Thoughts on Vulnerability
Recently, I’ve been exploring vulnerability through an ecological lens. I see it as a holistic system that protects the life balance by fostering a direct and mindful relationship with the environment, not just a psychological state. Early humans were naked and barefoot in prehistoric times, forcing us to be acutely aware of their surroundings. Carelessness was a one-way ticket to death. This deep understanding kept them cautious and balanced.
Their vulnerability wasn’t a weakness but a feedback loop that demanded care and respect for the world they moved through.
The healthy fear of protecting our bare feet would prevent us from stepping on sharp objects and living beings alike.
This shift reflects a larger pattern in human progress—each technological “advancement” is powered by the desperate desire to be exempt from nature's moods, further insulating us from her will and interrupting the natural systems of “essential vulnerability” that once kept us in harmony.
The more we demonize vulnerability (in all forms), the easier it becomes to act without care and to exploit ecosystems without feeling remorse. We don’t feel remorse for the insect that perishes under our shoe; we most likely were unaware it was there.
Progress itself isn’t inherently harmful, but things become precarious when the intention behind it severs us from the sensitivity that vulnerability fosters. The challenge is finding a way to rewrite that powerful narrative of denial coiled at the center of modern progression—a way to protect ourselves without forgetting the ground beneath our feet.
Reading this, I kept thinking that vulnerability isn’t just something we lost, it’s something we no longer know how to metabolize.
We built layers of insulation not only to survive nature, but to avoid the responsibility that sensitivity demands. Feeling requires response, not just awareness.
What struck me most is the idea of vulnerability as a feedback system. If that’s true, then numbing ourselves isn’t neutral: it actively distorts the signal.
I’m curious: do you think modern progress failed because it erased vulnerability, or because it reintroduced it without teaching us how to listen?
Willow, this is sacred. It reads like an ancient remembering.
As a mother, of a 21 & 3 year old daughters {Kaydence & Autumn} I feel this in my bones. Vulnerability is not weakness, it is the original technology, the living sensor that keeps life in balance. Bare feet as prayer, attention as protection, tenderness as intelligence.
May we evolve without anesthetizing our sensitivity. May we learn to build shelter that still honors the soil. May we keep listening for the small lives beneath us, and let care be the compass.
Thank you for putting words to what the earth has always been teaching. I’m a writer of words and music too, and this kind of thought feels like medicine. ✨🧚♀️🌿🌙
@les_mermaid on ig xo