Knowing How to Self-Disclose

Being vulnerable and open with your participants is vital to forming a relationship that will have a positive impact. Also, over-sharing and failing to hold space for participants can be inappropriate and break trust. In a recent Mentor Professional Development, Program Manager Brian discussed with mentors ways to navigate the sometimes tricky balance of being open and vulnerable with sharing appropriately as a BYEP mentor.

  • What does it mean to self-disclose?

  • Can you think of a time at BYEP when you had an opportunity to self-disclose? What was that situation? What did you do? Is there something you wish you did differently looking back?

  • Have you ever had a time when anyone overshared with you? How did you know that is was inappropriate?

Pros and cons of self-disclosing:

  • Pros:

    • Offering a relatable experience to someone

    • Offering real vulnerability and a chance to connect

  • Cons:

    • Come across as unprofessional

    • Come across as self-absorbed and not able or willing to hold space for a participant

    • The participants may judge you and they may feel uncomfortable

A few rules of self-disclosure to keep in mind:

  1. We are here to keep participants safe first and foremost, and setting boundaries in our mentor role is vital to being able to do that.

  2. Use self-disclosure sparingly - you should not find yourself self-disclosing big things every workshop. In general, you should not be talking about yourself that often with participants.

  3. Know how much you are willing to share before self-disclosing something big. Think about what questions you are not comfortable answering.

  4. Don’t share about things that are unresolved or overly sensitive for you.

  5. If you sense yourself sharing in order to seem cool or to portray yourself in a certain way, consider rethinking sharing.

Being in a group with participants at BYEP is a close connection. In many close relationships like this, we are used to have an equal exchange of emotion and information. In the mentor role at BYEP, there is still emotional closeness, but the participants should almost never be holding space for mentors.

Thank you for your continued support of our participants and commitment to our program! Here’s a look at what we’ve been getting up to:

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