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What could I do or change to be better this time around ? Nothing original or interesting comes out of my mouth when I’m asked this question. I usually string along a few tasteful clichés and hope for the best, to be honest : “I’ll work out more”, “oh, I’ll start drawing again”, “I’ll try different things everyday”, etc. They’re just beautiful chimaeras, though. I can always do better. As I get older, I crackle and pop, and try to stay away from bitterness and cynicism. I’m still a bit of a scoundrel, I still can’t hold a brush for the life of me, and running never gets easier. I make these big resolutions because I know I won’t hold myself to them : I can never stop my true colours from shining through. I hide behind something simple, so that I don’t have to change anything too drastically. So this time around, I’m trying something else, a change of perspective, a gear shift, something along those lines : this time around, I want to squeeze a zing of kindness, of vulnerability in my life. And it is going to sound cheesy and stupid, maybe even insensitive. How can I, from a supposedly privileged position, preach vulnerability ? It’s so small, compared to the state of this world, it won’t change a lot, but maybe it’ll help me out. Is it selfish ? It most certainly is. But it’s also a question of survival, and that is what matters, at least to me. So this year, my resolution is to try and let a little vulnerability into that rigid, stubborn, messy head of mine.

Giving in to vulnerability goes against every single instinct we still have inside of us. It implies that we need to let others in, to not tense up at every single question, to accept some conflict and some resistance from others. And I grind my teeth at night and clench my jaw as soon as I wake up, just to not think about it too much. Vulnerability means letting our walls down, even just a little bit, despite it being near impossible. So why would I want to do that in the first place ? Submitting myself to being known by others is a mortifying ordeal that scares the living daylights out of me (you could say I am a private person). Besides, letting people get close to us is a hopeless task, isn’t it ? A whole philosophical current warns us against this very thing. Humans are usually described as sociable but fragile animals, and if we get too close to one another, we bite. Arthur Schopenhauer went as far as to compare us to hedgehogs, with our prickly prides and prejudices. There is an abundant tradition of rich white men telling us that we thrive in destroying each other and hating each other’s guts (thanks, guys, real cool of y’all), and that individualism is the only way out. We’re scared of getting close to one another, and being vulnerable becomes a sign of stupidity, of naivety and innocence. If people hurt us in the past when we let them in, what is stopping them from doing it again ? That’s what I’ve been told, time and time again. No wonder I am wary. 

But is vulnerability really such a weakness ? I don’t know. Well, I don’t really think about it, to be more precise. I find ways to avoid it, and act like a fool. I used to believe that letting people get to know me meant giving them weapons to use against me. I used to see personal questions as venomous traps scattered around to hurt me, later on. And, in some ways, I still do. Giving away too much information about myself to people gives them power over me, and I hate that. And so, I never say anything. And thus an insidious little thought made its way into my hollow teenage head : “life is tough, get used to it”. It was clamoured all over and plastered in everything I saw. I needed to be ruff’n’tuff as leather and let no one in, I needed to kick people in the guts when they were down. Mean and lean, showing teeth like a hurt and wounded creature. Individualism was praised to me, and forced into my head as the only path to follow, as the only valid way to exist in our world. And, to be honest, I hate it. It’s lonely behind those prison bars. Vulnerability was cast aside by me, long ago, in order to get behind a massive shield of solitary indifference. In order to fall into those individualistic categories and situations, in order to become the perfect little human being. But I cared so much, maybe too much, and it ate me. So I let it go : vulnerability isn’t a sign of weakness, it’s a question of trust and empathy and strength. It’s finding the right people to give strength to, and knowing that they will be there to catch you when you fall down.

Being vulnerable and letting people know us isn’t pathetic and pitiful, it’s an act of love. It’s surrendering to arms that care. And it’s an understanding of hate and fear : you’ll get to know as much as possible about the people you admire, the ones you despise, and those who scare you, if only to protect yourself. Being open to vulnerability means welcoming intensity into your life. Lovers know each other, and choose one another time and time again, and the same can be said of sworn rivals. “Know your enemy” as well as you know yourself, some say. Let vulnerability become a token of our humanity and our history, a remnant of a sometimes forgotten time and place. It allows us to remember what once was and what could be, like windows into our souls. I still hum my ex best friend’s favourite songs from years ago. I still remember the way my cheeks burned with the weight of shame when middle school brutes laughed at my “too broad” shoulders (or anything they found stupid about me, really). I’m still haunted by the painful spectres of guilt and embarrassment, born from when a teenage me realised my potential queerness. And, even if these feelings are still very much there today, they don’t stop me from moving forward anymore. They allowed me to grow, sharper and stronger, to fight for myself. In recovering from my past mistakes, I regained control over my agency, over my own limits. It gave me back crumbs of consciousness and made me tougher than I ever was, because I allowed myself trust, and some “lâcher-prise”. Very early on, I got into the habit of targeting myself, and of putting myself in uncomfortable situations on purpose, like a sort of punishment for being stuck in my own skin. Vulnerability stops me from taking jabs at my own self ; I won’t be my own laughing stock anymore. As Hannah Gadsby says in the powerful show that is Nanette : “Do you understand what self-deprecation means when it comes from somebody who already exists in the margins ? it’s not humility. It’s humiliation”. And I don’t want to humiliate myself anymore. Vulnerability has become an ode to what I want to be, what I strive for, and acts as a reminder of my own mortal frailty. It’s a token of what I aspire to be, and of what I was, at least. It helped me find my own community and a renewed sense of myself. It allowed me to say, at long last : “I am not alone”.

Because vulnerability eventually becomes a way to choose kindness in the face of hate and bigotry. People are built for love, not fear, and lawful, legitimate power cannot come from demeaning others (which is exactly what the violence in our systems rests on, but I will say more on this subject at another time). Kindness and vulnerability, when the whole world is spitting in your face because your existence is revolting to them, is an act of rebellion. It’s choosing not to be defined by trauma, it’s breaking a cycle of corrosive and capitalistic violence that gnaws on us, little by little. It’s choosing freedom over cynicism and supposed edginess, it’s actively working for betterment instead of sitting and passively snickering in the back, feeling superior to everyone else. It’s repeating, again and again, “this ends with me”. Albert Camus couldn’t have summed this up easier (in a quote that he never actually penned, as I’ve recently learned) : “The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion”. I want to be free, better than those who put me down, and I repeat it in the mirrors that devour me until it sticks to the back of my throat. I will not let what is out of my control have power over me and I will let myself be compassionate, kind and empathetic out of spite. There is nothing tougher than deliberately showing openness and vulnerability. I will smile in the face of bigotry with pleasure and coldness, because I choose to be better. And, in this new sense of community and belonging, I gain the strength to extend a hand to those who need it. Those who denied me the right to sit with them can go suck it. I get to control who want to get closer to, and I renew my ability to give, eyes closed and trusting.

 So, as I said earlier on, it’s not really a resolution. It’s not the first day of the rest of my life. It’s hard, and it goes against everything I have been told, and it hurts like hell.Sure, I’ll be more open, braver, but I’m still anxiously biting the skin off my nails on the inside. I still clench my jaw, however it’s less and less painful. And maybe it’ll make no difference (probably not, even), but at the end of the day, my shoulders will be lighter, I hope. Either way, I will find a brand new zeal in this vulnerability (as shiny as can be), pushing me forward. However hard it may be (I mean look at me, these few words took ages to write and I’m still shaky about it).