Recently, in a bookshop, a total stranger told me the details of how she lost her beloved, how they met, and how she was certain he was sending her messages from beyond, and then she told me that I was an angel sent to heal her. I know I’m no angel, but if by listening she felt somewhat healed, then that is a gift I was happy to be able to give. I’m totally used to it; it’s been this way for so long I can’t recall when it wasn’t.

I’m one of those people that others find easy to confide in. It’s almost like I have a superpower, except I can’t control it and don’t know how to unleash it. Strangers at the grocery store will unburden on me. Cashiers checking me out will tell me their deep pains. Hairdressers doing my hair will find themselves revealing their innermost secrets. I’ve even had someone unload their childhood trauma while they were supposed to be giving me a job interview. Sometimes they catch themselves, and their expression often reads something like, what the f— am I doing? But most of the time, I just get thanked profusely.

My kids think it’s the weirdest thing ever. They get frustrated when their friends sit on the floor with me and tell me about their struggles at home or their self-confidence issues instead of going to the basement to be with them. My daughter especially gets upset when we’re out. Sometimes she attempts to patiently wait while listening to a stranger, but often she mutters “Here we go again,” and huffs off, always asking me later, “Why do they tell you all this?”

“I don’t know,” is what I answer, because I don’t. In paradox, I’m one of the most private people you can meet. I’m only writing this blog post after a writer friend of mine insisted for ohhh … the last several months that I open up, that I let my readers in. After all, if I want to get to know you, my future reader, then shouldn’t you get to know me?

I think though, that one of the reasons people do confide in me is because they sense genuine interest from me. I do care. The fact that they are a stranger to me makes little difference. I want them to find peace and contentment. I wish that for everyone on the planet. If we were all content and at peace, this world would be a different place.

Once our interaction ends, the stranger who made themselves vulnerable to me still knows nothing about me. Or maybe what they know is that I’m a good listener, and that I don’t judge, and that I have compassion and kindness in me. They know these things about who I am, but they know nothing about me. Their vulnerability is one-sided. And I think maybe that’s part of the beauty of these exchanges for me: they don’t feel threatened by revealing parts of themselves they normally keep hidden.

And I’m not talking about the ugly dark sides of ourselves, the mean or the nasty. I’m talking about the parts of ourselves we think weakens, demeans, or shames us. An adult abandoned as a child lives in shame. Having a drug-addict for a parent is shameful. Having dropped out of school is a failure. Having those parts of themselves met with compassion and understanding instead of judgment and disgust is maybe the real reason they unburden. But I still have no idea how they can they tell this is what they will get when they begin speaking to me. They probably don’t know either; the subconscious is likely at work.

In my classroom at school, I tell the kids we don’t need to insult and undermine others to make ourselves feel better. That what we need to do is listen to ourselves, because if we want to treat someone else poorly, it means we are feeling poorly. And that what truly needs attention is ourselves. A few heads nod in agreement, and some others aren’t listening to me at all, because well, I’m their teacher. The thing is, these strangers confiding in me, the eternal student, are also inadvertantly teaching me. They’re teaching me the importance of one-sided vulnerability and facing those parts of ourselves with compassion and tenderness. They’re teaching me the true power we can find in loving ourselves.