Thanks to a Danish friend I have been doing some reading lately (something I don't always have a lot of time to do).
I am currently reading Daring Greatly by Brene Brown and thought I'd recommend it to the community as its a great book IMHO. There is a chapter on how both men and women handle vulnerability differently that really spoke to me - I was like that's exactly what tends to happen when men open up!
Anyway, in another chapter she quoted from a children's book called The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams (Circa 1922). I haven't read it but again the quote from it spoke to me. Here it is:
quote:
"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but really loves you, then you become Real."
"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.
"Sometimes", said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real, you don't mind being hurt."
"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"
"It doesn't happen all at onec," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't often happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out, and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real, you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."
