Wired for Wonder: Brene Brown – Daring Greatly
Brene walked on stage and presented herself as a vulnerability researcher who for years had interviewed people to understand what made them vulnerable and what that actually meant. Several years ago someone told her that TEDx Houston was coming up and that she should speak about her research in front of the audience there. Why not she thought, I mean how many people would be there? even if she messed it up only a couple of hundred people would see her.
The video was published on Ted.com and the hits started to increase as the video went viral and newspapers and tv shows started to make reference to it. Comments started to appear underneath references to Brene on the Internet…
Her husband and friends told her not to read them but she did and what she saw was a mixture of encouragement, pity and some really awful, horrible words. Someone wrote that people like Brene shouldn’t be on camera talking about vulnerability until they’ve lost a few pounds. Another wrote that maybe she should look into having Botox to remove all the lines on her face.
Brene didn’t take all of this very well at all went into a state of depression, keeping herself at home and eating ice cream. She knew she needed to get herself out of the dark place and after watching back to back episodes of downton abbey she decided to jump onto the Internet to search for inspiration. In a moment of serendipity Google returned her with a quote from Theodore Roosevelt who in 1910 said…
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Brene then talked about how we can be both brave and afraid at the same time, the two are not mutually exclusive. There is nothing comfortable about courage as it is almost certain you will have your butt kicked at some point. This was something Brene, was brought up to expect with a family motto of “Lock and Load” (she is from Texas) but never really thought about after she started high school.
Recounting a story of a man whom she interviewed as part of her research Brene spoke of a man whose life was constantly expecting disappointment. Every moment of joy was tainted by a thought that it had to end at some point and that there would be disappointment to follow. The man’s wife died when they were in their 80’s and this is when Brene interviewed him. He said that he wished he had embraced the joy of each moment he had rather than living in a constant bubble of pessimism.
Another great story was that of a 21 year old who said on watching Brene’s video took the courage to buy a ring and propose to his girlfriend. Taking the girl out to dinner he got down on one knee and presented the ring to be told that while he was a great guy she thought it best if they started to see other people. More than a little upset he went back to his house-mates and told them the story – they said he was an idiot and should have played it cool by pretending he really wasn’t “in to the chick”. He corrected them and said it was the only thing to do and that by daring greatly he was opening himself up to the wonderful things that life has to offer. The guys in the room were overwhelmed with emotion and began crying saying “Right on man!”.
Vulnerability is courage and perfectionism is a form of armour, instead we should be striving for excellence and always open to criticism but remember that if you’re not in the arena then Brene won’t want to hear from you!
You can watch Brene’s original TED Talk here or buy Brene’s book here Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead
