CONTINUED ON PAGE 32
THE LOOMING CLOUDS threatened to
form a tornado at any moment, but all was
sunny inside Brené Brown’s house in Houston,
Texas. When ;e Connection caught up with
the much-sought-a;er researcher, author and
public speaker, she was preparing to go to
Necker Island, an islet in the British Virgin
Islands archipelago, owned by Sir Richard
Branson, to conduct a leadership retreat
with the British businessman and various
social entrepreneurs. As she describes her
upcoming trip, nearly in the same breath
she explains how she had a hectic morning
chasing her son’s gecko, Sticky, a;er it had
escaped while she cleaned its tank. “You
wouldn’t think it, but those suckers are fast!”
she laughs heartily.
Brown’s down-to-earth and warm
demeanor is immediately apparent as she
talks with this reporter across her farmhouse-style kitchen table. Her approachable style
makes it easy to forget that Brown is o;en
hailed, by academics and the media, as one of
the biggest thought leaders of the modern era.
Her ;ndings
In a time when many people are seeking to
shi; from busyness to mindfulness, Brown’s
contributions are striking a chord. As a
research professor at the University of Houston’s Graduate College of Social Work, she
specializes in some of life’s toughest topics:
feeling unworthy, feeling not good or strong
enough, self-perceived shortcomings, trauma,
regret, fear, rejection—experiences many of
us have but don’t know how to address or
overcome. She asserts that embracing tough
topics is precisely what most of us need to
thrive. Brown’s research is opening a door to
normalizing discussion around these topics,
Let go of
who you
think you’re
supposed to
be; embrace
who you are.
—Brené Brown
look like?” on page 33). “When we’re in shame,
we’re not ;t for human consumption. And
we’re especially dangerous around people
over whom we have some power,” she writes
in her latest book, Rising Strong. One way we
deal with it is by lashing out at others for
unrelated events: We miss an important
meeting and we yell at our children. We’re
late for work, so we yell at our partners for
hanging the dry cleaning in the wrong
spot. “It doesn’t have to make sense either,”
she says. “It just has to give us some sense
of relief and control.”
But here’s the key: By addressing these
topics, we can begin to live wholeheartedly.
In her 2010 book, ;e Gi;s of Imperfection,
Brown explains what that looks like: “Whole-
hearted living is about engaging in our lives
from a place of worthiness. It means cultivat-
ing the courage, compassion and connection
to wake up in the morning and think, ‘No
matter what gets done and how much is le;
undone, I am enough.’ It’s going to bed at
night thinking, ‘Yes, I am imperfect and vul-
nerable and sometimes afraid, but that doesn’t
change the truth that I am also brave and
worthy of love and belonging.’ ”
Reviewing Brown’s research is like having
a conversation with your next-door neighbor;
she explains her ;ndings through analogies,
AC/DC lyrics, stories of humbling family expe-
riences and even snarky email exchanges—all
done purposefully. “Stories are just data with a
soul,” she says.
It’s this relatability that attracts everyone
from parent groups to executives in Fortune
In her speech “;e Power of Vulnerability,”
one of the most watched TED talks, with more
than 20 million online views, Brown says, “We
live in a vulnerable world. And one of the ways
we deal with it is we numb vulnerability. And
I think there’s evidence. … We are the most
in-debt, obese, addicted and medicated adult
cohort in U.S. history. ;e problem is—and I
learned this from the research—that you can-
not selectively numb emotion. You can’t say,
‘Here’s vulnerability, here’s grief, here’s shame,
here’s fear, here’s disappointment. I don’t want
to feel these. I’m going to have a couple of
beers and a banana nut mu;n.’ ”
Shame, she says, stems from expectations
of how we think we’re supposed to be, but
aren’t (see “What do shame and vulnerability
wh lehearted path The A journey with Brené Brown By Hana Medina
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