“Brene Brown And The Gifts Of Imperfection”
At the beginning of Shelter In Place, I told my classes that what we were experiencing was not distance learning, but distance learning through a pandemic that for some has been very traumatic. I told them that in the midst of a traumatic experience sometimes analytical writing is difficult, and I gave the students writing options. I told them to choose whatever writing assignments would most nourish their skills and their spirits.
As the summer unfolded into social unrest, and a spiraling pandemic that would yield yet another semester of Distance Learning I kept thinking of two aphorisms- The first of these, “physician heal thyself,” I do not know whom to attribute, but the second, “vulnerability is not weakness,” comes from Brene Brown’s 2010 Power of Vulnerability TED Talk which I have used in my curriculum since the fall of 2016.
In The Gifts of Imperfection Brene Brown develops the arguments she makes in her 2010 TED talks about vulnerability and shame: How the willingness to embrace vulnerability, and move beyond the silence of shame, is the birthplace of wholehearted living, and resilience from trauma.
While shame cannot exist in silence, the silences of the shame are rooted in vulnerability. “Being vulnerable,” Brown says, “involves emotional risk, exposure, uncertainty. It fuels our daily lives. Our willingness to be vulnerable is our most accurate measure of courage…..What makes us vulnerable makes us beautiful.” I think it is challenging for teenagers, and for all of us to understand how vulnerability is connected to self esteem. “Self esteem,” Brown says, is a willingness to be vulnerable, and requires us to look at what makes us vulnerable not as weakness but as why and how we are worthy of love and belonging, and embracing our imperfections.” This requires us not just to let go of shame, but to let go of what other people think, and owning our story.
As an English teacher, I know my students will not be able or willing to tell me their stories. That said, I still try to create a brave space where they can at least tell their stories to themselves. One exercise I have had my students do is a free write about something that they have never been able to tell anyone, not even themselves. They will do this free write knowing that afterwards they will rip it up into tiny pieces that I go around the room and collect in a giant purple candy dish. It is powerful for the students to see all those tiny pieces fall into the garbage can. It demonstrates them how they are not alone. I ask them after to reflect on the process. My ninth grade students enjoyed the process reflection, but not the essay I asked them to write. My seniors all enthusiastically appreciated the essay. I did not know how this would work with distance learning, but I was still willing to try.
The in class instruction that requires students to witness all those tiny pieces of their free writes going into the class garbage can, reflects all the mechanisms of what Brown defines as courage and connection “Courage comes from the Latin word “cor,” meaning “heart” — and the original definition was to tell the story of who you are with your whole heart….Having courage also means to embrace a willingness to be imperfect, and a willingness to let go of who they thought they should be in order to be who they were, which you have to absolutely do that for connection.” It also reflects what she argues about the importance of recognizing who we can share our shame stories with, and who we can’t, but having empathy and compassion that we are not alone in the ways ALL of us feel imperfect. This is so important, especially at a school like the school I teach at where student are hyper focused on perfection.
The Gifts Of Imperfection has given me new ways to continue to build upon the ways I try to create a brave space in my classes, where students can find a more whole hearted approach to studying literature and recognize the ways the human experience is imperfect, and that the trauma within the human experience does not define it as much resilience. Yet, what I think most speaks to me in Brown’s text are the ways she emphasizes how the opposite of play is depression, and the ways happiness is tied to experience, and joyfulness is tied to gratitude and spirt. I do not think anyone can truly be “happy” in a pandemic. To numb out the vulnerability we might feel in the face of fear and sorrow, is to numb out our ability to feel joy. And that joy is particularly needed right now- for all of us.
