"Why are you hiding in plain sight?"
Sunday Letter #24
“Why are you hiding in plain sight?” Her words — her question — immediately struck me. I was on my way home from work, listening to Beyond the Self, a podcast by Africa Brooke (someone I greatly admire) — specifically, to episode #55 “Why are you hiding in plain sight?”.
“To be able to build intimacy with yourself and other people and the world around you, you have to be willing to take emotional risks. And that means communicating in a braver way. It doesn’t mean say whatever the fuck you want and not take other people’s boundaries into account and not take the context of the situation into account — no. But it does mean you need to be braver than you’re currently being. That you need to stop … agreeing with things that you don’t actually agree with.”
Africa Brooke
Growing up, I was extremely shy. When I was in elementary school, middle school, high school — heck, even early college (18-20 years old) to a certain extent — I tried to hide. In my classes, I would sit in the back (corner seats, never center), I would almost never raise my hand if I had a question about something, and I hardly ever volunteered to read out loud, answer the teacher/professor’s questions to the class, or go up to the board to solve something. I hated — and absolutely dreaded — the “get to know you/ice breaker” activities of the first day of class where you’d introduce yourself and tell everyone a fun fact about yourself. If I could have, I would’ve opted instead to bury myself in a small hole (at the back of the class, of course).
Now, some people may be surprised to read this — especially people who knew me in college — because I seemed to be able to talk to many people, and know how to [somewhat] navigate my way between different groups of people. During my first year of college, I remember someone telling me he saw me as an extrovert, as a “social butterfly.” What? I had thought. Really? I felt the complete opposite of that; an introvert through and through (I’ve been an INFJ according to the Myers-Briggs test for the past decade), and someone who had near-crippling anxiety, but hid it very well.
There goes the hiding again.
A lot of things led to my wanting to hide growing up: low self-worth, extreme self-consciousness, wanting to fit in, fear of abandonment, not wanting to “rock the boat” with what I did or said for fear that people would leave me, not wanting to look “weird” or “strange” to others, and more. Some of these fears still come up from time to time, though not as strongly as they once did (thank you shadow work + shadow integration).
But they do appear. Especially lately.
Should I post this? Should I write this? What will people think of me? My friends? This doesn’t fit today’s mainstream societal narrative… What if people abandon me? What if they misinterpret what I’m trying to say? I’m going to be ostracized. Will I be okay if I say this? These are all things that I have thought to myself these past couple of years — though mostly this year. There have been times that I’ve posted things on my IG stories that I felt nervous to share, and there have been times that I chose not to express my thoughts and feelings on certain topics. It’s been both a struggle and an eye-opening, mind-strengthening, and heart-expanding experience.
One that I’ve not quite mastered — but am not giving up on.
I can feel it breathing, I thought to myself. There I was, at the end of Vista Trail, sitting on the red rocks of Boynton Canyon (seen above). I was with two other people, and we had reached the end of our hike. As they were taking in the view, I sat on the rocks, put my hands on the cool stone, and looked around me in amazement and awe. I have never felt, anywhere else, such peace before. Everything was still, and everything felt vibrantly alive. The cliffs, the rocks, the trees, the plants, and the earth. A sudden, yet extremely gentle, wave of lightness, groundedness, and cleansing peace flowed through me as I sat there and breathed in the cool air. I felt, in that moment, everything breathing. I felt the canyon breathing.
In one of her recent videos, Jonna Jinton describes going to what she calls the Humming Mountains in Sweden and her experience there — which I very much resonate with, as it is incredibly similar to my own experience in Sedona. “I started sensing something… It was as if I, for the first time in my life, could feel that the mountains in front of me was alive. When I stood there, on that rock, it was as if I felt how the mountains were sending out some kind of frequency … as if the mountains were humming … I felt the sound inside of me. I felt the vibrations of the sound.”
“I understand if some of you think I’m ‘woo-woo’ — crazy. And it’s okay if you think that.” I, now, have been starting to feel this way too, about my own experiences — like when I felt the canyon breathing. Still, though, there is a tiny voice within me, calling me a “freak” for having felt that. I know what that voice is; it’s a part of me — my inner teenager — that wants to protect me, that is afraid that people will leave me (will leave her) if they find out how “strange” I am, and that just wants to be accepted. She wants to belong, and she wants to be cherished. She wants to be loved. And so, as I give her all the love that she deserves, I tell her that she is safe to show others her true self. That I’ll protect her, and that I’ll always be here for and with her, every step of the way. I won’t hide anymore.
Africa Brooke’s podcast episode was phenomenal. I had to listen to it more than once. Here are a few quotes that really stood out to me, though all that she had to say was incredibly powerful:
“A lot of us are hiding in plain sight. And … it breaks my heart, it breaks my heart. Because this is where self-censorship comes in. Where you’re presenting yourself to be a certain way in the world, but it’s actually causing you a lot of pain. Because you’re never giving yourself the opportunity to say what you truly think, you’re never giving yourself the opportunity to strengthen your critical thinking muscles, you’re not giving yourself the opportunity to take emotional risks.”
“Stop agreeing with things that you don’t actually agree with. You don’t have to deny reality just because other people are. And there can be very smart and compassionate, tactful ways to do that. We have this idea that it’s an “all or nothing,” to express yourself bravely means saying whatever the fuck you want, or you just don’t say anything at all. And you keep the peace. But is it really keeping the peace when you’re causing such internal chaos within yourself?”
“Visibility is how you hold yourself internally, and then it projects itself outwardly. Being visible is a decision that you have to make within yourself, but it’s happening regardless. And how you communicate is directly tied to visibility. How you allow for your beliefs and your opinions and your ideas to be expressed in the world is directly tied to your relationship with your own visibility.”
“For a lot of us, we’re afraid. ‘If I become too visible, I will come across more people that disagree with me, and that will make me very uncomfortable.’ ‘I will come across people that might label me as insert-whatever-insult-here.’ ‘I will be rejected.’ ‘People will reject my ideas.’ ‘I will be criticized constantly.’ ‘I will be seen as the bad person.’ There are so many stories and internal chatter that support the visibility fears that we have … So many of us are so conflict-avoidant that we won’t allow ourselves to be visible in the way that we truly want to be.”
May we all have the courage to show our true selves to ourselves, to others, and to the world. I hope you’ve had an incredible weekend, and I wish you a very restful, joy-filled, and fulfilling week ahead. Don’t forget to take care of yourself — whether that be listening to (and maybe dancing to?) your favorite song, spending extra time in the shower, buying yourself a bouquet of flowers, or taking five minutes a day to be still, ground yourself, and take some deep, expansive breaths.
You deserve it.
All my love,
Christina
Africa Brooke’s Beyond the Self - Episode #55 “Why are you hiding in plain sight?”
Jonna Jinton’s newest video ♡.
Bai-Terek’s and Urmat Kurkaev’s performance of Altai throat singing.
Sunset Meditation handpan music - Malte Marten.
“The wound is the place where the light enters you.” Quote by Sufi mystic and 13th-century poet Rumi.