We’re Not Really Strangers opens the door to emotional vulnerability

Game starts real conversations between you and your friends

Image by: Curtis Heinzl
We’re Not Really Strangers is the perfect night-in game.

A group of emotional girls and a bottle of wine make for interesting conversations, to say the least, during We’re Not Really Strangers.

We’re Not Really Strangers is a conversation starter card game which aims to evoke under-the-surface level feelings and conversations. With you and a friend, or even a whole house worth of friends (up to 6 players), you can learn more about your peers and yourself.

Oftentimes, “getting to know” someone is confined to irrelevant surface-level questions—questions no one really cares about the answer to. Where did you grow up? What’s your favourite colour (this one is so dumb)? Do you have any pets? Etcetera, etcetera.

We’re Not Really Strangers goes way beyond these questions.

The game opens up a way to make meaningful connections with your peers on a three-level basis. The first level of the game explores how others view you, the second level gets a bit more personal, and the third nearly triggers a full-blown am-I-about-to-break-into-tears-mid-answer type question.

Questions range from “How are you, really?” to “What’s the most pain you’ve ever been in that wasn’t physical?” urging you to drop your inhibitions and expose a difficult time in your life to your friends.

Of course, some play this game without taking it too seriously. Their answer to the most painful experience question might be they don’t have one, or something trivial like their pet goldfish dying when they were six years old. Maybe that’s the case—and that’s okay.

Not everyone has had traumatic, unsettling experiences that have profoundly affected them. Or maybe, it’s difficult for them to drop their walls—they might struggle to connect with their emotions and understand them on a deeper level. Doing so can be very difficult.

Emotional vulnerability is not an easy task. To completely expose yourself and your feelings to the world, then sit back and listen to yourself honestly break down how experiences, people, and yourself have made you feel in the past can open a dark wormhole.

No one really wants to fall into their deepest thoughts and feelings. However, with practice, it’s possible to navigate properly. It’s hard, but everything’s hard without practice.

When you go to the gym and start to lift heavier, it’s not easy. Your body hurts the next day. It’s painful. But with practice and repetition of those heavier weights, the next day slowly starts to hurt less and less. At one point, those weights are no longer heavy.

That’s what being vulnerable feels like.

We’re Not Really Strangers does just that: it teaches you how to slowly open yourself up to emotional vulnerability. It gives you an opportunity to be in the company of your friends who can support you and help you through the process. With each new card and each new opportunity to be honest in conversation, you’re practicing understanding your thoughts and feelings.

Its honest nature is what makes this game so perfect for connecting to your feelings—as difficult as that may be. Believe it or not, it’s encouraging to see a bunch of your friends ugly cry, because you know they won’t judge you when you do the same thing.

Connecting to your feelings is so important for your mental health. It makes room in your brain and stops your negative experiences or feelings from piling up on you. Oftentimes, the reason you feel a crushing weight of stress is because you haven’t thought about your feelings.

Backing up, opening the wound, and examining why you feel the way you do can help you make better connections, both with yourself and your peers.

It’s not easy to play; it’s not easy to be vulnerable. But it’s so relieving. You feel supported, loved, and understood by the end of it—not only by your peers, but by yourself.

Tags

friends, game, Housemates, vulnerability

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