Many people feel a profound sense of shame for the difficult circumstances and seasons they’ve been through that cause them to feel damaged and broken. They feel humiliated about being in a situation that made them fall apart and have a need to put themselves back together. They want to hide those parts of their story. They might be willing to remember the lessons they learned from the hard times, but tend to gloss over the broken season where they felt lonely or scared or suffered through grief or depression.

Those universal feelings are regarded as weak, and society tells us they should remain hidden. Yet those feelings are the cords that really connect us. When someone takes a risk and shares their story with you, that identification affects your heart, and you don’t feel so much shame about your own story. C. S. Lewis once said, “Friendship is born at the moment…