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An analysis of my life has shown me time and again how interwoven strength and vulnerability are. I can see times in my life when I struggled to be strong and when I hid my vulnerability. I have often put up a tough exterior to hide my incredibly fragile vulnerability as well as my incredibly fragile inner strength. It seemed like my inner strength intimidated people and my vulnerability offered them ammunition against me, so I learned to hide both behind a tough exterior. I feared having my vulnerability used against me and my strength scaring people  away . Hiding both my strength and my vulnerability became yet another mask I wore to  protect myself from the people in my life. I didn't quite understand how to be both strong and vulnerable with others without putting myself at risk.  Other times I'd overshare with people as a test to see who would stay and who would leave. I get to choose who sees different aspects of my life. I didn't understand the idea that some peop...

Recently, as I stood in the middle of Sweet Creek with one foot on one rock and the other foot on another rock in order to take a picture of one of the many waterfalls we saw while hiking the Sweet Creek Trail, I thought about a blog post I'd been struggling to finish. I felt perfectly comfortable standing in that slightly unsteady stance to capture the image I wanted. My mind wandered back to the words I'd been struggling to find to express my latest thoughts on vulnerability. I looked down into the water I straddled and felt the fleetingness of words written and discarded as not perfect enough. So much of my life I've felt the need to protect myself - physically, mentally, emotionally. There have been times when I've been paralyzed by my fear of vulnerability. Vulnerability and I have always had a very tumultuous relationship. After I snapped the photo, I secured both feet on one rock, stepped onto a larger rock and sat down. I took a deep cleansing breath and ...

Vulnerability is a bitch in the sense that a bitch is a Babe in Total Control of Herself. (For more on my thoughts about why being called a bitch isn't the insult intended, see Okay, So Sometimes I Really Am a B****, What of It? ) Vulnerability feels like being out of control, but is often a controlled exposure of the best of what's hidden in one's heart and soul. I've long fought exposing my vulnerabilities to others. I held secret the best of me mainly because I somehow confused secret with sacred. I thought by hiding my truth, I was cherishing it and holding it sacred. As I've released my need to conceal all my deep truth, I've realized when we lock our sacred selves in a chest to be discovered like a buried treasure, we cheat the world, those who love us, and even ourselves of the best we can be. I'm still often tempted to avoid letting others see that which makes me feel vulnerable. I see that struggle in the poems I'm compiling for my upcoming ...

As a writer, I often feel a sense of isolation that is only relieved through sharing my work. As a human being, I sometimes feel a sense of vulnerability that is only relieved when I risk connecting with others. Being a writer gives me an excuse to avoid risking vulnerability. When I was compiling the poems for my book, Strength in Silhouette: Poems , I couldn't help but notice how often strength and vulnerability played on the same playground, and they played together well. I reflected over several years when I spent concerted efforts to risk vulnerability in order to grow closer to those I loved and to be more authentic. Each foray I made into vulnerability made me feel stronger. It wasn't that I couldn't be hurt. It wasn't that I didn't hurt. I was hurt. I felt pain deeply, but I felt a strength coming through the vulnerability that reminded me I could do better than survive, I could thrive. So, as I sorted through the poems to focus on strength I watched my...

Vulnerability in Silhouette: Poems, my second poetry book exploring the relationship between vulnerability and strength, celebrates its first birthday in September. To celebrate I'm offering a giveaway over on Goodreads. Enter to win 1 of 10 signed copies! Reviews are always appreciated, particularly if you enjoy the read! < Goodreads Book Giveaway Vulnerability in Silhouette by T.L. Cooper Giveaway ends October 01, 2016. See the giveaway details at Goodreads. Enter Giveaway /> And, if you're wondering, the first book of poetry that explored the relationship between vulnerability and strength was Strength in Silhouette: Poems . And, if you just don't want to wait, you can purchase an unsigned copy or the Kindle version of Vulnerability in Silhouette: Poems now.

Sometime in the first few weeks of 2010 I set a personal goal that scared me more than any goal I’d ever set in my life.  I decided to allow myself - no, let’s go a step farther - to make myself vulnerable.  I’ve always been known for speaking my mind, but I’m not always good at expressing my innermost feelings.  This would surprise some people who probably don’t understand that for me speaking my mind and expressing my emotions is two VERY different things. I have no problem giving you my opinion about anything or helping you analyze a problem.  I can even discuss the emotional ramifications related to the problem with ease.  I can discuss the ins and outs of your personal problems, politics, religion, current issues, and myriad other things without hesitation.  I don’t even care if we disagree.  Either I’ll learn something new or I’ll share something that helps you better understand my point of view.  Perh...

Last night I listened to Brene Brown on TEDTalks. She discussed vulnerability. I listened as she explained several things I discovered in 2010 when I did an experiment in making myself more vulnerable. Her discoveries about herself so mirrored what I discovered about myself, it scared me. After it was over, I fought back the tear that slid down my cheek. I read a blog post I wrote in early 2011 about my experiment in being more vulnerable, Vulnerability, I Once Considered You a Curse Word this morning, and realized three things. 1) I haven't come quite as far as I'd planned in the past few years, 2) I sure do like me more today than I did when I started my experiment, and 3) I find much more strength than weakness in allowing myself to be vulnerable. I still struggle with allowing myself to be vulnerable. I fall back into old patterns of protecting myself and lose sight of the benefits of opening my truth to other people. I still have moments of intense fear that people wi...

Shame... Shame on you... Shame on me... You have no shame... Shame... Sighs! I am not ashamed of who I am or my life experiences. I am not ashamed... And, yet, there have been far too many moments of my life lived in shame, lived in the shame of someone else's perception of my existence and my experiences. We all have. We wear shame like a prism of everything we've done wrong shrinking us into our smallest selves and projecting reasons to not be loved into the world. I recently read I Thought It Was Just Me (But It Isn't): Making the Journey from "What Will People Think?" to "I Am Enough" by Brené Brown (read my review ). When I started it, I had no intention of doing the exercises; however, I quickly changed my mind. As I read I realized that to have the full experience, to truly understand the book, I needed to do the exercises. Still, to be honest, I didn't expect to get much out of it...  After all, I'd already done this work... I...

I'm currently giving away 10 copies of the Kindle version of Vulnerability in Silhouette: Poems! Only a few copies left, so act quick! See this #AmazonGiveaway for a chance to win: Vulnerability in Silhouette: Poems (Kindle Edition). https://giveaway.amazon.com/p/1738d057cbca3444 NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Ends the earlier of Sep 18, 2016 11:59 PM PDT, or when all prizes are claimed. See Official Rules http://amzn.to/GArules .  If you win, reviews are always appreciated... If you prefer to just purchase a copy outright, please visit  Amazon . Also, if you'd also like a chance to win a signed trade paperback copy of Vulnerability in Silhouette: Poems, please visit Goodreads .

Authenticity... Have you ever met someone and immediately felt their authenticity? Have you ever been in a situation where you felt like an impostor? Have you ever feared someone seeing through a carefully crafted image you'd cultivated? Have you ever feared your authentic self would be hated or maligned? Have you ever feared your authentic self would invite ridicule and pain? Have you ever feared your authentic self would expose your vulnerabilities? Yes, I have. I most definitely have. And, if you have, too, then you and I have that in common. It's sometimes difficult to be authentic when you know the person you are will be deemed unacceptable, particularly in your own close knit circle of friends and family. When you're told often enough that you're not good enough, not perfect not, not acceptable enough, not lovable, you begin to believe it even if you don't admit it to yourself. As that message sinks in, it becomes easy to put on a mask in order t...

"Asking makes you vulnerable." This statement grabbed my attention and shook me until my teeth rattled when Amanda Palmer said it in her TED Talk. I whispered it to myself. I said it aloud in the room. I went back and listened to the talk again days later to think about this one statement again. Vulnerability and I have never been best friends. We've always had a bit of a love/hate relationship. Friends have complained "You never ask for help." and I don't know what they're talking about. I think I ask for help. I have an overwhelming fear of being overly needy and pushing people away with my neediness. But I really do think I ask for help; however, I don't like feeling vulnerable. I've written about my struggle with vulnerability a few times before. Most recently in  Finding Strength in Vulnerability , but perhaps more on target in  Self-destruction Masquerades as Strength . I like to think I'm strong, and I learned early in life that as...

My relationship with trust is... well, complicated, chaotic, and ever-changing! It is also affirming, inspiring, and reassuring! I suppose that takes us back to complicated. I've spent my life vacillating between being too trusting and not trusting at all. Errors in judgment and taking the blame for other people's actions led me to having less than zero trust in my own judgment. I walked around terrified that if I trusted someone that by definition made them untrustworthy, but if I couldn't trust them then maybe I should trust them but if I trusted them.... Oh, what a tangled circle we twirl in when we practice illogical logic. Dizzy yet? Anyway, at some point I convinced myself I trusted no one, not my friends, not my husband, not my family, not myself. I spiraled deep into that dizzying circle of mistrust, distrust, total lack of trust. Oh, I could put on the proper face at the proper time for the proper reason, but underneath every expression of trust was a loathin...

In the song, X-static Process Madonna sings "I always wish that I could find someone as beautiful as you but in the process I forgot that I was special, too." and she ends the song with " I always wish I could find someone as talented as you but in the process I forgot that I was just as good as you." The first time I heard this song, I cried. Let me rephrase that; I wept. Okay, perhaps I sobbed. Those words went through my heart like a wooden stake through a vampire's heart. I felt like I was disintegrating just like those vampires on Buffy the Vampire Slayer . I didn't understand my reaction at the time. I was happy. My life was nearly perfect. So why did I have such a strong reaction to a simple song about losing one's self in the presence of another person? This is the power of words. They resonate sometimes with our inner selves in a way we don't understand at the time. And, it's why I love words so very much. I've been working on...