shame doesn't just just quiet you. it keeps you waiting.

and years later, you wonder why you feel behind.

I mean, it’s the whole point of shame, isn’t it,

to keep people like me (and maybe you) locked up? Frozen in time. Bound. Shying away from attention, from bringing light to the life you have lived. Never asking for what you need.

Shame doesn’t just quiet you. It buries you in place. Years pass, and you wake up wondering why you feel behind. Why you hesitate. Why you wait for permission that never comes.

It happens subtly, and I daresay, slowly. One moment, you are a child, moving wild and reckless with momentum, raw with possibility. Laughing loudly in a place where someone shushes you. Saying something honest, only to discover that you’d gone too far. And then, somewhere in your life, something in your story catches you and makes you look at yourself differently. An action. A word. A decision, or a misstep. Or someone else’s decision or mistake. A moment that told you, in no uncertain terms, that you were too much. Or not enough. Or wrong, untrustworthy, or dirty.

You learned the lesson so well that you stopped moving in the same way. Stopped reaching for what you deserve and stopped trusting your inner guidance.

I do this funny thing when I’m out and moving around a group of people I don’t know. Something renders me almost entirely silent. I do not like this about myself. I try my best to beat it, but sometimes it beats me. I nod and smile in (I think) the right places, but all my words have disappeared somehow. Somewhere in the back of the throat. Then someone asks if I’m alright, and I feel ridiculous.

I can tell the difference, now, between the silence I choose and the silence that settles on my head like a shroud and wraps around my thoughts, the silence that has become me. Thank God for writing (and for the fact that I get to read these notes aloud.) And you, reader. Thank God for you. I am happy that I kept writing after The Terrible. I’m happy about bone, and THE CATCH, and this Substack. My service is to truth, and our deep-dark inner worlds, and I am so lucky to have found my calling.

As I navigate these golden years, I am interested and fascinated, even in my own life, to see shame disguise itself as discipline, self-awareness, manners, and carefulness. It tells you You’re just being responsible. You’re just waiting for the right time. You’re just making sure you’re ready. But the right time never comes because shame is sneaky like that. It operates on weight. It keeps you out of practice. It keeps you quiet. Small. It keeps you still.

There is always a moment when you realize the walls around you are not real. Not only that…you were never locked inside. The hesitation wasn’t only wisdom but instead fear wearing its most convincing mask.

It’s not up to me to permit you, but if you were looking for a sign, the fact that I’m up in the small hours feeling somewhat compelled to write this might be it. Stretch into your space more and inhabit it. Get a little louder, maybe. Step forward even if you don’t feel ready. I will do some new stuff this year, dear reader, daring stuff…because life is calling for more, as it does, calling me to be visible in new and different ways, and I want to meet the challenge. I have to. Shame wants us good and quiet, but we were never meant for that.