Vulnerability Hangover

Note: Paid supporters of this newsletter receive additional, monthly essays as a small thank-you for their support, and I’ve decided to open up this month’s essay to everyone, as it’s relevant to the release of my new book.

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Whether we’re asking someone out, expressing deep-felt feelings to a partner, or standing on stage, sharing something we care about with a crowd of strangers, being open and honest can drain us.

Author Brené Brown has called this post-openness fatigue a “vulnerability hangover,” as engaging in any sort of self-doubt-sparking, true-self-exposing effort can drain us to a degree normal, similar activities would be unlikely to induce.

I feel this sense of wrung-out-ness every time I write a new book or release some new project to the world, and I feel a hint of the same any time I leave my work, my thoughts, my beliefs prone for the world to appreciate or disdain, to value or dismiss, to celebrate or to laugh at.

It’s a feeling I’ve become familiar with over the years, this many books deep into my author career, but also because my lifestyle has been unusual.

The choices we make and opinions we hold that fail to align with conventional modes of doing and thinking open us up to critique in a way folks who follow a more typical path tend to avoid.

And this is true no matter how much time and effort we put into something, no matter how carefully calibrated it is with our priorities and ambitions: different is still different, and that means we’re more likely to get noticed, with all the pros and cons that come with such distinction.

This sort of vulnerability, this nakedness to outside scrutiny, is part of why public figures burn-out at such a high rate, despite seemingly living the dream, getting the sort of attention many of us crave, and enjoying the secondary benefits of notoriety.

Anything we do that makes us noticeable can also highlight our flaws (or perceived flaws), and that dual-focus can make the rewards that might be derived from standing out less fulfilling (and thus, less worth it) for some people.

I’ve had time to work on this, and fortunately at this point in my career and life I’m familiar enough with the psychological weight of standing in front of a crowd of strangers and speaking, and of committing my thoughts to writings that will be replicated and shuffled off, at times context-free, to all corners of the world.

It’s still worrisome in a way, as there’s always the chance that something I say or write or do will be misinterpreted, or that someone will find flaws or suggestions of moral ineptitude in my ideas or the products of my work; these are possibilities I’ve learned to accept, despite still not being thrilled about them (and at times worrying about them probably too much, until the wave of concern subsides).

I’ve also learned to give myself time after such undertakings, because while it seems like we might have all the energy in the world after offloading a big project or psychological burden from our shoulders, those subsequent periods can actually be laden with secondary worries and deep, exhausting exhales that justify taking a little time to fully recover and recalibrate—similar to how we might de- and re-compress after running a marathon or carrying a heavy load for weeks or months without rest.

One benefit of embracing this internal effort-related rhythm is that it becomes easier to roll back into difficult, off-kilter, us-shaped things, because we’re not trying to do so while in the midst of a vulnerability hangover from a previous exertion.

I have a list of things I intend to tackle, soon, and I look forward to doing so.

But for now, in the early days of my new book landing on shelves and in the hands of people who I hope enjoy and find value in it (a hope over which I have zero control, which can be stressful unto itself), I’m giving myself permission to breathe deeply, stretch and rest, and to pull myself back up in my own time, at which point I can start my journey toward another, inevitable period of exposure-linked repose.