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Lesson Objectives
- Challenge old definitions and dispel the myths surrounding the concept of vulnerability.
- Examine how your early experiences of vulnerability shaped your understanding of what it means to experience uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure.
- Learn the relationships between vulnerability, courage, and full engagement and how that affects the way we live, love, and lead.
- Identify the potential barriers you may face when practicing vulnerability and how the practices of laughter, song, and dance help build connection.
Reading Assignment – Daring Greatly
Chapter 2
Introduction Video
Lesson Video – The Myths of Vulnerability
Exercise One – Vulnerability Sentence Stems
Complete the sentence stems below:
Exercise Two – Arena Anthems
Taken from Gifts of Imperfection:
Laughter, song, and dance create emotional and spiritual connection; they remind us of the one thing that truly matters when we are searching for comfort, celebration, inspiration, or healing: We are not alone.
From the eight-track tapes my parents played in our station wagon to my stack of vinyl records from the 1970s to my mixed-tapes from the ’80s and ’90s to the iTunes playlists on my new computer, my life has a soundtrack. And the songs from that soundtrack can stir memories and provoke emotion in me like nothing else can.
I realize that not everyone shares the same passion for music, but the one thing that is universal about song is its ability to move us emotionally – sometimes in ways we don’t even think about. For example, I was recently watching the director’s cut of a movie. It showed a very dramatic scene from the film with music and then without music. I couldn’t believe the difference.
The first time I watched the film, I didn’t even notice that music was playing. I was just on the edge of my seat waiting and hoping that things would turn out the way I wanted them to. When I watched it without music, the scene was flat. There wasn’t the same level of anticipation. Without music it felt factual, not emotional.
Whether it’s a hymn at church, the national anthem, a college fight song, a song on the radio, or the carefully scored soundtrack to a movie, music reaches out and offers us connection – something we really can’t live without.
In this exercise, I want you to find your arena anthem – a song that will inspire you to stay brave when the gremlins start getting to you or when you start to doubt your ability to stay vulnerable through the tough parts.
You might choose just one song or you may choose to put together a soundtrack or playlist. Either way, make space to explore the role of music in your life and how it can shape your experience of stepping into the arena.
Please consider sharing your anthems in the lesson discussion. I’ve made some great playlists based on the arena anthems people have shared with me!
Art Journaling Exercise
Journaling Instructions:
- Find or take a picture that represents how the song you chose makes you feel and attach it to your journal.
- Select lyrics from your anthem song that stand out to you.
- Write down those lyrics in your journal and decorate around them.
- You can use the supplies you have available to get creative when completing and decorating this journal page.
- Free journal using the following questions:
- Why do the lyrics pump you up?
- What specifically hits home for you?
- What do you love about this song?
- How do you feel when you are about to walk into your arena and how does the song change those feelings?
- Play the song as you do this exercise.
Video – Into the Bones
