Has something like this happened to you?...

You know by heart what they expect of you. The problem is that you no longer know what you really want.

That's why today's reflection touches this key that tells us sometimes we become very good at reading the environment. We know when to talk, what to keep quiet, how to like each other and even which version of ours works best with each person... I mean how to fit in?

And that may seem like security, but it can also hide years accommodating our identity to belong. And the moment comes, the meeting ends at home, everyone is happy and you, who cooked and attended to everyone, realize that you didn't even sit down to eat.

Sometimes it happens to us in life too because we are so attentive to what others need that we always leave it for later. I wonder at what point do we get used to leaving ourselves last?... We can spend so much time paying attention to what others need, expect or recognize from us, that one day we discover that we too stop paying attention to ourselves... Why?

Because there comes a time when no one has to ask us to change anymore. You do it one by yourself, automatically, before checking if it was really needed. And after so much learning to read everyone, we can end up not knowing how to read ourselves.

That's when we feel that there come those moments when feeling invisible has nothing to do with being alone. We can have a family, a partner, friends, co-workers. We can receive messages all day long, participate in conversations, solve problems, keep an eye on many people and still end up with a feeling that is difficult to explain: no one seems to notice how we are.

Maybe because we get used to being the one who can handle everything: the one who solves, the one who listens, the one who is responsible, the one who takes care, the one who always finds a way, the ambulance person everyone calls when something happens.

‎And when you occupy that place for a long time, others can get so used to what you do that they stop wondering how much it costs you to do it, but sometimes something even more important happens: you get used to it too.

You stop wondering how you are, you ignore the tiredness because you can still go on, you postpone what you want because someone needs something more urgent. And you start measuring your days by everything you managed to do, without wondering too much about how you felt while doing it.

Until one day you want someone to see us and we find out that we haven't looked at each other for a long time. We like to feel seen, the look of others matters to us. From our first links we build part of our identity through the recognition, the response and the validation we receive. The problem appears when that look becomes the only evidence that we are important.

Then we can start doing too much to get it: being indispensable, pleasing, overloading ourselves, seeking approval, needing someone to recognize our effort to feel that it was worthwhile.

And the reality is that growing up also involves building a personal perspective capable of saying: I know what I'm living, I know what I need and I know who I am even when no one else seems to notice.

We need others to see us, yes, but we also need to learn not to disappear from our own gaze.
‎

Janitze 🦋