The Gifts of Imperfection

I recently read 'The Gifts of Imperfection' by Brené Brown. This is the same woman whose TED talk I shared in a previous post. The book is brilliant.

Here's my brief summary. Her three gifts of imperfection are: courage, compassion, and connection. I think I see how each of these flows from our imperfection, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on that - especially if you've read the book. Anyway, she gives some very rigorous definitions of terms in the book, including for these three terms, but here's my quick take:

1. Courage: to share your heart, embrace vulnerability, and fully feel both positive and negative emotions.
2. Compassion: to embrace others in their imperfections, recognizing that we've all been there, we're all doing the best we can, and we're all in this together.
3. Connection to others: fuels the most joyful experiences of life. I believe it is relationships that offer us the most important among the possible purposes of life. In my research on happiness, the one factor that comes up in every single study I've seen or heard of is relationships.

She talks a lot about shame and I think a lot of what she says is really illuminating. She spent years researching shame and one of the things I learned from her was that "Shame hates it when we reach out and tell our story. ... Shame loves secrecy."

In the book, she shares an experience where she connected with her sister to share a vulnerable moment of shame. I love her description of the sister's response:

She didn't try to fix me or make me feel better; she just listened and had the courage to share some of her own vulnerabilities with me.

I felt totally exposed and completely loved and accepted at the same time (which is the definition of compassion for me). Trust me when I tell you that shame and fear can't tolerate that kind of powerful connection surging between people.

Very cool. Having the courage to share her vulnerability is what it took to unlock the power of friendship to relieve the shame and fear.

Here's a nice little excerpt on compassion.

The word compassion is derived from the Latin words pati and cum, meaning "to suffer with." I don't believe that compassion is our default response. I think our first response to pain - ours or someone else's - is to self-protect. We protect ourselves by looking for someone or something to blame. Or sometimes we shield ourselves by turning to judgment or by immediately going into fix-it mode.

Wow, that sounds a lot like me. But we don't have to let our fear of pain rule us. Pain is something that, if entered into and embraced, loses its power over us. At least the kind of inward suffering that results from thought processes and emotions.

She then quotes from an American Buddhist nun named Pema Chödrön.

Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It's a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.

She defines connection as follows:

... the energy that exists between people when they feel seen, heard, and valued; when they can give and receive without judgment; and when they derive sustenance and strength from the relationship.

She later says,

Until we can receive with an open heart, we are never really giving with an open heart. When we attach judgment to receiving help, we knowingly or unknowingly attach judgment to giving help.

And,

If connection is the energy that surges between people, we have to remember that those surges must travel in both directions.

This summary is from just the first two chapters of the book. The rest of the book is equally powerful, at least for me. As a recovering perfectionist, I felt like the book spoke to me on so many levels. In fact, I'd love to meet the author. It sounds like she and I have very similar personalities and dispositions ... and a very similar set of weaknesses. Maybe that's why the book seems so perfect for me.

But I don't think the book is just for perfectionists. It's a beautiful set of principles that we can all profit from regardless of where we're coming from. It's an attempt to offer a guide to what she calls 'wholehearted living' and I love the picture she paints of that lifestyle. It's what I want. And I think it's a model for living that will make the world a better place as more of us embrace it.

If you get a chance to read the book, please let me know what you think.