There is a difference between weakness and vulnerability. Vulnerability acknowledges one of many sides to your paradoxical and multidimensional self is tender and hurtable. Acknowledging this makes you human. Denying or disavowing it makes you unhuman. This understanding of vulnerability can coexist with courage. For it takes a lot more courage to fully reveal who you are and no courage to not reveal who you are. On the other hand, weakness has a very one-dimensional view of “a lack of strength”. It simplistically defines itself as the opposite of invulnerability. This leads to a very one-dimensional view of oneself, others, and the world. And it leads to an unhuman experience of life. And it takes away the kind of courage that coexists with vulnerability.
