The Price of Vulnerability 6/7

Sara Says She Believes in Love

Maiken Ringkjøbing has always believed in and dreamed of love. She has simply struggled to dare to pursue it. In this personal story, Maiken Ringkjøbing explores why the fear of being hurt can outweigh the longing for love. What does it do to a person to protect themselves so much that no one is ever truly allowed to get close?

The Price of Vulnerability is her story about love, fear, and a constant escape from losing control. About growing up with the ideal of great love while simultaneously being terrified of it. Through conversations with psychologists, her parents’ love letters, and her own experiences, she has explored why some of us long for love yet still struggle to surrender to it.

This is the sixth part of The Price of Vulnerability by Maiken Ringkjøbing.

The journey does not begin without fear — but with enough courage to finally stay.

Sara says she believes in love.

She believes in it and thinks it is one of the most beautiful things that exists. But she struggles to imagine herself in that kind of relationship with another person.

Not because she has never tried it before or thrived in it, but because, from one day to the next, the rug was pulled out from under her by her ex-boyfriend — the man she thought she would grow old with.

And that kind of loss of control is something she simply cannot reconcile herself with.

She tells me that she is good at keeping people at arm’s length. That sex and flirting are easy — but the moment someone gets close to her soft spot, she pulls away.

She fears false security so much that she barely dares to investigate whether real security even exists.

And for her, that fear is greater than love itself.

Anja Gundelach Brems says that many people can relate to this regardless of what kind of family structure they grew up in.

Relationships are easier for many people when they feel predictable and within reach. But it is possible to work on allowing relationships to remain within reach while also being vulnerable.

“The people I hear about who succeed in today’s dating culture are the ones who quickly dare to bring dating itself into the conversation. Meaning that, on the date, they talk a little about what dating feels like for the other person, what matters to them when dating, or what they are willing to commit to — that they dare to talk about the terms of connection itself.

That is also a way of putting yourself on the line and making yourself vulnerable. When you reach out your hand, you risk it being rejected, but that is also where something actually happens.

Otherwise it all becomes endless, because then you can just sit there exchanging opinions. But does it become exciting? Do you feel the other person? Do you feel yourself?”

No. Honestly, I do not.

Can you recognize yourself in that feeling of merely exchanging opinions? Maybe even withholding your real thoughts and desires because you are afraid they might scare the other person away?

Because honestly: I am guilty.

So many times over the years, I have genuinely felt lonely. Not when it comes to friends and family — I have more love there than I could ever ask for, and I know how lucky I am.

But beyond my parents, I have watched my friends fall in love, enter long-term relationships, leave relationships, and fall in love all over again, while I repeatedly plastered a smile across my face and acted perfectly content being forever single.

You know that feeling? When other people seem to fall into love effortlessly, one after another, while you feel like you are standing in line for something that never actually opens.

The struggle to find someone who wants me enough for me to dare to want them too...

Wait.

What was that thought I just caught myself having?

I have probably thought it many times before, but only now do I realize how absurd it sounds.

Have I actually spent my life trying to find someone who wants me so much that I can finally surrender enough to dare to want them back?

That sounds insane.

I simply do not dare to open myself up emotionally before I feel completely certain about the other person.

And Sara agrees with me.

She looks at people with their houses, Volvos, and dogs and hopes that one day she can overcome herself. That she will stop finding flaws in every man who shows even the slightest interest in her.

She hopes that, one day, the desire to truly meet another human being will become greater than the fear.

We cannot expect someone else to surrender emotionally if we never open up ourselves.

And if we do not — how can we ever truly be sure?

“There are actually very good reasons why people are afraid to open up. Sometimes the relationship simply needs to feel a little safer first.

And that is exactly why dating can feel so incredibly difficult, because you are meeting someone you do not know — which, by definition, does not feel safe.

Then, once you get to know the person better, start caring about them, and feel safer around them, you may suddenly become afraid to share yourself because now there is actually something to lose.

Someone has to start somewhere.”

Anja says this over the phone.

And it moves me deeply.

Because throughout our conversation, she puts words to everything I have never quite known how to express.

Love is life’s paradox:
A paradox that both can and cannot be solved.

Anja talks about couples who have been together for many years yet still feel lonely because they are too afraid to risk sharing their deepest needs.

“It is not strange that two people can sit together and still feel lonely, because they have never dared to risk anything. They have not truly brought themselves all the way into the relationship or shared their needs, dreams, and longings.”

At the end, I ask Anja what she wishes people in similar situations understood.

She takes a deep breath and pauses for a moment.

Then she says the golden words.

The words that once again bring tears to my eyes.

I do not think she can hear it, but slowly, she is healing something inside me.

“Everything comes with a price. If you try to avoid the pain of not being held in your vulnerability, then the price is that you do not fully engage — and nothing ever becomes truly important. And that can become lonely.

But remember: there can be many good reasons why someone is afraid to lean into love.

And there should not be an ideal saying that you absolutely must dare to do so. That ideal often creates even more pressure to succeed, to choose correctly, and to believe that the good and right thing is always to dare to love.”

...Sara needs to hear this.

I hang up, and something feels different.

Not because I suddenly know how to love.

But because someone finally said out loud the thing I have carried for years:

There is nothing wrong with me — I have simply been protecting myself.

And maybe...

I have protected myself so well that I never truly gave anyone the chance to stay.

Before ending the conversation, Anja calmly asks whether there is someone special in my life right now — whether I am dating someone.

And yes, I am.

In fact, this entire little project of mine began shortly after the start of a new romantic relationship with a man I met a month and a half earlier.

What a coincidence.

And because of that, I am also incredibly ready to try changing the patterns that, until now, have not worked for me at all.

Her final advice to me — and to you — is this:

“If he has started to matter to you, then talk to him about it. Talk about how this is something you can practice together.”

And I do.

Because that very evening, for the first time on my own initiative, I text him to say that I miss him.

It was a small act.
A message.

But it was also the first step away from running away.

And maybe...

The first step toward love.