Self-love is the Answer to Your Fear of Vulnerability
How my fear of vulnerability held me back from what I love to do and how I learned to overcome it.
I used to be an actor. That was my path for a very long time.
And for the most part, I played characters who were tough, mean, funny or men.
“Witches, bitches and britches,” as they call it in opera.
I was good at playing these people, and it came pretty easily to me.
In my senior year of college, I got cast as Kitty Duval in William Saroyan’s The Time of Your Life.
And Kitty Duval was none of those things. She was a soft, vulnerable damsel in distress with a bit of spunk.
On the surface, I knew it was a good challenge for me. On the inside, I haaaaaaated it. I had so much resistance towards the character and didn’t know what to do with her.
I wanted to play up the spunk — make her a cold, hardened woman. A cynic, a comic, something I could access more easily. But Kitty Duval was not that. And that was not the direction our director was taking her in.
Kitty Duval was a soft, wounded, sensitive feminine woman with romantic dreams and memories and fantasies that she spoke about audibly.
She wore her aching heart on her sleeve, and she was a total nightmare for me.
I did not DO vulnerability — even as a fictional character in a make-believe play.
I was deep in my fearful avoidant attachment at the time. In some ways, I related a lot to Kitty Duval. But NOT in ways I wanted to face, acknowledge or accept in myself.
And abso-fucking-lutely not in ways I wanted to put on display for everyone who knew me, along with their friends and family.
Even though it was all pretend. It wasn’t me. I mean, in theory, people would just think I was a REALLY good actor 😂
But something in me didn’t want people even to THINK I could access that kind of vulnerability for a role.
During my audition, the director stopped me and said, “You’re giving me Strong Noemi again. I want to see Soft Noemi.”
My brain said, “Of course.”
My body went, “Nope.”
I guess I hinted at the potential for vulnerability because I did get the part. But it didn’t show up until a few weeks into rehearsal.
I would default to cool and feisty, somewhat reserved Kitty. I would argue with myself for why that was the better approach to her character. Deeper, more accurate, more interesting. And much much easier for me.
During dreamy scenes, I would falter. During love scenes, I would freeze. To the point where my scene partner gently asked me if I was shy because I seemed reluctant.
“No!”
Yes.
Shy. Mortified. Annoyed. Disgusted. Not to mention, extremely uncomfortable.
And also frustrated with myself, of course. I was an actor. It was a role. Not even super complex. Four emotional scenes in total. Not that hard. I knew how it needed to be played. I could even sort of do it alone.
But when I got on stage in rehearsal, I froze. I couldn’t feel or access any of it within me. I resented everyone. The cast, the director, Kitty, Saroyan, myself, the play.
It’s strange because I admired the people who were able to do it. If I’d been watching another actor give herself fully to that role, I would have been captivated by her performance. She would have had my respect for her courage, talent and professionalism.
But I couldn’t let myself do it. I wanted to. I took acting very seriously and was annoyed with myself for not doing it.
I just physically wasn’t able to let my guard down.
My body and voice did not respond to my commands to be vulnerable.
I think I dragged this on for too long because at one point, the director stopped and gave me a stern talking to about my lack of progress with the role, which hit me right in the “professionalism and integrity as an actor.”
She was frustrated with me, too. Having it reflected back to me flooded me with shame.
For the first time in a long time, I felt like a bad actor for not being able to get over myself and my silly mental blocks.
It wasn’t fun. But that shame and disappointment overrode my fear for a while and lit a fire under my ass.
So, I got into character. But it was pretend vulnerability. It wasn’t me.
I was acting.
On stage, I sort of got over it. Sort of. I still don’t think I “gave myself fully to the role.” But it was good enough for a college production.
In real life — nothing really changed. I was still guarded and hot-and-cold.
It wasn’t until I started healing my attachment style five years later and learned how to approach vulnerability that I was able to open and soften in my relationships.
Vulnerability with others requires deep self-love, self-compassion and self-trust.
I did not love myself. Nor did I trust myself. And I had very little true compassion for myself when I tried to play Kitty.
We fear our own self-loathing more than we fear the reactions of others. We can only be truly vulnerable with others when we have a safe, supportive and loving space to return to in our own mind and body.
If my attempt at vulnerability had been met with anything other than applause for a stellar acting performance, I would berate myself for it too harshly. I would not have had the tools or resources to support and recenter myself. I would not want to do it ever again. It would just make an unfriendly inner environment ten times more unfriendlier.
So, of course, I wasn’t able to do it. Of course, my body resisted it. Of course, my mind protected me from it.
I had to learn how to love myself first before I could open up to others.
It took a lot of deep, intentional healing work on my self-esteem, self-concept and attachment style to get to a point where I reveal myself to others — honest, soft but firm. Real and raw but unguarded, and enjoy the relational benefits that came with that kind of authenticity.
Honest love. Deeper connection. True intimacy.
It still takes work. To soften when the instinct is to harden. To reveal when the urge is to hide. To listen when I want to defend. To stay present when I want to check out. And to trust myself to take care of myself when I’m tender when I really want to kick myself.
It’s a skill that needs to be cultivated. And it gets easier with practice.
Would I be able to play Kitty with greater ease today? Probably. I don’t think I’d be the perfect fit for that role physically. But, at least, she wouldn’t trigger the fuck out of me. I might even appreciate her for the essence she embodies and enjoy exploring that field.
But I’m not an actor now. I stepped away from that path recently. Although I still have a lot of love for it, real people with their real-life relationships are what interest me.
As for myself, I feel more comfortable with vulnerability in my own self-expression and my real-life relationships because I have the tools to discern when to (and not to) be vulnerable and how to love and support myself through it.
And I want to share what I’ve learned with you. That’s what this page is dedicated to.
Take care ❤️
Hi, I’m Noemi, a certified relationship coach. I help you understand your patterns and cultivate self-love, confidence, and compassion to create the deep, fulfilling conscious relationships your heart desires.
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