else’s actions, and 2) even if I could anticipate them, I can’t change them. People are going to make their own choices, and nothing I do is going to change that.

I can control myself: my choices, my behaviors, and my responses to what other people say or do. This is where people often get mixed up over what boundaries are. Boundaries are not: “You can’t do xyz”; boundaries are: “If you choose to do xyz, this will be my response.” For example, while at work, I cannot control how a client chooses to speak to me. Our company manages memory care facilities and oftentimes family members of our residents are angry over something, and they call in to try and get an issue resolved. Sometimes, they’re very angry and hostile and they speak to me or to my colleagues with disrespect. I cannot anticipate this nor can I control how they choose to speak to us. I can, however, explain to them that I’m trying to help them, I’m on their side, and shouting at me isn’t going to speed up the process or get them the answers they’re looking for; I can also explain that I can’t do my job if they’re going to keep yelling and interrupting me, and if they choose to do so, I will have to end the call.

This has been a lesson that’s taken a while to learn. My anxiety is one of my greatest enemies because it’s constantly urging me to contaminate the good things in my life with paranoia and insecurities. Because the truth is, it feels so much better to let other people be responsible for my insecurities and fears. Unburdening ourselves of the responsibility of healing and growth can feel cathartic, not because it’s actually helping us, but because it feeds into our own self-preservation narrative that since we’ve been traumatized, other people owe us safety. It’s ultimately an enormous copout and I’ve seen firsthand how this attitude absolutely destroys relationships and friendships.

There are a lot of platitudes that I don’t particularly believe are completely true. “You can’t love others until you love yourself,” for example, is a massive oversimplification of reality. People who struggle with mental illness and self-esteem issues are absolutely capable of loving other people, even when they struggle to love and accept themselves. I think a more accurate statement is that hurt people hurt people. Unresolved and ignored traumas cause incredible damage in relationships. It’s not that the traumatized person is incapable of love, but rather that their unresolved wounds radiate outwards and cause harm. I’ve seen this in a lot of people, specifically former friends who, out of their unresolved traumas, expected everyone around them to walk on eggshells so that they didn’t have to face their own insecurities. These folks lost a lot of friends and often went scorched earth on people out of some idea of injustice. They because emotionally abusive to the people in their lives and, even when confronted with this fact, did not care.

I say all of this because Daring Greatly is primarily about how to build a life of Wholeheartedness, as Brene Brown calls it. Instead of playing it safe and living a fearful, bitter, angry life rooted in pain and disconnectedness, she urges people to embrace vulnerability, allow themselves to heal and grow, and build an existence rooted in openness. People who have experienced trauma often are terrified of experiencing more trauma. I am one such person. And sometimes we’re so focused on trying to avoid potential new traumas that we forget to actually live our lives. We close ourselves off, we shut ourselves down, because it’s the only way we think we can protect ourselves. But as Brene Brown points out, we can’t protect ourselves from pain. We also can’t selectively numb ourselves. Numbing the painful emotions also numbs the good emotions.

Art cannot flow from a soul shut off from itself. That’s my takeaway from this. If I want to create as voraciously as I say I do, I have to be open to all parts of life. Now, to clarify, this does not mean seeking out self-damaging behavior for the sake of “feeling.” I am a huge advocate for mental health medication, so when I say “numbing” I’m not referring to medication someone takes to function. By “numbing” I mean intentionally shutting oneself down emotionally to avoid pain. I’m a medicated, mentally ill and disabled person. I take multiple medications for my mental health. These things allow me to exist in a state of at least relative function.

I still struggle, but in that struggle, I grow. I heal. I create. And I move forward. Because I deserve to live a life as full and fulfilling as possible, and I refuse to shrink myself in exchange for some fleeting feeling of “safety” and control. I want a poetic life. I want to dare greatly and burn brilliantly, and I can’t do that if I’m weighing myself down.

So remember: don’t weigh yourself down. Let yourself start to heal.