the desire for connection often wars with the terror of being truly known. It's wild to think how much energy I used to spend meticulously crafting a 'me' that felt safe enough to present, a 'me' that wouldn't scare anyone off, while simultaneously aching for someone to just... see past it all. The exhaustion of that performance was almost as terrifying as the exposure itself, but now, the quiet courage of just being is a different kind of scary, in a good way, I think.