Ep #108 Dropping The Armor, Embracing Vulnerability

This episode is on embracing vulnerability to foster connection and love.

Dropping the armor is about allowing yourself to be human, and following the advice you give to others.

It's empowerment through imperfection.

This is what authenticity looks like.

Mentioned in this episode:
Brené Brown on The Tim Ferriss Show Podcast Instagram Clip
Listen to the full episode here: Brené Brown — Striving versus Self-Acceptance, Saving Marriages, and More (#409) or watch on YouTube

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• Episode Transcript

  Coach Alex Ray: 0:25

  Hello, my unicorns, welcome back. In today's episode we're going to talk about dropping the armor and embracing your authentic self, and we're going to start right off by giving you a real world example. This is my like fifth time hidden record for this podcast episode. I've tried to record it a few times each time and that I do it. It's just like messy and sloppy and I keep stumbling. Oh, and now I get a phone call. Okay, okay, I'm back. Look, I could edit it, that I could edit that part out. But honestly, I think that the realness of it, the humanness of it, the unfilteredness of it, really aligns with today's episode. And, of course, today's episode is again about dropping armor and embracing authentic solves its permission to be imperfect. It's really truly the same. Today's episode is like the opposite of perfectionism, and I don't know about you, but I struggle with perfectionism. I have very high standards for myself that I would never impose on anyone else and, honestly, if I were to impose my standards on someone else, I'd probably be thinking that I was being an asshole to them. I don't actually want to give other people the requirements that I give to myself. I feel like that kind of mean often, and so, if you can relate to that at all, then you, my friend, you're in the right place for this episode. I've noticed this coming up a lot for my clients recently. I've noticed it coming up for myself as well, and though it is going to be uncomfortable, what we're talking about today it's going to be uncomfortable to let go of that armor. Stripping away the layers of protection actually allows us to not only reveal the beautiful, authentic humans that we are. It also allows us to love and be loved by the world deeper, to connect with others on a more fulfilling, authentic life, giving level. The first thing I want you to keep in mind as we're talking about this is that you can't selectively armor up Meaning. When you armor up and you protect yourself from being vulnerable, you also protect yourself from feeling things like joy or happiness or excitement, like how many times have you been afraid of succeeding? Because if you succeed, then, oh my god, there's going to be this huge pressure that you have on yourself to keep it up or to keep going with it. At least, that's what I do to myself. I know that for sure. Whatever your reason is that you're afraid of succeeding, think about like you're trying to protect from the negative sides of success, or what you imagine to be the negative sides of success, and you're also protecting yourself, then, unintentionally, from getting to experience all the joy from succeeding. We stunt our own growth when we armor up and we hinder connection with others. One of the biggest signs that you are armoring up is not following the advice that you give to other people. I do it too. I know it well. There's no shame here. We're in this together, my friend. But when we have standards that we won't hold other people to but we require ourselves to uphold, it's time to ask yourself why Are you avoiding canceling a commitment because you don't want to be judged? Are you not asking for help or actively turning away help because you can't show that you're human, or you think that people might think you're weak? Are you putting on a show for people online when things aren't okay? It doesn't mean that you do have to share what's really going on in your life, like strangers on the internet don't deserve to be part of the deepest parts, most intimate parts of your life, but when things aren't going well, do you really need to be putting on a show? Are you just exhausting yourself to try to put on a display for other people and then think back to all of these things, like are these things that you would actually expect anyone else to do? I know I wouldn't Someone else. If I saw anyone else doing these things I'd be like girl, relax, what the hell are you doing? Take a freaking break and stop avoiding canceling the commitment. Just cancel it. Ask for help or allow help and definitely fuck the internet. Stop trying to uphold yourself to expectations of people that you don't even know. We even are trained by society to have this kind of armor on us. Like think about what happens when someone asks how are you doing? Our first go to response is typically good. Why? Most of the time we're not just good. We're either doing wonderful or sometimes we're just kind of meh, or often shitty. So why is the response just good? Perhaps it's an opportunity to avoid being vulnerable. Perhaps good, I'm good is a casual, nonchalant version of armoring up. So these things again are very easy to see in other people. You probably have a lot higher standards for yourself. And why do you do that? Why do any of us do it? Protection, because we don't want to think of ourselves as human, as vulnerable. I'm going to share with you a clip from Brene Brown on the Tim Ferriss Show podcast. I'll have the link down in the show notes for you as well, but just listen in, as Brene Brown describes this in a way only Brene Brown really can.

  Brené Brown on The Tim Ferriss Show Podcast: 7:15

  We all grew up and experienced, at varying degrees, trauma, disappointment, hard stuff. We armored up and at some point, that armor no longer serves us. The weight of the armor is too heavy and it's not protecting you. It's keeping you from being seen and known by others. This is the developmental milestone of midlife. This is when the universe comes down, puts your hands on your shoulders and pulls you close and whispers in your ear I'm not fucking around, you're halfway to dead. The armor is keeping you from growing into the gifts I've given you. That is not without penalty. Time is up. So this is what you see happen to people in midlife, and it's not a crisis. It's a slow, brutal unraveling. This is where everything that we thought protected us keeps us from being the partners, the parents, the professionals, the people that we want to be.

  Coach Alex Ray: 8:18

  Now again, you can find that clip and the full episode in the show notes. I've got the link to the Instagram post that I just played. But how true is that? And you know, as queer people, I think that we have multiple of these midlife crises because there's so much of our identity that we are coming to know throughout our lives, because we're not just the traditional path of humans in our society. We've got so much more to discover about ourselves and we've got so much armor that we've put on to protect ourselves out of fear of being cast out, out of fear of not belonging, out of fear of the pain we might have to go through if people knew who we really are. As queer people, I think we go through multiple of these life crises and each time is a beautiful shedding of this armor. It's not pretty, it's often painful, it's often difficult, but it is worth it. It's important to think about as you're noticing this armor in your life, understanding why you do it. It's not because you're an idiot, it's not because something's wrong with you, it's not because no one else is doing this. It's because you're human and it's out of protection. There's a beautiful, wonderful, kind, subconscious part of your brain that's armoring up to protect you because it worked in the past and at this point in your life it's just no longer serving you. We put on armor to protect ourselves from pain, of embarrassment, of letting people down, of shame all great things to not want. We're avoiding being human, though, for what? To protect ourselves from emotional pain and rejection, but we miss out on the love and acceptance that we would otherwise get. When you have decided something bad will happen, but you don't take that uncomfortable action Step two of the Confident Queer process right. Take action towards that uncomfortable step, then you don't get to test and disprove the belief that you have about how others will react. In other words, we build walls to shield our hearts from getting hurt and we end up lonely with our own shit thoughts instead of experiencing connection and love. We're in this together. You're surrounded by fellow unicorns just like you, who are in the same place, my friend. So please do not let this message, this reminder, this introspection here trigger even more shame. This is the time to notice that there's a beautiful part of you that, while it's not working well for you anymore, it has good intentions. This voice that you have that holds you back and has really high standards for yourself that you would never hold anyone else to and armors up for protection. It's not because something's wrong with you. It's just because you're human and you're protecting yourself from pain. I don't think we would tell anyone who was trying to protect themselves from experiencing pain that they were an awful being and something was wrong with them. So what do we do? Where do we go from here? Once you notice these patterns for yourself, go back to the confident queer process. Allow yourself to be uncomfortable when you notice it. Don't immediately try to change it. Allow yourself to be uncomfortable about whatever changes you might be doing. For example, if you have a commitment that you need to cancel, you can change it and it feels like, oh my gosh, that's really taking off the armor. They're going to see that like I can't keep my commitments and something's wrong with me and all the story, and then you go wait, hold on, pause. This is a story that's in my head that I've used for protection. I don't want them to see that I'm human. The truth is that all the time we make commitments that we end up not being able to keep because they just don't work for us, we didn't actually know what the future held and we realized I've got to change and cancel. I've got to stand up for myself and actually voice that this is no longer something that works for me or fits for me. So allow yourself to be uncomfortable with this vulnerability. Take action towards it. Take action in line with your values, in line with the priorities of your life, in line with what you would tell other people to do. Because here's the thing, this is one of my favorite questions to ask when coaching. If I have a client that's stuck in indecision, I will often ask what would you tell your friend, your partner, your child, whatever? What would you tell them to do if you were in the same situation? And the answer is boom, it's very clear, like 99.99% of the time. Then why are you struggling to do what you would tell anyone else to do? Why is that difficult? It's because of all the stories. It's because of all the fear. It's you armoring up and not doing that thing. Whatever you would tell someone else to do in that situation is what aligns with your values and who you want to be in the world and the example that you want to set for others. So that's the answer that you really want to follow. However, when you're not following it, it's just this issue of being afraid to let down your armor. So again, how do we handle this? Allow yourself to be uncomfortable, take action towards it, take action that you would have advised a friend to do, and then have your own back, which means both preparing ahead of time for how you'll stay true to yourself and purposely calming your nervous system down on the other side. So let's just stick with this example of you have to cancel plans with a friend. Okay, you've maybe canceled on them before and you're afraid and it's easier to either just not go at all and not address it, or it's easier to just push through when you know that you are physically and emotionally drained and really shouldn't go, that you need some rest time. Okay, first, allowing discomfort looks like just pausing and being with the uncomfortable feelings in your body. It's imagining yourself canceling and being with that uncomfortable feeling in your body. Then it's taking action by being up front with that friend and saying, hey, I'm really sorry, I hate to do this, but I really do need to cancel. I need to not push myself this evening, you know. Thanks again for the invitation. Whatever is appropriate for your scenario, okay, and then have your own back, which means you've done that thing ahead of time to prepare for how you're going to stay true. You've practiced it in your head, you've maybe written it down. You could even text it to your friend if you feel appropriate to have it in writing. It can be much easier to say these things in writing than in person, which will help build the confidence that you need in order to be able to address these things in person or over the phone or however you need to address them. Okay, so you could also talk it through with a friend or your coach to just get some more outside feedback and kind of talk it through even role play, the uncomfortable scenario. And you can also set up accountability on the other side so that after you have this difficult conversation of canceling plans, you have someone to go to say, hey, check, I did it, I did it. It was uncomfortable, but I survived and I'm okay. And then it's purposely calming your nervous system down on the other side as well. So you've got accountability on the other side and you've also got calming yourself. This could be like you go on a walk, you take a bubble bath, you listen to some music, you spend time with a friend. Obviously, that would be kind of like a different scenario, probably if you needed to stay, for our original scenario we're talking about is you staying home from going out because you're exhausted and need to rest and hang out with someone else. Maybe isn't really actually the right solution, but maybe it is. Maybe you just didn't need to hang out with that original friend that we were talking about in the first scenario. I don't know, this is your scenario to use, but you get what I'm saying. Do something on the other side of whatever comfortable action you took, to reward yourself, to calm yourself, to appreciate yourself. Think about even journaling about how it went, so that you can actually logically look at hey, what was the true outcome of that? Originally I thought it was gonna be really terrifying or really terrible, or my friend was gonna hate me. How did it actually go? Oh, the friend just said, hey, no problem, I appreciate that, or I respect that. Thanks for taking care of yourself. Wow, I can't believe that this whole time I've been going and upholding plans that I never wanted to do, just out of fear that my friends would hate me. Turns out, my friends don't mind at all and it's totally okay. I should cancel plans more often. All right, let me share with you some real world things that have happened in my client's lives. When they dropped the armor, I had one client who finally dropped the armor and broke up with a toxic axe, and though it was really uncomfortable and scary to do it, they felt so much relief on the other side and so much more appreciation for themself. Another finally got help from their team at work so they weren't drowning in stressful tasks. Another took time off of work, even though they were afraid of what others would think about them if they took time off during this busy season. They took the sick leave or the vacation time and they were able to have the recovery day that they needed so that they could come back to work well rested and, guess what? No one was mad at them. It was totally fine. Another dressed authentically according to their gender identity at work and found that their coworkers didn't even bat an eye. Another found a new hobby that excites them and where they've been welcomed with open arms to explore their gender expression when they were finally were willing to be their authentic self and to be in spaces that they didn't think that they originally were going to belong. And lo and behold, they did. And I, in my own life, found that a love unlike anything I've ever experienced before, more safe and calm and stable and deep than I ever knew, was possible with my partner. And it's because I let go of the walls that I was holding up, the armor that I was holding onto and, I'll be honest, I haven't let go of all the armor. I find new ways on a regular basis where, oh, I'm armoring up. I'm not actually telling the truth about how I feel right now. I'm trying to protect myself. I'm afraid of what he might think of me if I say this or do this. Speak up, speak up. So, my friend, the question for you today is what armor do you need to drop and what support will you allow yourself or empower yourself rather to have along the way Until next Tuesday? Bye.