Brené Brown explains how to overcome our sense of disconnection and find our common humanity.
Collective assembly has long been a part of the human experience. . . . Collective assembly is more than just people coming together to distract themselves from life by watching a game, concert, or play—instead it is an opportunity to feel connected to something bigger than oneself; it is an opportunity to feel joy, social connection, meaning, and peace.
The foundation of courage is vulnerability—the ability to navigate uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure. It takes courage to open ourselves up to joy. In fact, as I’ve written in other books, I believe joy is probably the most vulnerable emotion we experience. As many research participants have shared with me, we’re afraid that if we allow ourselves to feel joy, we’ll get blindsided by disaster or disappointment.
Pain is also a vulnerable emotion. It takes real courage to allow ourselves to feel pain. When we’re suffering, many of us are better at causing pain than feeling it. Rather than sitting with our hurt, we discharge our feelings by lashing out in anger or blaming others for our big suffering or our everyday hassles.
Collective assembly meets the primal human yearnings for shared social experiences. A collective assembly can start to heal the wounds of a traumatized community. When we come together to share authentic joy, hope, and pain, we melt the pervasive cynicism that often cloaks our better human nature.
To read more of Brene Brown's article, please click here.
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