Episode 16: Is Vulnerability Weakness Or Strength?

Speaker 2: 0:00
Assalamu alaikum, I’m Hiba and I’m Zaid, You’re listening to Diary of a Matchmaker a podcast that will take you into our world as matchmakers.

Speaker 1: 0:09
We’ll share our experiences and offer advice for the single Muslim.

Speaker 2: 0:12
So let’s dive in. Bismillah, assalamu alaikum everyone, welcome to another episode of Diary of a Matchmaker. My name is Zaid and on the other mic is my wife and co-host, hiba.

Speaker 1: 0:26
Assalamualaikum.

Speaker 2: 0:28
So we recently took a personality type test. It was the first time I’ve done this in a long time and it was something that a client shared with us that prompted us to do it, and she said that she is a specific type. I can’t remember the exact initials, but we both took our tests and we were very surprised at how accurate the results were, because I was reading your results and I’m like this is you. This perfectly describes you right.

Speaker 1: 1:02
And when you read your results, I felt exactly the same Right, right.

Speaker 2: 1:08
So what were some of the things that stood out about your test?

Speaker 1: 1:11
So, first of all, my personality type is called campaigner. I forgot the initials E, c something I forgot but basically what stands out about this personality is how dreamy this person is and how curious this person is. Just like children, everything intrigues their curiosity and they just want to be around people.

Speaker 1: 1:47
At the same time, they have some level of introvert being introverted, and that does describe you. Yeah, so, and they’re very, very, very optimistic and upbeat and all of that I’m not that hundred percent, but the curiosity thing and um, the um, I don’t know, dreaminess and all of that, that totally describes me yeah, what about me?

Speaker 2: 2:08
I think that one thing that stood out about mine is that I’m easily irritable, right?

Speaker 1: 2:15
take things. Personally, I take things personally sensitive, yeah, averse to criticism, averse to criticism.

Speaker 2: 2:22
Averse to criticism. Yeah, those are some things that I’m working on, but these things on our personality test, I feel like it ties into vulnerability and the importance of vulnerability, especially when it comes to finding a match. I think back as to times in my life when I’ve been vulnerable obviously starting two businesses, getting married. But specifically, I think I had to take my vulnerability to another level when I finished theater school. So I did theater school for two years and as soon as I graduated, a lot of my classmates and other artists were talking about something called the Fringe Festival. So I looked into it and it’s actually pretty cool. They do this in various cities, both in Canada and the States, and it’s more like an opportunity for independent artists to showcase their talent, and people in the community come pay $10, $15, whatever, and they come support the local artist. So you could be a stand up comedian, a juggler, you know, a vocal artist, you could be anything and um, and you just come perform in front of a bunch of strangers. So for me, I submitted an application and paid a fee. Didn’t think I would get a spot, but I did, and as and as soon as I got a spot, I’m like I got to take this seriously and figure out what I’m going to do at this festival.

Speaker 2: 3:51
So I had this story in the back of my mind, which was sharing my journey trying to get married, what that was like, all the rejections I faced, all the pressure I faced trying to fit in and get a conventional job, all of those things and I thought maybe there’s something here, maybe there’s a story here that people will resonate with. So I spent months working on it. I remember my director dropped out. I ended up self-directing it. I performed in front of my laptop, recorded it, gave myself feedback.

Speaker 2: 4:28
It was tough, but finally, when I got up on stage to perform, sometimes I just have a few people in the crowd and that was fine, really. Yeah, I remember I think there were days, maybe five or seven people sitting in the audience and here I am standing in front of a bunch of strangers, sharing my life journey coming to Canada, all the rejections I faced, why I faced them. So I was sharing a lot in front of a lot of people I mean in front of a bunch of strangers. And some nights I would be sleeping in the masjid because it was Ramadan and I didn’t have a place to stay and luckily the masjid, because it was Ramadan and I didn’t have a place to stay and luckily the masjid was open. So I learned a lot through that experience but alhamdulillah I’m happy that I was able to push myself to do that and get get comfortable being uncomfortable that takes a lot of courage it does, it does not.

Speaker 2: 5:21
I don’t think of myself as a very courageous person, but I knew that at that point in my life that I had to push myself a little bit more um and um, and that involved being a little bit more vulnerable. But when we look at the um, when we look at our intake forms and we think back at our discovery calls, do we see a pattern of people being vulnerable or do we see something else?

Speaker 1: 5:51
I think we see both some forms. You can clearly get an idea of the person. They share their uh, they share a level of vulnerability. Open up about like challenges they faced, how their journey trying to get married been so far when their faith was tested like a good level of vulnerability shows up. But other times people hold back and I like we just feel that we’re reading a textbook.

Speaker 2: 6:22
Give me some examples. How do people hold back?

Speaker 1: 6:24
feel that we’re reading a textbook. Give me some examples. How do people hold back? Like, for example, there was this form of a lady and very, very lovely lady and we knew her, we had the discovery call with her and she got emotional on the call and stuff. So we knew she’s not a cold person. But then when we saw her form, it felt like I said reading a textbook, like she answered the question in a very mechanical way a, b, c, d, it was void of emotions, emotion.

Speaker 2: 6:53
There was no sense of like femininity, emotions human, human side, yeah, humanity in there. So um, it took us. It was a very long for me.

Speaker 1: 7:04
It took us a long time to fill it out because she detailed everything like what she’s expecting and the type of person she sees herself with. They would be doing this. They would be doing not doing this. They would.

Speaker 2: 7:20
So it didn’t feel like she’s talking about a person yeah, and this is not the first time I’ve seen that. Um. So one of the questions we ask on our forums is what are the roles and responsibilities of a potential husband? And sometimes we get the the answers as it is to provide food, shelter and clothing, or, um, it is to be a leader or sometimes they just quote an ayah from the quran without any comment right, just copy and paste, yeah and the point is that I can just look this up in the quran or open a book of hadith and and find this out this is a.

Speaker 1: 7:57
This is not a fiqh question right.

Speaker 2: 7:59
This is not an opportunity for you to share how knowledgeable you are about islam. It’s opportunity for you to share yourself, right, who you are. If you are somebody that’s very, has very strong islamic convictions, then you say that, then say I believe strongly in the islamic perspective of the roles and responsibilities of a husband, and this is why because that shares a little understanding of you that means you’re very, you’re very much religiously oriented, right versus other people like, um, other people would say you know it’s what’s another Like, for example?

Speaker 1: 8:40
this form said we live in a very fluid society, so their roles and responsibilities would be fluid as well.

Speaker 2: 8:49
Right, right, not that that’s un-Islamic, no Right, but the point is that that gives some insight as to the kind of person they are Exactly. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 8:57
So, specifically with that girl, we had to schedule a call with her to just like go over her form and try to get clarity on some things. And when we started digging and asking, the girl started crying and she shared with us that the reason she answered the questions this way is because of the rejections she’s been through and the bad experiences she’s been through. So the bad experiences she’s been through, so now she decided just to follow this strict formula of what to look for in a spouse like to remove herself from the equation exactly like I remember.

Speaker 1: 9:30
She even had a specific amount of money that a potential husband should be earning before she gets married, which was very strange so, yeah, holding back and, um, like hiding your vulnerable side, is something that’s very understandable, um, because you don’t want to come off as someone who’s weak, who’s emotionally unstable, who lacks self-confidence and stuff. But this is only because we misunderstand what vulnerability is that’s true, uh.

Speaker 2: 10:02
So dr bernie brown, who’s a famous author, um counselor, researcher, she’s also a licensed counselor too. Uh, she has a famous ted talk, in case you haven’t seen it, um, but she defines vulnerability as having the courage to show up and be seen when you have no control over the outcome. Vulnerability is not weakness, it’s our greatest measure of courage. And then she also adds that you have to get comfortable with being uncomfortable, and in order to build real connections, we have to allow ourselves to be seen. So another time where we saw this play out was, uh, during a double date, where we, uh, we give our activities to our clients and then we ask them for this, for some feedback. So the girl told us that one of the questions that came up in the activity was name uh three strengths and weaknesses, and uh, that you have that you have.

Speaker 2: 11:06
And uh, it was for the guy and the guy just outright said I don’t want to answer this question right, yeah, yeah, exactly, yeah yeah and uh. It was very strange just to hear that response like, how, like, do you not believe you have strengths and weaknesses, or are you just afraid of being vulnerable?

Speaker 1: 11:26
I. I think it’s just afraid of opening up and because, like when you’re admitting your weaknesses to yourself and to a stranger like this, takes a great deal of courage, right, right.

Speaker 2: 11:38
Yeah, and you can’t expect someone to be open and transparent with you if you’re not willing to do the same for them.

Speaker 1: 11:44
Exactly so. Vulnerability like even when you’re trying to build new relationships with friends, colleagues, whatever it is, it does require a level of vulnerability. But specifically when you’re trying to get to know someone for the purpose of marriage, it becomes even more crucial. Specifically when you’re trying to get to know someone for the purpose of marriage, it becomes even more crucial because if they’re not seeing you for who you are, if you’re putting up a front and you’re not seeing them for who they are, then we get to a situation where marriages happen and soon after marriage we hear something like oh, she changed after marriage, or he became a different person, or I didn’t know this about him, and divorces unfortunately happen. So yeah, like you said, we gotta be comfortable with being uncomfortable. If they like you for who you are, and then that’s great. And if they don’t like you for who you are, or you don’t like them for who they are, then you know you’re not compatible. Either you don’t like their goofy side or you don’t appreciate their seriousness like you feel they’re always serious, or?

Speaker 1: 12:48
whatever, it is right.

Speaker 2: 12:50
Right. I mean hiding your vulnerability can take different forms. We just shared one example where people are just copying and pasting religious texts. They’re not sharing who they are. Another person could just completely shut off and say, no, I’m not going to share anything that makes me feel vulnerable. And then on the other extreme end and we dealt with this at a double date where this girl who was previously married, she was in an abusive relationship, dealt with a lot of trauma and she was just unloading all of that in this double date.

Speaker 1: 13:30
The first date, on the first date.

Speaker 2: 13:32
It’s the first time she’s meeting this person and, needless to say, the double date wasn’t fruitful. They didn’t want to move forward, but it’s just. It’s amazing how I mean, because I keep thinking about this and I think it’s just such common sense, but yet we see a lack of it, a lack of vulnerability or a lack of appropriate boundaries.

Speaker 1: 13:59
If we look in the Sira, we see a great example of the Prophet peace be upon him practicing vulnerability, you could say. And it’s the most famous story, which is the revelation. When the revelation came first to him, alayhi salam, and of course the prophet alayhi salam was in the cave and jibreel alayhi salam came to him and squeezed him multiple times. The prophet didn’t know where this creature came from. We know the story. But the prophet went running back home and he asked khadijah, cover me, cover me, because he was shaking right. It was a very um out of this world experience. Yet he didn’t have a problem going back to his wife and just showing his human side, his vulnerable side, and seeking refuge in his wife. And what did Khadijah say? She comforted him by just reassuring him that you are this great person, you’re honest, you’re a righteous man.

Speaker 2: 15:19
You maintain the ties of kinship.

Speaker 1: 15:23
You have mercy on the orphan and all of that, and Allah will never dishonor someone like this. The point of this story is the Prophet didn’t have a problem showing his vulnerable side.

Speaker 2: 15:38
To his wife.

Speaker 1: 15:39
To his wife exactly, and we have a lot to learn from this story.

Speaker 2: 15:44
The Prophet was not a human textbook. Yes, he was a manifestation of the Qur’an, but he was also a human being. He had emotions. He would get angry, he would get sad, he would get happy, but he never hesitated to show those emotions, especially when it came to his wives, especially when he came to his wife’s. And when we talk about marriage or putting on the best version of yourself, what that means is that we’re not trying to be fake, that we are clear about our convictions, our values. Clear about our convictions, our values and, uh, and we’re not trying to um fit in to some sort of expectations that someone else has of us.

Speaker 2: 16:41
Yeah, I remember when I was first trying to get married, there was um a lot of pressure for me to um, do something or be something that I didn’t feel like, feel comfortable with, and and yet I didn’t for lack of a better term sell out. I stayed true to who I was, and it took time for me to get married, but I got comfortable with being uncomfortable and it took time.

Speaker 1: 17:08
I think we just have to accept that no one is perfect. We are not perfect, so don’t work on yourself All of that, but also don’t feel like you have to be perfect for somebody to like you, to love you, to want to marry you and at the same time, we’re all on a journey.

Speaker 1: 17:29
And at the same time, you’re on a journey and at the same time, you’re not going to find the perfect person. So accept someone’s faults and not faults. Accept someone’s uh flaws. Accept someone’s flaws and also allow them to see your flaws as well, of course, in a respectful, polite, fashionable way all right, uh inshallah, you guys benefited from this episode.

Speaker 2: 17:50
Um feel free to send us some fan mail. Um how can they send us fan mail?

Speaker 1: 17:54
yeah, just click on the link under this episode, send us a fan mail, tell us when was the last time you practiced vulnerability? Uh, do you feel does it come easy to you to be vulnerable with a stranger? And we would love to chat, but for next time, inshallah till next time.