Confessions.
A quiet space for the truths I never meant to say aloud.
These are not essays.
Not proclamations.
Not polished thoughts crafted for applause.
They are fragments.
Moments.
Unfinished reckonings with the self.
Written not to impress, but to unburden.
This page is not a performance.
It is a mirror.
And sometimes, a wound.
Other times, a small opening where light gets in.
You’ll find here the things I’ve whispered to no one.
Things I almost deleted.
But something in me said :
“Keep this. Someone else may be wandering too.”
So if you’ve ever felt like a stranger to your own mind,
like you’ve lived too long inside a version of yourself that no longer fits — then welcome.
1/. A Memoir of The Performed Life
For most of my life, I lived as if on a stage, though there was no curtain, no applause, no audience I could ever clearly name. And yet, I performed.
Not in any grand, theatrical sense — but in the quiet, daily rehearsals of being who I thought I ought to be. A version of myself projected outward like a hologram : curated, consistent, commendable. Someone respectable. Someone wise. Someone who always had an answer, even when none existed.
It was never a lie, not exactly. More like a posture maintained for so long that the muscles forgot how to relax. A mask not worn to deceive, but to survive.
I believe, one of the deepest awakenings a person can have — the unsettling realization that much of what we call "life" is, in fact, performance. A performance so well-rehearsed over decades that the actor and the mask begin to blur.
Over the decades, I invested in this version of myself with the dedication of a craftsman. I built it with careful words, controlled emotions, a well-calibrated silence, and endless internal edits. But somewhere along the way, I began to serve it. My decisions became not about what I wanted, but what this projected self would do. I became an actor chasing the approval of an audience that only existed in my mind. And that, perhaps, is the most tragic illusion of all.
The fatigue crept in slowly. At first, it felt like restlessness. Then like weariness. Then, like a deep existential exhaustion — like running a race with no finish line, or climbing a staircase that only leads back to the ground floor. The self I had created became both sanctuary and cell.
Sustaining illusions is hard work. Becoming the caretakers of our own prisons is painful.
I began to notice that the fear of failure wasn’t fear of falling short in the world’s eyes. It was the fear of not living up to my own performance. I had set the stage so high, so constantly lit, that even a moment of darkness felt like disgrace. The pressure to remain consistent — to always be capable, insightful, driven — made me impulsive in the worst ways. I said yes when I wanted to say no. I chased goals that were never mine. I walked paths simply because I had once declared I would.
People’s perception of me — what they thought, or what I imagined they thought — became a noose I wore willingly. Their admiration was the drug. Their expectations, the dealer. But the addiction? That was mine alone.
At some point, the questions began to emerge, quietly at first, then louder :
Who am I when I stop performing?
What if I disappoint everyone I’ve trained to believe in this version of me?
What would it feel like to simply not care?
These weren’t nihilistic questions. They were invitations to freedom. But freedom, I’ve learned, is a terrifying thing — especially when you’ve built your identity on the scaffolding of stability and reputation.
And yet, there is something holy about collapse. Something tender in the unraveling. When the mask finally slipped, I didn’t vanish. I breathed. For the first time in decades, I allowed myself to fail gently. To be uncertain without scrambling for resolution. To speak without scripting. To be.
I’ve started small rebellions now. Saying "I don’t know". No more bearing disrespect for anymore. Because, dignity is not ego; it is the quiet flame of self-worth. And when that flame is smothered too long, a rightful revolt isn’t just permissible — it becomes necessary. Choosing silence when a clever remark would win admiration. Letting others misunderstand me — and not correcting them.
These aren’t acts of sabotage. They are acts of reclamation. Reclaiming the space to be real. Reclaiming the time to be tired. Reclaiming the joy of not always being composed.
In hindsight, I see that the false self wasn’t evil. It was a shield I forged when the world seemed too noisy, too demanding, too uncertain. But shields grow heavy. And no one can carry one forever.
So I’m learning, slowly, to live unarmored.
I am not the self others believe me to be.
I am not even the self I believed myself to be.
I am the space beneath the performance. The silence beneath the applause. The breath between the roles.
And maybe, just maybe, that is enough.
One doesn’t need to have the answers. He only needs to stop running from the questions.
2/. What I Couldn’t Answer, and Why That Set Me Free?
There came a moment when even the questions felt too heavy.
I stared at them — not as prompts, but as mirrors I couldn’t face : Who am I when no one is watching? What values have I been living that are not truly mine? What would it mean to fail gracefully? If I stopped performing, who would leave, and who would stay?
I had no answers.
And for a time, that absence terrified me. It felt like standing on the edge of a cliff with no footing beneath, just wind and silence and an unnamed vertigo. But slowly — imperceptibly at first — that emptiness stopped being threatening. It started to feel sacred.
The truth is, I didn’t have answers because I had never made room for them. My life was filled with noise, projection, anticipation. Always acting, never pausing. So how could the real me have spoken, even if he wanted to?
That’s when I realized : Not knowing is not failure. It’s the beginning of freedom.
When I stopped trying to answer the questions, I began to live them. I started observing myself with a gentler gaze. I noticed what made me light up when no one was looking. I noticed the values I defended but didn’t feel. I noticed how deeply I feared being misunderstood — not because it hurt, but because it shook the illusion I’d been selling.
Not having answers allowed space for truth to seep in — not all at once, but like light through the cracks of an old house. Quiet, golden, healing.
And so, I embraced a new rhythm — reflection, not interrogation. A slow return to the essence beneath the mask.
3/. My Mind Had Forgotten How To Land
One day, I realized, I was drifting through the digital landscape like a ghost. Skimming titles, grazing headlines, scrolling past meaning as if it were too heavy to hold.
I used to think I was searching for information. Now I suspect I’m seeking connection — just not the kind that lights up a screen. The kind that lights up the soul.
I scrolled like someone flipping through a book they don’t remember picking up, unsure whether they’re looking for a sentence or an escape. The pages blurred. The thoughts evaporated. And at the end of it, I was fuller with noise, but emptier in knowing.
My mind forgot how to land.
It glided. It hovered. It touched down only briefly before taking off again. Restless. Hungry. Half-hoping the next scroll will feed something deeper. But it rarely did.
It’s not that I lacked discipline. It’s that I’d spent years being conditioned into immediacy. Speed had become my breath. Skimming, my thinking. Efficiency, my theology.
But I wanted to come home again — to a mind that lands. To a gaze that lingers. To a heart that listens longer than a swipe.
So I’ve begun small acts of return : One thingy at a time. One article read fully. One deep breath before the click. One quiet refusal to scroll when I feel most lost.
Because I now know : meaning does not live in speed. And wisdom does not survive the skim.
Attention is not a resource. It is a relationship. And I intend to make it sacred again.
I want a mind that lands like a bird — graceful, intentional, silent. And stays for a while. Long enough to notice. Long enough to feel. Long enough to become whole again.
I have shelves — both physical and digital — filled with unread books, bookmarked essays, articles saved for a day that never arrived.
They were not hoarded mindlessly. Each one was a signal of something that touched me, even if fleetingly. A line that resonated. A headline that hinted at an answer. A promise of future wisdom.
But that future never came.
I told myself I’d return. That one day I’d have time, clarity, stillness. That I would sit down and drink from this well of deferred insight. But I never did. The act of saving became the act itself.
Why? Because reading is not just intellectual — it’s emotional. To read deeply is to risk being changed. And in a life curated by performance, change is dangerous. It threatens the architecture.
So I collected. Not as a scholar, but as a seeker too afraid to kneel at the altar.
But I see now — the library I built but never entered is not a failure. It’s a map of the person I longed to become. Every saved link, every unopened book was a breadcrumb on the trail to the life I was too distracted, too exhausted, too armored to live.
And now, I open the door. One book. One page. One thought at a time. Not to conquer knowledge — but to let it dissolve what no longer serves.
To stop saving for later. And start living now.
4/. The Silence I Now Trust
There was a time I always had something to say. An answer. A theory. A defense. A polished truth ready to go. I filled silence like it was a crack in the wall. I spoke to be heard. I explained so I wouldn’t be misunderstood. I argued, not always to win, but to be seen.
But something in me has quieted now. Lately, I find myself letting things pass. Letting people misread me. Letting misunderstandings walk by like strangers in a crowd.
Not because I’ve stopped caring. But because I’ve stopped needing to control how I am received. I no longer crave to be clarified. I no longer beg to be believed. I no longer chase the comfort of being agreed with.
There is a peace in that. A silence I now trust.
I no longer complain. I no longer explain. Not because I’ve grown cold, but because I’ve grown whole. There’s a wisdom in letting the world misinterpret you. Not every misreading needs correction. Not every accusation needs a rebuttal. Not every silence is a void — it can be a shield.
I don’t want to convince anyone of who I am. I don’t want to perform my pain. I don’t want to beg for understanding that would come tainted, conditional, or late.
I just want to be. And let being speak for itself.
There’s a sacred dignity in not answering. There’s power in not reacting. There’s liberation in being misunderstood and still choosing peace.
This silence is not withdrawal. It’s alignment.
It’s knowing that truth, unforced, will remain true. Even when no one applauds it. Even when no one understands it. Even when no one stays to listen.
This is the silence I now trust. Not as absence, but as arrival.
5/. Freedom from The Worry of Being Seen
There came a day when I looked around and saw masks — not just on others, but in the air between us. Layers of performance, projection, survival. And I saw my own mask too — not as a lie, but as a habit. An inherited way of being that once protected me, but had since become a prison.
And then something broke open.
I realized : everyone is wearing a mask.
Not because they are deceitful, but because they are afraid. Afraid of being seen and not accepted. Afraid of being ignored. Afraid of being known too well — or not at all.
Everyone is carrying their own private chaos. Their own stitched-together stories. Their own invisible wars.
Most people do not have time to judge me. They are too busy trying not to fall apart themselves.
And suddenly, it all simplified.
The weight of being watched? Gone.
The imagined audience in my head? Disbanded.
The tightrope walk of self-image? Cancelled.
Because now I see — everyone is just trying to hold their mask in place. Everyone is performing to survive the day. Everyone is far more concerned with how they are seen than with how they see me.
And my hyper-consciousness of being perceived, judged, evaluated — it became laughable. Not in a mocking way, but in the way a child finally laughs at a shadow that once seemed monstrous.
This realization didn’t make me reckless. It made me gentle.
Gentle with others, because I know they’re scared. Gentle with myself, because I’ve been scared too.
This is the truth that loosened the grip of anxiety :
They are not watching you as closely as you think. And if they are, it says more about their need than your worth.
So I stopped performing. Not all at once. But in layers.
I let some silence fall in conversations. I stopped rehearsing my next sentence while someone else was still speaking. I let myself be misunderstood without urgently correcting it.
And I felt lighter. Not because life got easier. But because I stopped carrying everyone’s gaze as if it were my burden.
Now, I live a little more freely. A little more truthfully. A little more invisibly, in the best possible way.
Because the realization that freed me is this :
Most of us are too busy holding up our masks to ever truly see yours. And so, you might as well take yours off — and breathe.
Thanks for dropping by !