Emotional Nakedness
My new book, Getting Naked, is soon to be published and the theme is the importance of finding the right person, the right place and the right time to be emotionally transparent.
This book is NOT about physical nakedness. It’s about being emotionally naked, spiritually vulnerable, and the willingness to expose one’s deepest truth. It is a metaphoric view of nakedness as an emotional and spiritual value in our human growth and the development of our being.
I define getting naked as the ability to be vulnerable, honest, transparent, shame free, and unburdened in the presence of a confidante, friend, coach or counselor as the witness to your authenticity.
Emotions, I believe, are severely misunderstood in modern culture. Emotions seem to be greatly feared because we believe they are impossible to control. We can control physical nakedness by adding clothing for protection, comfort, discreetness, beauty, and style; but emotional nakedness is more challenging.
So what does “emotional nakedness” actually mean?
Intimacy is about nakedness. Part of the reason our culture used to believe that you should not be physically naked with someone before you were married is because ideally we should first learn to be naked emotionally. Well those days are long gone.
Physical nakedness is best in the context of emotional and spiritual connectedness.
One of the definitions for the word naked is being devoid of concealment or disguise.
Intimacy – whether sexual or in a nonsexual deep connection with another friend, colleague or family member – is where emotional nakedness should reside. We don’t want to be emotionally naked without careful choosing any more than we would be physically naked in an unsafe environment or relationship.
When you have an intimacy of a trusting other there should be no need for a disguise… which is easier said than done Self-protection is a very human experience, and one that we never really show any need for training. We often self-protect ourselves by concealing and disguising, and we do this just as much emotionally as we do physically.